A ‘great moral voice’ – funeral held for holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel

People exit the Fifth Avenue Synagogue during the funeral for Nobel laureate and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel in NY on July 3, 2016.

Israel’s prime minister says the memory of the late Nobel laureate, author and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel will be “enshrined in our hearts and in the heart of humanity forever”.

A news release on the governor’s site explains that “it is fitting” that the spire of the World Trade Center, which was built as a response to terrorism, be lit in honor of Wiesel, who spent his life fighting hate.

Wiesel’s father, mother Sarah and younger sister Tzipora all died during and as a result of the Holocaust.

Among the attendees was Abraham Foxman, former national director of the Anti-Defamation League.

His death was confirmed on Twitter by Israel’s Holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem, after being first reported by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

Wiesel’s death was announced Saturday.

Millions learned about the Holocaust through Wiesel, who began publishing work in the 1950s.

“He carried a message universally, he carried the Jewish pain, the message of Jewish tragedy to the world but he took it way beyond”, Foxman said.

Wiesel shared the harrowing story of his internment at Auschwitz as a teenager through his classic memoir “Night”, one of the most widely read and discussed books of the 20th century.

Extending his condolences to Mr. Wiesel’s wife, family and all others touched by this loss, the Secretary-General said that the United Nations is grateful for Mr. Wiesel’s contributions and remains strongly committed to Holocaust remembrance and the wider struggle for human rights for all, the spokesperson added.