Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced he would issue an official apology on Nov. 7 at the House of Commons over his country's refusal to take in Jewish refugees escaping Nazi Germany on the MS St. Louis ocean liner in 1939.
Trudeau announced the date for the apology during a High Holidays phone call with the Canadian Rabbinic Caucus, according to a Thursday post to his Twitter account.
"The St. Louis was carrying German Jews looking for refuge in Canada, but they were turned away under the 'None is too many' policy of the time. 254 ended up being killed," he wrote.
In a follow-up tweet, Trudeau wrote, "This was an absolute moral failure on the part of the government, and though of course an apology can't bring the victims back, we're committed to doing what we can to right this wrong."
The German liner MS St. Louis was carrying 907 German Jews fleeing Nazi persecution.
The ship was also rejected by Cuba and the United States, and the passengers were forced to return to Europe.
In the run-up to World War II and the Holocaust, the Canadian government, headed by the Liberal party, which Trudeau now heads, yielded to anti-Semitic sentiments and severely restricted Jewish immigration. From 1933 to 1945, only about 5,000 Jewish refugees were accepted.
