Germany has a moral duty to fight rising anti-Semitism, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Friday in an emotional speech at a Berlin synagogue to mark the 80th anniversary of a Nazi campaign of attacks on Jews.
Dressed in black, Merkel told Jewish leaders that violence against Jews, blamed on far-right militants or Muslims, was growing in Germany now, eight decades later.
"Jewish life is blossoming again in Germany - an unexpected gift to us after the Shoah," she said, using the Hebrew word for the Holocaust. "But we are also witnessing a worrying anti-Semitism that threatens Jewish life in our country."