A graphic purportedly showing the messages penned by President Trump and President Obama during their respective visits to Yad Vashem, Israel’s memorial to the victims of the Holocaust, appeared on social media in May 2017:

It is a great honor to be here with all of my friends – so amazing + will never forget. Donald Trump I am grateful to Yad Vashem and all of those responsible for this remarkable institution. At a time of great peril and promise, war and strife, we are blessed to have such a powerful reminder of man’s potential for great evil, but also our own capacity to rise up from tragedy and remake our world. Let our children come here, and know their history, so that they can add their voices to proclaim ‘never again.’ And may we remember those who perished, not only as victims, but also as individuals who hoped and loved and dreamed like us, and who have become symbols of the human spirit. Barack Obama

This image accurately shows what Trump and Obama wrote in the Yad Vashem guest book.

President Trump visited Yad Vashem on 23 May 2017. He delivered a speech at the memorial and signed the guest book. Haaretz, a news outlet in the middle east, posted an image of Trump’s message:



“So amazing,” Trump describes Yad Vashem visit as only he canhttps://t.co/qezNcuuIcM pic.twitter.com/qGo7ZielBA — Haaretz.com (@haaretzcom) May 23, 2017

The text of Obama’s message is also accurate. Obama visited Yad Vashem in July 2008, when he was a presidential candidate. Haaretz also published an image of this message:



Trump and Obama’s entries in Yad Vashem guestbook – spot the differences pic.twitter.com/sFsnJOkaM7 — Haaretz.com (@haaretzcom) May 23, 2017

Much ado was made about the differences between the messages written by President Trump and Obama after visiting Yad Vashem. The Washington Post noted that Trump’s tight schedule may have contributed to the brevity and oddly cheerful tone of his message:

The brevity and tone of the note may have been a function of the hurry the president was in during his time at the site, known as Yad Vashem, which he visited Tuesday. Packing so much into just 27 hours in Israel left only half an hour for the memorial, a customary stop on U.S. presidential visits, which precluded him from getting a full tour of the museum. Trump already had come under fire for that perceived slight to the memorial before his one-sentence missive started raising eyebrows and making headlines.

In 2008, George W. Bush left an even shorter note than Trump’s (although without the current president’s signature exclamation marks): God bless Israel.

Here are a few other messages penned by United States politicians in the Yad Vashem guest book: