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At Memorial, Obama Urges Action Against Racism and Anti-Semitism A Last Bout of Diplomacy in Israel, Then on to Jordan for Obama
(about 1 hour later)
JERUSALEM — After rekindling the eternal flame and laying a wreath at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial, a solemn President Obama spoke on Friday of a collective “obligation not just to bear witness but to act” against racism “and especially anti-Semitism” as he wrapped up his three-day visit here with a trio of symbolic pilgrimages. JERUSALEM – President Obama prepared to fly from Israel to Jordan on Friday afternoon, where he is likely to confront pressure to help this financially-strapped country cope with a desperate tide of refugees from Syria.
“We have the choice to ignore what happens to others or to act on behalf of others,” Mr. Obama said after a tour of the museum and a brief memorial service. It is Mr. Obama’s first visit to an Arab state since the Middle East erupted in unrest two years ago, toppling leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen, and plunging Syria, Jordan’s neighbor, into civil war. He is scheduled to hold talks with King Abdullah later on Friday.
“Our sons and daughters are not born to hate, they are taught to hate,” he added. “The state of Israel does not exist because of the Holocaust but in the survival of a strong Jewish state of Israel the Holocaust will never happen again.” Before leaving Israel, Mr. Obama played the role of icebreaker in a long-simmering feud between Israel and Turkey, facilitating a phone call between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a senior administration official said.
The remarks were Mr. Obama’s only scheduled public comments in Israel in a day filled with poignant gestures. He began by laying stones on the graves of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism, and Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli prime minister assassinated in 1995 while on the brink of making peace. Friday afternoon, he visited the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, the biblical birthplace of Jesus, before heading on to Jordan. In a statement issued just before Air Force One took off from Tel Aviv, Mr. Obama welcomed the call, saying, “The United States deeply values our close partnerships with both Israel and Turkey, and we attach great importance to the restoration of positive relations between them in order to advance regional peace and security.”
A windstorm forced Mr. Obama to modify his travel plans to reach Bethlehem. Initially he was to fly by helicopter. Instead, he traveled in a motorcade — a change welcomed by Palestinian officials since it meant that Mr. Obama would have to pass directly by Israel’s separation barrier. Israel and Turkey had cultivated close ties, but relations between them broke down in 2010 after Israeli commandos raided a Turkish ship that was attempting to break the Israeli blockade on Gaza, resulting in nine deaths. Recently, Mr. Erdogan drew harsh criticism for saying that Zionism was a “crime against humanity.”
After a bold, soaring speech Thursday afternoon encouraging Israel’s younger generation to press its leaders into action on the peace process, which many analysts saw as critical of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s handling of it so far, President Obama met for two hours over lunch with Mr. Netanyahu on Friday. A senior Israeli official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to do so said the two men again discussed a range of regional security issues, and that on the Palestinians, Mr. Netanyahu “stressed it’s crucial that the security component gets the attention it deserves.” Diplomacy aside, Mr. Obama spent his last day in Israel making pilgrimages to symbols of the Holocaust, modern Zionism, the Middle East peace process, and Christianity. In coming here, Mr. Obama has traded symbolism for a still-unfolding crisis in Syria.
Mr. Netanyahu’s spokesman, Mark Regev, told foreign reporters on Friday that the Israeli leadership was pleased with President Obama’s call for resuming negotiations without preconditions, and said that Mr. Netanyahu was ready to do so immediately. But he acknowledged that the visit had not shifted Israel’s position or provided a new framework for action. About 3,000 refugees a day are fleeing into Jordan, swelling the ranks of Syrian refugees to 460,000, equivalent to nine percent of the kingdom’s population. That has put a heavy strain on the Jordanian economy, which is only partly offset by aid from the United States.
“We want to see a peace process where both sides are playing a part to move the process forward, we want to see a process that is a two-way street,” Mr. Regev said. “It can’t just be that one side makes demands and the other side makes concessions. That’s a one-way street. Jordan is seeking increased aid from European and Gulf states, which have lagged the United States in their support. Given a potential pool of three million four million refugees in southern Syria, Jordanian officials fear the daily influx could swell to as much as 50,000.
“We’re ready,” he added. “The question is: is the Palestinian leadership?” Mr. Obama’s speech in Jerusalem, in which he appealed to younger Israelis to prod their leaders to pursue peace with the Palestinians, was warmly received in Jordan, where the king has been a steadfast, if somewhat despairing, advocate for the two-state solution.
Noting that Secretary of State John Kerry was expected to return to Jerusalem on Saturday night for further talks, Mr. Regev said, “I think we’re going to see immediate follow-up.” As he wrapped up his visit to Israel Friday, Mr. Obama eschewed politics for more universal themes.
Israeli newspapers were enthusiastic on Friday about the president’s visit, saying the nation had fallen for him, but cautioning that his prescription for peace would not be easy to follow. Three newspapers used his declaration in Hebrew — “You are not alone” — as a front-page banner headline. After rekindling the eternal flame and laying a wreath at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in the morning, a solemn Mr. Obama spoke of a collective “obligation not just to bear witness but to act” against racism “and especially anti-Semitism.”
“The most powerful man in the world arrived in the most threatened state in the world to promise love,” columnist Ari Shavit wrote in the left-leaning Haaretz. “He gave us love every single second, in every speech and in every gesture.” “Our sons and daughters are not born to hate, they are taught to hate,” Mr. Obama said. “The state of Israel does not exist because of the Holocaust but in the survival of a strong Jewish state of Israel the Holocaust will never happen again.”
But Mr. Shavit cautioned that “one cannot ignore the naïveté of Obama’s speech.” The remarks were Mr. Obama’s only scheduled public comments in Israel on a day filled with poignant gestures. He began by laying stones on the graves of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism, and Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli prime minister and peacemaker assassinated in 1995.
“The president must still prove that the peace he promises can actually be implemented,” he wrote. In the afternoon, he visited the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, the biblical birthplace of Jesus. A windstorm forced Mr. Obama to modify his travel plans to reach Bethlehem.
Palestinians, by contrast, were mostly disappointed. The president’s scheduled provided for only brief sojourns in their territory on Thursday and Friday, prompting some to say they felt like an afterthought. Others recoiled from Mr. Obama’s frequent use of Hebrew; his suggestion that he no longer sees a settlement freeze as crucial to restarting peace talks; and from his repeated testimony to the United States’ eternal friendship with the nation they see as an enemy. With his helicopter grounded, he traveled by motorcade — a change welcomed by Palestinian officials since it meant he would have to pass directly by Israel’s separation barrier.
“President Obama is eating, sleeping and chatting with people in Israel while he is spending few hours with Palestinian politicians,” said Said Kamal, a shopkeeper in Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority government in the West Bank, where Mr. Obama met Thursday with President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. “This visit will result in nothing for the Palestinians.” Outside the church, Mr. Obama, accompanied by the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, was welcomed by about 20 children in white shirts and dark pants, waving American and Palestinian flags.
Mirvat Mohammad, 47, said that “America considers us as terrorists, therefore we will get nothing from this visit.” And Mohammad Haj Yassin, an architect, said that “since the last visit of the previous president, more land was confiscated, the U.S. administration did nothing about it.” Mr. Obama also had lunch Friday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a day after a speech that many analysts saw as harshly critical of Mr. Netanyahu’s handling of the peace process.
Yousef Munayyer, executive director of the Jerusalem Fund and Palestine Center, based in Washington, was one of several analysts critical of Mr. Obama’s speech for presenting “peace as a choice Israelis might make instead of an obligation they must fulfill.” Israeli newspapers were enthusiastic about the visit, saying the nation had fallen for Mr. Obama, but cautioning that his call for peace would not be easy to follow. Three newspapers used his declaration in Hebrew — “You are not alone” — as a front-page banner headline.
“Reading between the lines, this speech suggests that President Obama will do little more than pay lip service to an outcome he refuses to put the muscle of his office behind,” Mr. Munayyer said. “He has told Israelis that the U.S. will stand by Israel regardless of what choices it makes — even if that choice continues to be perpetual occupation. That is, to say the least, unbecoming of the leader of the free world.” “The most powerful man in the world arrived in the most threatened state in the world to promise love,” columnist Ari Shavit wrote in the left-leaning Haaretz. “He gave us love every single second, in every speech and in every gesture.” But Mr. Shavit cautioned that “one cannot ignore the naivete of Obama’s speech.”
In Bethlehem Friday afternoon, Mr. Abbas accompanied President Obama to the darkened, gilded sanctuary of the famous church, under dozens of gold lamps. The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III, welcomed Mr. Obama to the “place where heaven and Earth meet.” Palestinians, by contrast, were mostly disappointed. Some recoiled from Mr. Obama’s frequent use of Hebrew; his suggestion that he no longer sees a settlement freeze as crucial to restarting peace talks; and from his repeated testimony to the United States eternal friendship with the nation they see as an enemy.
“We welcome you as a messenger of peace and reconciliation,” the patriarch said. Quoting the Beatitudes, he added, “Blessed are the peacemakers.” “President Obama is eating, sleeping and chatting with people in Israel while he is spending few hours with Palestinian politicians,” said Said Kamal, a shopkeeper in Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority government in the West Bank, where Mr. Obama met Thursday with Mr. Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.
At Yad Vashem earlier, the president was flanked as he has been for much of the time since he landed in Israel Friday by Mr. Netanyahu and by President Shimon Peres, who presented him with Israel’s Medal of Distinction at a state dinner Thursday night. He was also accompanied by Yisrael Meir Lau, a Holocaust survivor who is chief rabbi of Tel Aviv, and Avner Shalev, the museum’s director. Mirvat Mohammad, 47, said, “America considers us as terrorists; therefore we will get nothing from this visit.” Mohammad Haj Yassin, an architect, said that “since the last visit of the previous president, more land was confiscated; the U.S. administration did nothing about it.”
They first visited the Hall of Names, a huge dome filled with photographs and dossiers describing the individuals who perished, then the Hall of Remembrance. Yousef Munayer, executive director of the Washington-based Jerusalem Fund and Palestine Center, was one of several analysts critical of Mr. Obama’s speech for presenting “peace as a choice Israelis might make instead of an obligation they must fulfill.”
On Friday morning, Mr. Obama was flanked, as he has been for much of the time since he landed in Israel Wednesday, by Mr. Netanyahu and by President Shimon Peres, who presented him with Israel’s Medal of Distinction at a state dinner Thursday night.
At Yad Vashem, the group first visited the Hall of Names, a huge dome filled with photographs and dossiers describing the individuals who perished, then the Hall of Remembrance.
Wearing a white skullcap, Mr. Obama arranged the wreath of red, white and purplish-blue flowers on a stone slab covering ashes of Holocaust victims, then stayed in a low crouch for a moment, head bowed. As a cantor sang the Jewish memorial prayer, “Eyl moleh rahamim,” the president kept his head low and occasionally closed his eyes.Wearing a white skullcap, Mr. Obama arranged the wreath of red, white and purplish-blue flowers on a stone slab covering ashes of Holocaust victims, then stayed in a low crouch for a moment, head bowed. As a cantor sang the Jewish memorial prayer, “Eyl moleh rahamim,” the president kept his head low and occasionally closed his eyes.
In his remarks, Mr. Obama noted that he had been to the Buchenwald concentration camp and to the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland, and that this was his second visit to Yad Vashem, having come as a presidential candidate in 2008.
“We can come here a thousand times and each time our hearts would break,” Mr. Obama said. “Here we see the depravity to which man can sink. We see how evil can, for a moment in time, triumph, when good people do nothing.”“We can come here a thousand times and each time our hearts would break,” Mr. Obama said. “Here we see the depravity to which man can sink. We see how evil can, for a moment in time, triumph, when good people do nothing.”
But he said because the museum also tells the story of rescuers, “this accounting of horror is a source of hope.But he said because the museum also tells the story of rescuers, “this accounting of horror is a source of hope.
“We always have choices, to succumb to our worst instincts” and “to be indifferent to suffering,” Mr. Obama added, “or to display empathy that is at the core of our humanity.”“We always have choices, to succumb to our worst instincts” and “to be indifferent to suffering,” Mr. Obama added, “or to display empathy that is at the core of our humanity.”
Rabbi Lau, 75, told the story of his liberation from Buchenwald on April 11, 1945, by American forces, recounting the disbelief in the barracks when a chaplain entered and shouted in Yiddish, “'Jews, you are free.'”
“This is the opportunity to thank you, to thank the American people, who came finally,” Mr. Lau said. Saying that one of the liberators apologized to him decades later for coming too late, the rabbi said to President Obama, “Yesterday you promised us that we are not alone. Don’t be too late.”

Khaled Abu Aker contributed reporting from Ramallah, West Bank, and Mark Landler from Tel Aviv.

Khaled Abu Aker contributed reporting from Ramallah, West Bank, and Mark Landler from Tel Aviv.