The Thessaloniki Holocaust Museum will express the international message of "Never Again," Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said during an event to lay the Museum's foundation stone.
The event was jointly attended by Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipra and Rivlin said that the Holocaust "is not just a Jewish issue - it is a global issue, and here in Greece it is a Greek issue as well, a national issue."
The museum that will be built here will provide a podium for the expression of the rich, varied and unique history of Greek Jews, especially those of Thessaloniki, the Israeli president said. The museum "ought to become a witness of our obligation to build a world that will truly shout, Never Again!," he noted.
The Israeli president referred to the Jewish community's history in the city and thanked the Greek state leaders, the German government, and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation for their contribution to the museum's creation.
The museum will be built on the old railroad grounds, from where the train carriages transported Greek Jews to the Nazi concentration camps. Of the 50,000 Jews deported, only 1,950 returned after WWII.
In his address, Tsipras said that "nobody has been forgotten, neither the criminals, nor the victims" and that the Museum will express "a constant reminder to the present and future generations as to the lengths that fascism, Nazism, anti-Semitism and racism" can go and the theories they can promulgate about separating human beings amond "higher and lower races" and promoting "ethnic purity".
