Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi on Thursday led some 10,000 young Jews, Poles and Holocaust survivors in the March of the Living, an annual event held at the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
It was the first time an IDF commander has led the international program for Jewish teens.
Education Minister Yuli Tamir and Chelsea Football Club manager Avram Grant also participated in the event, which was held as Israel marked the annual Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day.
This year's march, the 17th, started with the blowing of the shofar, or ram's horn, at the iron gate - crowned with the words Arbeit Macht Frei, or Work Sets You Free - that leads into the former camp of Auschwitz.
Traditionally, participants carry white-and-blue Israeli flags and are led by some camp survivors on their two-mile trek between Auschwitz and Birkenau, another area of the camp that is the site of wooden barracks and ruins of the gas chambers.
The Kaddish - the Jewish prayer for the dead - will be said at a huge stone monument to the camp's victims at Birkenau.
At least 1.1 million people, including Jews, Poles and Roma, were killed in the camp's gas chambers or from starvation, disease and forced labor. The camp was liberated in January 1945 by Soviet troops.
On Wednesday, Ashkenazi spoke of the importance of stopping global military threats.
During an address former Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp on the second day of an official visit to Poland, Ashkenazi referred to the U.S. decision not to bomb the camp during World War II despite knowing of the horrors taking place there.
"And today, they don't know what is happening in Iran?" the IDF chief posed.
Olmert, Peres read out names of relatives killed in Holocaust
Earlier on Thursday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and President Shimon Peres read out the names of family members who were killed in the Holocaust, participating in a Knesset ceremony marking Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day.
Cabinet ministers, MKs and survivors of the World War II Nazi genocide also took part in the state ceremony.
Olmert listed the names of members of his wife Aliza's family who were killed in the Holocaust. Peres read out the names of his relatives who were killed, as did Defense Minister Ehud Barak for members of his mother's family.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni listed the names of women who fought against the Germans during the Second World War.
Earlier Thursday, a two-minute siren wailed nationwide at 10:00 A.M. to mark the day.
Traffic came to a total standstill as drivers stood next to their cars and pedestrians stopped walking, many of them standing to attention or with their heads bowed to remember the victims of the Holocaust.
Israel began marking the annual remembrance day at nightfall on Wednesday, in a ceremony at Yad Vashem where Olmert lashed out at Holocaust deniers.
"The voices of those who deny the Holocaust are also being heard. To them, the haters, the deniers, and all the conspirators of evil and to all of those who allow them to function within their realms, we say today: This shall never happen again," Olmert said.
The prime minister told the audience that, "Sixty-three years have passed since the Satanic factories of death of the Nazis and their collaborators seized to operate, yet with the passing of time, the dimensions of the Holocaust still remain beyond comprehension, unfathomably shocking, unacceptably chilling."
"Who would have believed that 63 years later, hatred of Jews and Israelis would rear its ugly head in so many different places around the globe, provocatively and venomously, inciting hatred?" he asked.
Earlier at the Yad Vashem ceremony, Peres called on world leaders to act against modern global threats to ensure that such events as the Holocaust never occur again.
The national commemoration began at 8 P.M. with a ceremony at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Center in Jerusalem. The ceremony opened with the lighting of torches and a series of speeches by Israeli leaders, including Peres, Olmert, and Yad Vashem Council chair Yosef Lapid, himself a Holocaust survivor.
Hundreds filled the main plaza on a cool evening to listen to the speeches, prayers and music, including a children's harmonica band founded by Shmuel Gogol, a survivor of the Warsaw ghetto.
Six survivors lit beacons during the solemn ceremony, commemorating the six million Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis.
Yad Vashem events:
Yosef v'Echad: Ethnic interpretations of traditional Holocaust memorial songs. The group will repeat their musical performance four times throughout the day.
Artwork Collage: Drawings by 1,500 elementary school children from across the spectrum of Israeli society will be displayed in the Family Square, opposite the International School for Holocaust Studies. Drawn following a course of study about the Holocaust, the 4-5th graders illustrated their feelings and thoughts via drawings.
'U'vacharta B'Chaim,' Photographic Exhibition. The exhibition is a tribute to survivors who volunteer to give testimony at the School. Each participant chose three photographs from his own personal album: a childhood photo (where possible), a photograph from the time of their immigration to Israel and one current photo, with their family in Israel.
'Us and the Holocaust' The exhibition includes graphic design posters by students at Shenkar College in Ramat Gan and ORT College in Jerusalem. The posters reflect a contemporary outlook as the graphic design students relate to the topic of the Holocaust.
Ceremony for youth movements with the participation of hundreds of youth and Holocaust survivors, addresses by Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev, Holocaust survivor Yisrael Aviram and a representative of the youth movements. With the participation of singer Ninet Tayeb, Nuri Koren of the Yad Vashem Project Muzika and the Youth Movement Choir, conducted by Adi Ron. Masters of Ceremony: Tom Avni and Eliana Bakier, held in conjunction with the Ministry of Education's Youth and Social Administration-Valley of the Communities.
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