Hungarian President Janos Ader will visit the Knesset next month, after Knesset
Speaker Reuven Rivlin uninvited Hungarian Parliament Speaker László Kövér due to
his participation in a ceremony honoring a Nazi sympathizer.
Rivlin
announced on Thursday that Ader will participate in a ceremony on July 17 in
honor of the 100th birthday of Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat in Hungary
who saved thousands of Jews during the Holocaust.
“The president’s
participation sends a courageous moral message to the people of Israel and world
Jewry,” the Knesset speaker said.
Earlier this week, Rivlin told told his
Hungarian counterpart he is not welcome in the Knesset, following Kövér’s
participation in a memorial for writer Joszef Nyiro, who was a member of the
Nazi-sympathizing fascist Arrow Cross party in the Hungarian parliament during
World War II.
Rivlin is currently in Germany, where he met with President
Joachim Gauck and thanked him for the sale of Dolphin-class submarines to
Israel.
“Defense of Israel is defense of the free world.
Every
democracy must be able to defend itself from threats,” Rivlin stated. “We stand
together in the battle for democratic values that were trampled by the
Nazis.
Today Israel and Germany share these values.”