Jewish Agency head Natan Sharansky addressed a crowd assembled for The March of the Living at Auschwitz on Holocuast Remembrance Day Monday, reminding them of Israel’s historical importance to the Jewish people.

Sharansky is among a slew of politicians who have addressed the Iranian threat during their Holocaust Memorial Day speeches.

President Shimon Peres addressed the Irianian threat in his speech at the Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony at Yad Vashem on Sunday, stressing that the world cannot display the apathy that cost so many their lives in the past.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech at the ceremony also focused on the rising Iranian threat, a threat to repeat the Holocaust. “In the face of [Iran’s] calls to erase the Jewish state from the face of the earth repeated time and again, we see at best mild protestations, and this too seems to be fading,” Netanyahu lambasted the international community.

Sirens wailed throughout Israel Monday morning as the nation marked Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Wreaths were laid at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem, where the official state ceremony was held..

Peres, Netanyahu and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi were in attendance.
On Sunday evening, US President Barack Obama marked Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day with a statement honoring the memory of “those who endured the horrors” of the Nazi atrocities of World War II.

Obama said the Holocaust calls on all people to renew their commitment to prevent genocide and “to confront anti-Semitism and prejudice in all its forms.”

AP contributed to this report.