12 September 2006
A new institute for the research into the Shoah has opened in the German capital Berlin. The Bernard Lander Institute for the Communication of the Holocaust and Tolerance" is linked with the Berlin campus of Touro College, a private university for Jewish studies founded in 2003. Rabbi Andreas Nachama, former chairman of Berlin's Jewish community and director of the Touro College, will also be the first dean of the Lander Institute. The institution will also receive a new library with contemporary works, which was donated by the wife of the late publicist Henry Marx. The first Touro college campus was established by Bernard Lander in 1970. Today, the institution has campuses in New York, California, Israel and Russia, enrolling over 22,000 students.
Meanwhile, is has also been reported that an exhibition has opened which tells the story of Jewish soccer players in Germany before 1933. The show at Berlin's Centrum Judaicum is the first large exhibition to explore the subject and includes film footage of Jewish footballers along with souvenirs including postcards and pins. With the rise of the Nazis, Jewish footballers were forced out of public tournaments. The exhibition will cater especially to school children, explaining how the persecution of Jews affected ordinary people.
