|
Trending Topics
|
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/israel-outpouring-grief-death-elie-wiesel-40311230
Israelis Mourn Elie Wiesel as One of Their Own
(AP-ABC News) Aron Heller - Elie Wiesel never lived in Israel, but on Sunday the country mourned the death of the esteemed author and Nobel peace laureate as though it had lost a national icon. A frequent visitor who was fluent in Hebrew, Wiesel was a confidant of prime ministers and a towering cultural figure so revered that two premiers considered nominating him to be the country's ceremonial president. His enduring legacy of "Never Again" mirrored the psyche of a nation built on the ashes of the Nazi genocide of 6 million Jews. Wiesel's advocacy for Israel went far beyond Holocaust commemoration. Despite his close relationship with President Obama, he took out advertisements in four major newspapers in 2010 that criticized the Obama administration for pressuring the Netanyahu government to halt settlement construction in Jewish areas of east Jerusalem. "When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time," Wiesel wrote in the ad. "It is a homecoming."