On April 18, Israel celebrates Yom Ha-Shoah (Hebrew: יומהשואה), the Day of Catastrophe and Heroism of European Jewry, Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is a national day of remembrance for the approximately six million Jews who were exterminated by Nazi Germany and its allies during the Holocaust, as well as the Jewish Resistance. In 1951, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi signed a law commemorating Yom HaShoah on Nisan 27, the 10th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, which was the largest known example of Jewish resistance during the holocaust It is the 6th day after Passover and the week before Yom Hazikaron (Memorial Day) and Israel's Independence Day. The proximity of these dates symbolizes the path of the Jewish people to the revival of the state.
On Yom Ha-Shoah, all entertainment is canceled and commemorative ceremonies are held everywhere. The main one is held at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Complex and is broadcast on television. It starts in the evening of the previous day and lasts the whole next day. Heads of state, high-ranking officials from other countries, people who survived the Holocaust are present at the solemn ceremony. In the morning of the next day, a two-minute siren sounds that can be heard throughout the country. As soon as the sound of the siren sounds - life freezes all over Israel. Businesses stop, people freeze in the streets, drivers park their cars on the roadside - everyone remembers the Jews - victims of the Holocaust. After the end of the signal, the first persons of the state, representatives of public associations lay wreaths on the square of the Warsaw Ghetto in Yad Vashem. Millions of Jews living in Israel and beyond are praying that the times of destruction and horror will never be repeated.