Israel has condemned an Iranian-sponsored conference on Germany's World War II Holocaust.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called the conference "sickening," and said it shows the depth of hatred by Iran's government.

Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki, left, shakes hands with Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss from Jews United Against Zionism at a conference on the Holocaust, 11 Dec 2006

At opening ceremonies in Tehran Monday, Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said the two-day event at a foreign ministry institute does not aim to confirm or deny the Holocaust but to create an opportunity to debate it.

Some European countries have made it a crime to deny the Holocaust.

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad initiated the conference. He has said the killing of six million Jews by the Nazi German government is a "myth," and that Israel should be wiped off the map.

Germany and the United States are among those who have condemned the conference.

Among the participants is French professor Robert Faurisson, who denies the existence of the gas chambers used to exterminate the Jews, and David Duke, a former American politician and member of the white supremacist Ku Klux Klan.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and Reuters.