On a Sunday evening in Jerusalem, as the ancient stones of the city absorbed the last amber light of day, a group of mayors and municipal leaders from across the world gathered for a moment of collective memory. They came not for a diplomatic banquet or a formal reception, but for a candle-lighting ceremony marking the 88th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass. The flames they held against the coming darkness were small, but the weight behind them was enormous. The event opened the 35th International Mayors Conference, organized by the American Jewish Congress, and it set a deliberate tone for everything that would follow: this was not simply a conference about municipal cooperation or urban policy, but a gathering rooted in historical responsibility and a shared commitment to truth. The participants represented dozens of countries and every kind of community, from busy capitals to quiet rural towns, and they had been invited to Jerusalem to explore cooperation in technology, innovation, and economic development. But first they were asked to remember. They stood together, mayors of different nations and backgrounds, each holding a candle, helping to ensure that the catastrophe that began in 1938 would never be reduced to a statistic or a footnote. Present with them was US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, who carried a direct message: do not believe the accusations and distortions surrounding Israel, because what you can discover here with your own eyes matters far more than any narrative crafted abroad. His presence at the ceremony was no accident. For Huckabee, remembrance and advocacy belong together, and the mayors, he told them, have a unique power to shape public opinion and policy because they live so close to the ground. The conference would later move on to discussions about cybersecurity, agriculture, water conservation, and urban resilience, but the opening ceremony grounded those modern conversations in the oldest lesson of Jewish history: hatred, once normalized, accelerates toward catastrophe, and rescue begins when ordinary leaders refuse to look away.
To understand why that ceremony mattered, one has to remember exactly what Kristallnacht was. On November 9 and 10, 1938, coordinated anti-Jewish pogroms erupted across Germany and Austria, directed by Nazi authorities and carried out by stormtroopers and ordinary citizens alike. Jewish-owned businesses had their windows smashed and their goods thrown into the streets; hundreds of synagogues were burned while firefighters stood by or prevented the flames from spreading to neighboring buildings; Jewish homes and hospitals were invaded and vandalized. More than ninety Jews were murdered in the violence, and in the days that followed, some thirty thousand Jewish men were arrested and sent to concentration camps. The name “Kristallnacht” comes from the shattered glass that littered the sidewalks, but the glass was never really the point. The real catastrophe was the message that Jews were no longer safe anywhere in the Third Reich, and that the persecution of the 1930s was about to mutate into something far more systematic and far more lethal. For Jewish communities throughout the world, the memory of that night is a reminder that democratic protections are fragile, that silence makes space for cruelty, and that the worst atrocities always begin with smaller acts of humiliation and violence. By inviting municipal leaders to light candles in Jerusalem, the conference organizers were asking them to think about the places where hatred takes root: the streets they govern, the schools they fund, the public squares where citizens gather, and the local institutions that once looked away in 1938. Mayors are not abstract policymakers. They are the ones who walk neighborhoods, listen to frightened residents, and decide whether prejudice will be challenged or quietly permitted to spread. Remembering Kristallnacht, therefore, is not only an act of historical devotion. It is a way of nurturing the ethics of public life, and of insisting that the people who manage our cities must also be guardians of inclusive citizenship and human dignity.
The central message of the evening came from Huckabee, who spoke with the plain-spoken directness of a former Arkansas governor. He told the assembled mayors that Israel today is the subject of so many global lies that they can only be corrected by firsthand witness. “There are so many crazy things being said about Israel around the world that simply aren’t true,” he said. “Israel needs more people to come here, see the reality with their own eyes, and then go home and simply tell people what they saw.” The remark was more than a slogan; it was a working theory about how public opinion actually changes. Personal stories travel farther and last longer than political press releases. A mayor who has walked through Jerusalem’s markets, visited an Israeli hospital, or spoken with innovators in a laboratory understands something that cannot be captured in a one-minute news report. Huckabee drew a sharp contrast between those who spread misinformation from a safe distance and the practical, problem-solving leaders standing in front of him. He reminded them that municipal officials are uniquely positioned to make a difference. “Mayors and governors have one thing in common,” he said. “We actually get things done. You can wake up in the morning with an idea and have it implemented by the end of the day.” That ability to turn ideas into action, Huckabee added, carries serious moral weight. When local leaders are effective, they can become a bulwark against prejudice and can create partnerships that transcend the usual channels of diplomacy. His appeal was deliberately personal. Not every mayor can shape a country’s foreign policy, but every mayor can decide what to say in a public meeting, what relationships to cultivate, and what kind of example to set for citizens. In an age of disinformation and social media echo chambers, honest testimony is an act of leadership, and Huckabee was asking them to make that testimony happen.
Huckabee also turned the mayors’ attention to Israel’s economic transformation and the spirit of innovation that has come to define the country. He spoke with genuine admiration about a society that has produced remarkable technologies while confronting decades of warfare, security emergencies, and international pressure. Israel, he argued, has not merely survived. It has built a civilization where resilience and creativity are inseparable, from agricultural systems that make barren land bloom to cybersecurity defenses that protect digital infrastructure around the world. Then he made a point that has become a signature theme of his public role: instead of thanking Israel for the innovations that benefit the entire planet, some governments are trying to boycott and sanction it. “Instead of the world simply saying thank you to Israel for the technologies and innovations it provides,” Huckabee said, “there are countries seeking to boycott and sanction it. That’s crazy. What we should have here is a genuine partnership.” The audience of mayors was especially well positioned to understand his frustration. Municipal governments are constantly searching for better ways to manage transportation, secure public data, improve emergency response, and prepare for climate change. They have little time for ideological campaigns that produce no tangible benefit to the people who elected them. Boycotts, Huckabee suggested, are not only misguided; they are ultimately self-defeating, because they cut off the very channels of collaboration that could improve the lives of millions. For the mayors in the room, the evening framed a clear opportunity: Israel has been forced by its unique challenges to become a laboratory for the future, and many of the lessons learned here can be applied directly to cities facing drought, flooding, cyberattacks, pandemics, and rapid demographic change. The message was practical as well as political, an invitation to see Israel not as a source of conflict but as a source of solutions.
The broader purpose of the 35th International Mayors Conference, organized by the American Jewish Congress, was to convert moments of historical reflection into lasting relationships. AJC president Daniel Rosen explained that the conference had been designed to build trust and personal connections between Israeli innovators and international municipal leaders. “Over the coming days,” he said, “mayors from around the world will experience innovation born out of necessity. This visit is an opportunity to build trust and personal relationships that will endure long after it ends.” Rosen’s language was pragmatic, yet warm. He spoke of mayors returning home with a deeper connection to Israel and a genuine interest in pursuing joint initiatives, from adopting technologies that improve residents’ daily lives to developing economic and educational partnerships. The conference, in other words, is not intended as a one-time ceremonial encounter. It is a network-building exercise with specific goals. For many participants, meeting Israeli scientists, business leaders, and civic officials face to face is much more meaningful than receiving a stack of briefing documents. It allows them to imagine how a water-recycling project in their own district might actually take shape, or how a workshop on cyber hygiene for municipal employees could be adapted to their situation. The fact that the gathering was held in Jerusalem, rather than at some neutral convention center in Europe or North America, was itself a statement. No mayor can visit Jerusalem without feeling the extraordinary weight of history under their feet. Yet the city is also modern, lively, and complex, a place where ancient traditions intersect with startups, academia, and local government. Rosen and his colleagues want that mixture to linger in the minds of the participants long after they return to their own city halls. The hope is that they will remember not just the conflict headlines, but the concrete possibility of partnership.
At the end of the evening, the candles burned low and the mayors dispersed into a Jerusalem night that is still learning to balance the demands of security and the promise of coexistence. The ceremony was small, measured in remembered names and shared gestures rather than in dramatic diplomatic breakthroughs. But it carried an enduring message: memory must lead to action. Huckabee’s challenge hovered over the entire conference. Go home, he said, and simply tell people what you saw. In a world flooded with rage, falsehood, and carefully engineered lies, there is no real substitute for the person who can stand up in a crowded council chamber and say, “I was there. I saw it myself.” For the mayors, the days that followed would be filled with site visits, technology demonstrations, and conversations about infrastructure and innovation. They would encounter both the brilliant and the painful sides of Israeli society, the extraordinary resilience and the unresolved grief, the flourishing streets and the closed many windows. But the organizers hoped that the combination of candlelight and innovation, of ancient memory and modern achievement, would leave an unforgettable impression. The best way to honor the victims of Kristallnacht, the conference seemed to suggest, is to build alliances that resist the conditions in which such horrors grow: ignorance, isolation, and the cowardly silence of leaders who choose not to act. In that sense, the International Mayors Conference is far more than a professional gathering. It is a living memorial, carrying forward the understanding that “never again” cannot be a passive wish. It must be a promise enacted through the ordinary, often unglamorous work of governing: welcoming strangers, protecting vulnerable minorities, cooperating across borders, and speaking up, even at the risk of political inconvenience. As the mayors returned to their hotels, they carried something more valuable than schedules and welcome packets. They carried the memory of a night of broken glass, the image of small flames in the Jerusalem darkness, and an invitation to become part of a story that refuses to accept false narratives.