By Israel News Agency Staff

Jerusalem-----The following speech was made by Israel Interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert at the State Memorial Service for Victims of Terror.

Honorable president, bereaved families, distinguished guest, today, on Remembrance Day, we lovingly and with heavy hearts visit the precious memory of those Israel citizens who fell in terror attacks: women and men, babies and the elderly - the innocent victims of blind, wicked, murderous, indiscriminate hatred.

Our citizens who fell victim to terror were not Israel soldiers bearing arms against an enemy, they did not fall at the front of a military campaign in the line of fire. Theses good Israelis were innocent bystanders, passengers on a bus whose bitter destiny led them to meet with a vile murderer; students on the way to school; teenagers at entertainment spots; families eating together; laborers in their fields; simple people who met their deaths in an instant, at the hands of terrorists, their daily routine and that of their families shattered in one sharp explosion.

Terror aimed at citizens is the cowardly abyss; it is the total loss of humanism. It is the most serious danger today to human civilization, freedom, the democratic way of life, and world peace.

The State of Israel stands at the forefront of the war against terror, however terror today threatens the entire world, and those who have yet to internalize this will come to do so in time and will quickly reach the necessary conclusions. We will not rest in our struggle against terror until it is stopped.

Israel will continue to act against terrorist organizations with determination, perseverance and sophistication. We will do so while making an educated effort to distinguish between terrorists and the population not involved in terror. It is not only the murderers who are a deserving target, but also those who send them.

The heads of terrorist organizations are not immune. Anyone who transforms terror against citizens into a banner; anyone who nurtures murderous racial hatred towards every Jew and Israeli and targets them; anyone who sends brainwashed youngsters to blow themselves up in markets, malls and crowded areas; anyone who praises and glorifies despicable murderers and raises them to the rank of shaheed; anyone who educates his children toward contemptible hatred - anyone who does so, first and foremost, exposes his true self, his character, his baseness. Not only is he not deserving of political negotiations, he is not deserving of moving between borders and countries. He is an enemy to us, to anyone who desires peace, and ultimately he is an enemy to his own people.

On this Remembrance Day, Israel will not forget the victims of terror who were left alive, but seriously and agonizingly injured in body and soul - the disabled, the injured, those struck by terror, all those who struggle to be healed, to be rehabilitated and return to normal life. There are many who are hurt, and beside them stand their families and friends who assist them and who are partners in the ongoing and complicated journey of agony, until full recovery. We send them our love, and will pray for their recovery and rehabilitation. You, the bereaved families, lost that which was most precious.

Today, I promise you that Israel will do all that is in our power to stop terror, and that violence will be uprooted, and a swift end to wars and bloodshed will come. As the State of Israel's 58th Independence Day unfolds, we hope that the doctor of the broken hearted will prove a balm to the pain and sorrow of the victims of terror and their families, and that the horizon of peace will illuminate us soon, clear and promising.

Would that it could.

Communicated by the Israel Government Press Office

Related Web Site: Israel Foreign Ministry

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