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Source: http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Rivlin-welcomes-two-heads-of-state-to-Israel-427466
Israel Welcomes Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite
(Jerusalem Post) Greer Fay Cashman - Israeli President Reuven Rivlin on Monday welcomed Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite, who is in Israel to participate in the Lithuanian Global Economic Forum, which is being held in Israel for the first time. Grybauskaite spoke of her many Jewish friends and how shocked she had been as a student in St. Petersburg to see the city emptied of its Jews when they were permitted to leave for Israel. She said that she is also in Israel "to acknowledge our history." Though Vilnius was known as the Jerusalem of Lithuania, she was well aware that there were some very shameful episodes in Lithuania's treatment of its Jews. She had first discovered this when she toured the Holocaust Museum in Washington and came across the section devoted to Lithuania. What she saw was entirely new to her and shocked her. Today, she said, Lithuanians have a more positive attitude toward Israel. As a member of the UN Security Council, Lithuania frequently defends Israel, a fact for which Rivlin voiced appreciation.