Royals at the Commemoration of the 80th Anniversary of Liberation of Auschwitz: January 27, 2025


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I partly agree with you, but what difference does it make if today there are representatives of countries that helped the Nazi, but there will be no country that freed the prisoners
 
I was born in Poland and while I can't speak for everyone there I personally think that the presence of a princess(albeit by marriage) from a royal family with Nazi connections is not appropriate. I think Albert would have been criticized for sending her as his representative.
What kind of Nazi connections does the House of Hanover have? Was any former head of the House ever a member of the Nazi Party?
 
The older gentleman with Pss Amalia is Jacques Grishaver, the chairman of the Dutch Auschwitz committee. He also took the initiative for a monument in Amsterdam with all the names of the Dutch Holocaust victims in the Weesperstraat. The process was complicated and lengthy but he percevered and succeeded. He was became an officer in the order of Orange-Nassau (he was already a knight since 2006) and received the honorary golden star of the city of Amsterdam by the mayor last year.


His parents were rescued from the Hollandse Schouwburg Theatre, where they were awaiting deportations with other relatives by a (Jewish) resistance fighter friend of his grandfather. Most of his other relatives however were taken and never came back.
 
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King and Queen of the Belgians, behind them is the King of Spain
Photo

King Charles and the King and Queen of the Netherlands
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What a moving photo of King Charles III

The Royals place a votive candle in front of the train car, the symbol of the event, to pay tribute to the victims.
King Charles (what a photo)
King Charles
King and Queen of the Belgians
Crown Princess Victoria and, behind her,Hereditary Grand Duke and Hereditary Grand Duchess of Luxembourg
Crown Prince Haakon
Felipe and Letizia

After the ceremony, King Charles walked around the concentration camp

Photo 1

Looking at discarded personal belongings

...and a mountain of suitcases
 
Crown Princess Victoria arrives to the ceremony
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Crown Princess Victoria pays tribute to the victims at the candle ceremony
Pic 1 ** Pic 2 ** Pic 3

Crown Princess Victoria greets Holocaust survivor Leon Weintraub, a Polish-born Swedish physician, who has lived in Sweden since 1969.
Pic 1 ** Pic

Crown Princess Victoria, King Philippe and Queen Mathilde
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Crown Princess Victoria with the Swedish delegation:
Speaker of the Riksdag Andreas Norlén, Prime minister Ulf Kristersson and Minister for Culture Parisa Liljestrand.
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The Swedish Royal Court at its website:
Crown Princess Victoria and Prime minister Ulf Kristersson arrived with Auschwitz survivor Elisabeth Masur and her daughter at the government plane.


Prime minister Ulf Kristersson at his Instagram
 
There are many Royals with Nazis connections whether as members of the Hitler Youth or in the Nazi Party.
Prince Bernhard and Prince Claus both -So should the Dutch RF not attend?
Queen Silvia of Sweden father - So should the Swedish RF not attend?

Its totally unfair to pass that blame onto their spouses or children/grandchildren.
The Princess of Hanover also has not been seen with her estranged husband in well over a decade if not more.

There were many Jews from Monaco who were saved by Louis II from deportation and given false identity papers to keep them safe..
Agree, I believe it was the grandfather of Ernst August Senior who had connections with the Nazis. And not to forget that King Edward, later the Duke of Windsor and his wife had close connections with the Nazi government. That would mean that all of their children, grandchildren should not attend?
It is so very important that all those whether royal or not should never ever forget what happened and should keep in memory that it should never happen again, in no country never!
 
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Galleries with all royal guests attending:


** gettyimages gallery **









 
There are many Royals with Nazis connections whether as members of the Hitler Youth or in the Nazi Party.
Prince Bernhard and Prince Claus both -So should the Dutch RF not attend?
Queen Silvia of Sweden father - So should the Swedish RF not attend?

Its totally unfair to pass that blame onto their spouses or children/grandchildren.
The Princess of Hanover also has not been seen with her estranged husband in well over a decade if not more.

There were many Jews from Monaco who were saved by Louis II from deportation and given false identity papers to keep them safe..
Thank you for saying this An Ard Ri. There are so many in Europe's royal families who had family connections to those who were party members including the British Royals (the late Prince Phillip and also Princess Michael of Kent). Ironically it was Phillip's mother who was also hiding Jews when she was living in Greece.
At this point in modern history, I believe we should not be excluding the children, grandchildren, and other extended family members because there was an ancestor who was affiliated with the Nazi Party before and during WWII.
 
Frederik and Mary at the lighting of the candles


From the DRF

 
In the pictures of Victoria and one of Frederik and Mary you can Stephanie and Guillaume of Luxembourg and Haakon of Norway.
 
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It is a very sensitive topic in the Swedish Royal Family, and i’m sure also in plenty of other european royal families… Some of them, like many non-royals, having to live with the fact that their ancestors killed others because of being jews…

The inherited feelings of guilt and shame over their family history that many people still to this day lives with is not something anyone should be proud of… Children should never be held responsible for their parents actions… For better or for worse none of us choosed our parents…

Walther Sommerlath Sr was a member of the Nazi party. It does not seem like he showed much activity in it but he was still listed as a member in their register, and ran a company in Berlin 1939-1943 that the Nazis had seized from its Jewish owners. This company manufactured arms used in World War II…
A few years ago it was also discovered that he participated in organizing the rescue of German, anti-Hitler resistance members and Jewish people during the war, to Sweden.

The King of Sweden’s maternal grandfather however, Carl Eduard the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was one of germanys most famous aristocratic nazis… His daughter Princess Sibylla was never loved in Sweden and always looked down on because of that, and she recived death threats for the rest of her life…

Victoria is ofcourse well aware of all that… But if todays royal generation should be banned from taking part in holocaust memorial events based on the terrible choices some of their ancestors did during their life - then there would be almost no royals there at all…
 
Why does King Willem Alexander wear a kippah at this commemoration. I didn’t notice any other members of royal families wearing one.

Such a sad and moving event. 80 years and still we as humankind can be so cruel to one another.
 
Why does King Willem Alexander wear a kippah at this commemoration. I didn’t notice any other members of royal families wearing one.
Out of respect. He usually wears a kippah when visiting a synagogue or at an event related to Jews.

As recent as during the Portuguese state visit he also wore one when visiting the Portuguese synagogue of Amsterdam.
 
Article from BB re the DRF post - sharing that on the DRF post was the following: ...
and from Denmark, the King and Queen participated, along with, among others, four Danish survivors from the camp as well as the Prime Minister," the royal family writes on their Instagram.
Here is the BB article:

DRF IG
 
Out of respect. He usually wears a kippah when visiting a synagogue or at an event related to Jews.

As recent as during the Portuguese state visit he also wore one when visiting the Portuguese synagogue of Amsterdam.

Indeed. It is always the same blue kippah, laced with silver threads. In 2013 he wore it during his visits to the Jewish community of Amsterdam, not long after his inauguration. It is perhaps a gift from the community and he always wears it on such occassions.

Traditionally the Jewish comminuty has always been loyal and supportive of the royal house and included the royal family in their prayers at the synagogue. Some synagogues still do.

It was said that for the traditional carriage rides in Amsterdam for the annual pre-war visits of the court to the capital, the cheers were always the loudest in the Jewish neighbourhoods. 73% of the Jews in the Netherlands were murdered, which changed especially Amsterdam forever.
 
Why does King Willem Alexander wear a kippah at this commemoration. I didn’t notice any other members of royal families wearing one.

Such a sad and moving event. 80 years and still we as humankind can be so cruel to one another.
Indeed. We haven't learned a thing and we forget way too soon.

In dark moments I sometimes wonder when this will happen again. I.e. industrialized genocide.
 
King Charles was visibly moved by his visit to Auschwitz.
 
Anders Pihlblad, host at Swedish TV4's News morning, interviewed Crown Princess Victoria after the ceremony. The interview was shown at the News morning today.
Victoria says at the video:
– It is so incredibly incomprehensible to try to take in all the evil and everything that has happened in this place. At the same time, I feel how infinitely important it is to be here and perhaps especially today, to also be able to make this manifestation together with all other countries that we support and we stand side by side in this incredibly important issue.
She also speaks about the importance of honoring the memory of the victims and remembering their fate that must not be forgotten. To also remind us of what humans are capable of. It is nice for her on a personal level to feel that she is doing something, as she otherwise feels quite small and inadequate in this.
– To be able to come here and shed light on these incredibly important questions that we must not forget in the world we live in, in the times we live in, we must not forget these questions.
(..)
Video of the interview, Victoria's interview starts at 1.53:

As there were now only 50 survivors at the ceremony (ten years ago 300), who are the witnesses of this evil, we have to listen their stories and tell their stories further, so that the stories will never die. Victoria said at the interview that people should take their children to a concentration camp, so it will be interesting to see when Victoria and Daniel visit a camp with their children.


 
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a very moving ceremony indeed. what horror. i hope the surviving victims find peace.
 
Very moving to see King Charles at Auschwitz . Significant having a reigning British monarch visiting. I was surprised to learn that HM the Queen never visited. Of course I know she cared- just surprised she never visited.

If this is in the wrong place move it please.
What a kind and caring monarch King Charles seems.
 
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