This is a guest post by Jonathan Sacerdoti

Today is Yom Hashoah - the annual Jewish Remembrance Day for victims of the Holocaust. This annual day of remembrance was established In 1952 by the Knesset (Parliament) of the State of Israel.

While 27th January is the International Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust and other genocides, Jews have marked Yom Hashoah for more than 50 years, specifically to remember and honour the Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust. Every year, on the 27th day of Nissan (in Jewish lunar calendar), Jews around the world remember our six million brothers and sisters who were murdered, including the 1.5 million children. This date was chosen to recognise both the heroic resistance of the Warsaw Ghetto fighters which took place at this time in 1943, and the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, on this date in 1945.

This morning, around 400 people gathered in Hyde Park, at the site of the UK’s Holocaust Memorial, to take part in a short service of remembrance. We recited Kaddish for those who were killed, as well as psalms, poems and prayers both in Hebrew and English. A small choir from the Central Synagogue sung beautifully, and the readings were especially moving. The Shofar was sounded and six symbolic Memorial candles were lit -one for each million of our people who were killed – by survivors and refugees, accompanied by their children and grandchildren.

For me, the speech of the Israeli Ambassador, His Excellency Ron Prossor, was especially good. In it, he said: “We the Jewish people are a nation of survivors. The state of Israel is a living, breathing monument of our survival. Today there are those who continue to threaten our destruction. Even at the United Nations, president Ahmadinejad shamelessly promotes the evils of Holocaust denial. We can never allow malicious, evil and extreme ideas to remain unchallenged. Today as we remember the horrors of the past, we lay down our challenge to those who would attempt to recreate them. Just over a week from now we will celebrate Yom Haatzmaut, and Israel’s 62nd anniversary.

“Our tradition maintains a healthy balance between commemoration and celebration. This is a time for remembrance. We remember the past. We face the challenges of the future. We stand united as free people with a thriving state within our ancient homeland, ready, willing and able to defend our freedom.”

Also, the reading of Primo Levi’s Shema was extremely moving. If you have never done so, please read Levi’s book ‘Se questo è un uomo (If This Is a Man)’ as soon as possible.

For those who could not attend, I took some short videos of the proceedings, which I hope will help you mark the day privately wherever you are. Of course, if you can come to next year’s ceremony, I would strongly encourage you to do so. Next year Yom Hashoah will fall on 1st May. Please put the date in your diary, blackberry or iPhone right now, and join us in Hyde Park at the Holocaust Memorial garden. The ceremony will be about an hour long, and will start at  at 11.00am.

Let us never forget. As the years go on, remembrance becomes all the more important, and also increasingly difficult: soon the survivors will all be dead. As the son of a survivor, I am lucky to be alive myself, and also to have the opportunity to hear his story again and again, and to engage with it. The Holocaust period was a time of incredible evil, but also one which prompted acts of incredible goodness from certain people. Thanks to the selflessness and kindness of a collection of exemplary people, my father and much of his family were saved from death. I owe my existence to those who risked their own lives to save him, and for me, remembrance is as much about them as it is about the millions of victims.

It gives me great pride on this saddest of days, to be able to say עם ישראל חי.

You can see more videos from the event here.