Plans for creation of national Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam

DutchAmsterdam.nl — There are plans to establish a national Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam.

The museum will possibly be located in the Hollandse Schouwburg (Dutch Theatre).

Aided by money from Joodse tegoeden (Jewish assets*) the possibility of establishing the museum, how much it would cost, and whether it is feasible to create it within the Hollandsche Schouwburg is currently being researched.

Joël Cahen, Director of the Hollandsche Schouwburg and of the Jewish Historical Museum told local TV Station RTV N-H why it is important to establish the Holocal museum:

“Because the first generation of war survivors is dying out. The second generation sees that what they want to forget, the next generation does not want to forget. The third and fourth generations want to know everything, what happened with the grandfather, grandmother, or family?”

Hollandsche Schouwburg

During the Second World War the Nazi occupiers renamed the building Joodsche Schouwburg (Jewish Theatre), and used the building as a prison and as a deportation center for Jews.

in 1961 the building was demolished, except for the facade and the area immediately behind it — a skeleton of crumbled brick walls.

In 1962 the Hollandsche Schouwburg was transformed into a war memorial in remembrance of the Jews who perished under the Nazi regime.

Read more about the Hollandsche Schouwburg

* Joodse tegoeden (Jewish Assets) – money set aside by the Dutch government from which payments are made to Jewish war victims and their descendants, in restitution for money and property stolen during the Second World War and/or never properly compensated after the war.