President* Donald Trump is currently taking a break from being almost unanimously hated by the other two branches of U.S. government with an eight-day, four-country tour across the Middle East and Europe, arriving yesterday in Israel after his stay in Saudi Arabia.
Never before has the first foreign trip of a president of the United States included a visit to Israel. Thank you,… https://t.co/AqcFEq4i3j
Among the activities planned for the first family was a ceremonial presidential visit to Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust remembrance center.
The center is the result of the Yad Vashem Law enacted in 1953, which guides it "to collect, examine and publish testimony of the [Holocaust] and the heroism it called forth," according to Yad Vashem's website.
The center includes the Hall of Names, pictured above, which houses a historic project called Pages of Testimony—begun in the '50s to preserve the remnants of the identities of those lost during the tragedy that took millions of lives. The project currently houses 2.7 million original Pages of Testimony, according to the center's website.
A part of many foreign leaders' trips to Yad Vashem is signing the museum's "book of remembrance," possibly indicating their awareness of the center's importance with historical context or their nation's tie-in to world peace...
On the left, via @RaoulWootliff, the note Trump just left at Yad Vashem. 'So amazing!' On the right, the note Oba… https://t.co/rTXTmOST3c
And man did Trump *nail* that humbled-by-the-weight-of-history tone.
For perspective:
To compare at just the length level, see Bill Clinton and Barack Obama's remembrance notes below.
Obama: "I am grateful to Yad Vashem and all of those responsible for this remarkable institution. At a time of great peril and promise, war and strife, we are blessed to have such a powerful reminder of man's potential for great evil, but also our capacity to rise up from tragedy and remake our world.Let our children come here, and know this history, so that they can add their voices to proclaim 'never again.' And may we remember those who perished, not only as victims, but also as individuals who hoped and loved and dreamed like us, and who have become symbols of the human spirit."
Clinton: "Yad Vashem is a testament to the power of truth in the face of denial, the resilience of the human spirit in the face of despair, the triumph of the Jewish people over murder and destruction and a reminder to all people that the lessons of the Holocaust must never be forgotten. God bless Israel and its future."
And we'll just throw a little character-count graph in there for kicks.
I mean, points for concision?
Maybe the fact he was only scheduled to be in the museum for 15 minutes had something to do with the brevity of the note...
(He ended up being there for 30 minutes, according to Vox.)
Lets revisit that graph, only this time comparing the use of exclamation points (!) between the three presidents on official Holocaust remembrance records.
At least his speech during Yad Vashem's wreath-laying ceremony didn't sound anything like his speech to Coast Guard graduates last week?
Hat tip to @c_m_dangelo for this perfect headline https://t.co/B0Ab7rltNM
We have to take silver linings as they come these days.
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