Kaine, in Israel, sees ‘sad irony’ of U.N. events

On a day when the president of Iran decried Israel at a United Nations conference in Switzerland, Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine was in the Holy Land, meeting with top Israeli officials and attending a Holocaust remembrance service.

Kaine and his wife, first lady Anne Holton, last night were guests at the solemn opening ceremony at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial outside Jerusalem for the start of Israel’s annual commemoration of the 6 million Jews killed in the Holocaust.

“It was a very, very powerful service,“ Kaine told the Richmond Times-Dispatch last night in a brief phone interview.

“We were all really struck by the kind of sad irony of the fact that this day, a Holocaust denier was speaking at the conference on racism on the very day when for years, this country has commemorated and remembered the evils of the Holocaust.“

The governor was referring to a speech by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Geneva, during which he labeled Israel a “most cruel and repressive racist regime.“

The remarks spurred a walkout of Western diplomats at the conference, which the United States boycotted. Kaine, who met earlier in the day with Israeli President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said they expressed appreciation for U.S. support.

Diplomacy and ceremony were only part of the governor’s agenda in the opening days of his weeklong trade mission to Israel, Dubai and Morocco.

Kaine said Peres and Netanyahu were “very interested” in furthering economic ties between Virginia and Israel.

On Sunday, U.S. Ambassador to Israel James B. Cunningham hosted a reception in Kaine’s honor in Tel Aviv, attended by 40 Israeli business leaders.

Yesterday, the governor and Virginia Secretary of Commerce Pat Gottschalk networked at a gathering of a dozen Israeli manufacturers.

Tonight, Kaine and his delegation fly to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, for a confidential meeting to try to land an economic-development project for the state.

Contact Jim Nolan at (804) 649-6061 or .

The Associated Press contributed to this report.