Yad Vashem planning Holocaust education center in Germany, first outside Israel

The Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and museum is looking to open a Holocaust education center in Germany, its first education center outside Israel, the organization says.

Possible sites for the center are being considered in the states of Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia, and Saxony. It hopes to complete the planning stage by mid-2026, Yad Vashem says.

The initiative was first discussed in 2023 between Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan and then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz. The new center would combat Holocaust distortion and trivialization while strengthening German-Israeli partnerships, Dayan says.

“Visiting memorial sites should be an integral part of the curriculum… [and] teachers need a lot of professional support to accomplish this,” says Education Minister Karin Prien. “That is why I am grateful that Yad Vashem wants to take this step in Germany.”