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The IJ & Jeanné Wagner Jewish Community Center observed a Day of Remembrance on Thursday to pay homage to the millions who perished in the Holocaust.

Dubbed Yom Hashoah in Hebrew, the somber event is marked by prayers, speeches, songs and quiet reflections.

Salt Lake City's JCC heard a keynote address from Holocaust survivor Jerry Meents. Born in Amsterdam, Meents lost his family during the genocidal destruction, the center's website explained, and witnessed firsthand this Nazi cruelty.

The program included the lighting of memorial candles, the center said, and poems written by student winners of the Annual Holocaust Literary Contest.