Olmert condemns Iran's Holocaust denial

Berlin: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud OImert condemned Tehran's public denial of the holocaust on Tuesday and criticised a conference in which prominent Holocaust-deniers from around the world will meet.

Prior to talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Horst Koehler, Olmert visited a memorial at Berlin's Gruenewald train station, the departure point for thousands of the city's Jews to concentration camps during the Holocaust.

In an address, Olmert criticised Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's denial of the holocaust in which six million Jews were killed by the Nazis during World War II.

"We have learned and memorized the lesson (of the Holocaust); the weak and defenseless are doomed. Doomed are they who do not believe those who threaten to eradicate them. Doomed are the complacent. Doomed are they who entertain the false illusion that they could escape harm and that they could rely on the mercy of strangers," he said.

Germany has paid billions of dollars in reparations to Israel and victims of the Holocaust since the end of World War II. Relations between Israel and Germany remain strong with Israel's security being a pillar of German foreign policy.