German President Horst Koehler told the Israeli parliament Wednesday that responsibility for the Holocaust was an integral part of his country's national identity as he warned that the battle against anti-Semitism had not been won.

"I want to underline that the responsibility for the Shoah forms part of the German identity," said Koehler in a speech delivered in his native tongue after a brief preamble in Hebrew.

"That Israel can live within internationally recognized borders, free from fear and terror, is an incontestable maxim of German politics.

"My country has always demonstrated this by its actions. Germany stands unswervingly side by side with Israel and its people," he said.

In his speech, delivered just days after commemorations for the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp in Poland, Koehler stressed that Germany would never forget the lessons of the past.

"What will happen when there are no survivors left? They must remain part of our present. Their recollections must not be lost," he said.

"The faces of the victims must not be forgotten. We must ensure that the teachings of a generation will be passed on to the next generation.

"And we must all grasp the fact that the victims of the Shoah have given us a duty: to never allow genocide to happen again. Will we do justice to this duty?"

The German president also stressed that his country would be unstinting in its fight against anti-Semitism and any effort to downplay the horrors of the Holocaust in which at least six million Jews were killed.

"Every open society also has enemies. Xenophobia and anti-Semitism have not disappeared from Germany," he said.

"Comparisons which try to play down the Shoah are scandalous and we must oppose them. We must seek to oppose right-wing extremists and anti-Semites through political means and we must do so aggressively."

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites) earlier told parliament that while he was delighted to play host to the German president, the grief of the Holocaust would "endure forever".

Sharon also warned of a new wave of anti-Semitism that was designed to undermine the Jewish state's right to exist.

"The new anti-Semitism is aimed at preventing Israel from defending its borders," he said.

"They condemn the Shoah but also question Israel's very legitimacy and its fight against terrorism, against Iran, Syria and Hezbollah who all want to destroy us."

The speaker of the parliament, Reuven Rivlin, also urged Germany to outlaw any "neo-Nazi parties which deny or minimise the Shoah."

"We welcome you as a real friend and a courageous man ... but today, in Europe and in Germany, we are witnessing and hearing the same slogans, the same aggression and the same incitement to hatred against the Jews," he said.

A total of seven MPs boycotted the speech, having argued that it was inappropriate that German should be spoken from the floor of the parliament of the Jewish state, Knesset spokesman Giora Pordes said.

Among those who stayed away was Health Minister Danny Naveh and deputy speaker of the chamber, Hemi Doron, whose grandfather was killed during the Nazi era.

Source: Agencies