- April 13, 2026
- 4:00 pm
- Israel
By tradition, 6 Israelis who survived the Holocaust will light torches at the ceremony in memory of the 6 million murdered Jews.
On the evening of April 13, 2026, a state ceremony dedicated to the Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust and Heroism of the Jewish People will be held at the Yad Vashem memorial complex. In 2026, Yom HaShoah in Israel is observed on April 14, and the central state ceremony traditionally begins the evening before. This year’s focus is on the theme “The Jewish Family During the Holocaust“, and one of the main symbols of remembrance will once again be the lighting of six torches in honor of the six million murdered Jews.
For Israeli society, this is not just a memorial ritual on the calendar. It is a moment when the personal biographies of Holocaust survivors become part of the national conversation about memory, survival, repatriation, service to the country, and passing historical truth to future generations. It is particularly noteworthy that among those who will come to the torches at Yad Vashem are natives of Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland, Libya, Czechoslovakia, and Israel itself.
State Ceremony Yom HaShoah 2026: When It Will Take Place and What It Is Dedicated To
Theme of the Year — The Jewish Family During the Holocaust
This year’s state ceremony at Yad Vashem is dedicated to the theme “The Jewish Family During the Holocaust”. This is an important and powerful choice for the Israeli audience because the tragedy of the Shoah destroyed not only communities, cities, and countries, but above all families — parents, children, brothers, sisters, grandparents. Through family history, memory becomes not abstract, but extremely concrete and human.
From the stage, the names of people who went through ghettos, camps, death marches, the underground, wanderings, and post-war repatriation will be heard. Such stories in Israel are perceived not as an “archive”, but as a living foundation of national memory, especially in a society where many families have their own direct or indirect connection to the Holocaust.
Why the Ceremony Was Pre-recorded
In 2026, the event was pre-recorded at the Yad Vashem museum and will be broadcast on the evening of April 13 at 8:00 PM. This decision was made due to the war with Iran and in accordance with the instructions of the Home Front Command. Despite the ceasefire, the ceremony has not yet returned to its usual format. For Israel, this is another reminder that memory of the past and security issues in the present often find themselves side by side in the same public moment.
The ceremony will feature Yad Vashem Council Chairman Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, singers Roni Dalumi and Harel Skaat, actress Hadas Yaron, and the evening will be hosted by Miri Michaeli. But the emotional center of the event, as always, will not be the stage or the broadcast format, but the faces of the survivors.
Who Will Light the Six Torches of Remembrance at Yad Vashem
The first torch will be lit by Saadia Bahat, a native of Lithuania. His childhood was shattered by the Nazi army invasion, the Vilnius ghetto, the death of his parents, and subsequent camps in Estonia. Later, he ended up in Stutthof, miraculously survived, went through forced labor and a death march, and after liberation came to Mandatory Palestine. Already in Israel, he fought, received an education at the Technion, worked for many years at RAFAEL, and became a laureate of the Israel Prize in the field of security.
This is one of those biographies that resonate particularly strongly in the Israeli context: the journey from a persecuted Jewish boy in Europe to a person connected with the defense of the Jewish state.
The second torch will be lit by Mikhail Sidko, born in Ukraine. His family history passes through one of the most terrible symbols of the Holocaust in Eastern Europe — Babi Yar. There, before his eyes, his mother, little sister, and infant brother were killed. Mikhail himself and his brother managed to escape, and they were sheltered by Ukrainian neighbors, later recognized in Israel as Righteous Among the Nations. After the war, he served in the army, worked as an engineer, and in 2000 repatriated to Israel with his family.
For Israeli readers, this story is also important because it connects the tragedy of Eastern European Jewry, the memory of Babi Yar, the theme of rescue, and the late aliyah that brought a person from Ukraine to Israel already in adulthood.
The third torch will be lit by Miryam Bar-Lev, a native of Tel Aviv. Her family moved to the Netherlands, where after the Nazi occupation they went through the Westerbork and Bergen-Belsen camps. She survived hunger, humiliation, the death of her father, and the so-called “lost train”, liberated by the Soviet army in April 1945. After the war, Miryam returned to Eretz Israel, became a nurse, and worked for many years in the healthcare and education system.
The fourth torch is entrusted to Moshe Harari, a native of Poland, who survived the ghetto, escape to the forest, shelter with a peasant, post-war anti-Semitism, and the difficult journey to Mandatory Palestine through an internment camp in Cyprus. His entire subsequent life in Israel was connected with the defense industry.
The fifth torch will be lit by Ilana-Lina Falah, a native of Libya. Her story is especially significant because it reminds us that the Holocaust and the persecution of Jews affected not only Europe. Her family went through the Giado concentration camp, hunger, disease, the death of loved ones, and subsequent escape from pogroms. Already in Israel, Ilana built a new life, worked, and told others about the fate of Libyan Jews.
The sixth torch will be lit by Avigdor Neumann, a native of Czechoslovakia, born in a place that today is in the territory of Ukraine. He went through the ghetto, Birkenau, the loss of his family, a death march, a camp in Austria, and then the path of an illegal immigrant to Eretz Israel. Later, he participated in all of Israel’s wars and was wounded in the Yom Kippur War. Such a biography in the Israeli consciousness sounds like a concentrate of the entire era: the destruction of European Jewry, the struggle for return to the land of Israel, and personal participation in the defense of the state.
It is in such stories that NAnews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency sees the main meaning of Holocaust Remembrance Day: not only in mourning the dead but also in understanding the price survivors paid to reach Israel, create families, raise children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and then turn personal trauma into national memory.
Why These Biographies Are Important for Israel Today
Memory of the Holocaust — It’s Not a Past “Somewhere There”
Israel returns to these names every year not for formality. Behind each torch is not just the fate of one person, but an entire historical axis: Europe and North Africa, ghettos and camps, rescue and repatriation, the creation of the state and service to it after the Holocaust. Therefore, Yom HaShoah for Israeli society remains not a museum date, but part of the present.
This is especially felt against the backdrop of the fact that this year the ceremony takes place in conditions of regional tension and after decisions dictated by war. For a country that continues to live under threats, memory of the Holocaust is always connected not only with past pain but also with the modern question of Jewish security.
Who Else Will Speak at the Ceremony
On behalf of the Holocaust survivors, Haviva Burst, born in Poland, will speak. Her childhood went through the underground, shelters, the loss of her family, and solitary survival. After arriving in Mandatory Palestine, she became one of the founders of Kibbutz Tze’elim. The prayer “El Maleh Rachamim” will be read by Menachem Ne’eman, born in Romania, who survived the ghetto and later became a lawyer in Israel, deputy chairman of the district court in Haifa, and a lecturer in family law.
These details are as important as the torches themselves. They show that memory in Israel is not only a story about death but also a story about the continuation of life. About people who, after the Holocaust, did not disappear into the shadows of history but became builders of kibbutzim, fighters, engineers, judges, nurses, parents of large Israeli families.
This is the main meaning of the ceremony on April 13. The six torches at Yad Vashem are not only a symbol of six million. It is also a reminder that behind each name stood a family, and behind each survivor was a whole world that managed not only to survive but also to re-root in Israel.