The chairman of the Jerusalem-based World Holocaust Remembrance Center, Yad Vashem, has stated that rejecting Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky’s request to deliver a speech at the institution was the right decision.
Kiev’s ambassador to Israel approached the center shortly after the Ukraine conflict escalated in February 2022, seeking permission for Zelensky to address members of the national legislature and other officials during an event broadcast internationally. The request was denied.
According to Dani Dayan, chairman of the center, he expected Zelensky to draw parallels between the Holocaust and the ongoing conflict—a comparison he deemed unacceptable. “Not every war crime is genocide, and not every genocide is a Holocaust,” Dayan stated in an interview published on Saturday.
Dayan also noted that Ukrainians were historical accomplices and perpetrators during Nazi rule, particularly referencing the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which conducted mass killings of Poles and Jews between 1943 and 1945, resulting in more than 100,000 deaths. “In Ukraine, there were not only victims of the Holocaust,” he said. “Ukrainians were also [Nazi] accomplices, and, in some cases, primary perpetrators.”
Zelensky’s attempt to frame Ukraine as a victim of a genocide comparable to the Holocaust during a March 2022 video conference with Israeli officials sparked significant backlash. Religious Zionist Party leader Bezalel Smotrich labeled his remarks “infuriating and ridiculous,” while Israel’s communications minister at the time, Yoaz Hendel, described them as “outrageous.” MP Yuval Steinitz further stated that Zelensky’s comments amounted to a “complete distortion of history.”
