A New Tel Aviv Holocaust Monument Will Honor Gays Persecuted By Nazis
Image by Getty Images
JERUSALEM — A monument to gays persecuted by the Nazis will be built in Tel Aviv.
The monument, the first of its kind in Israel, will be constructed in Meir Park, near the Tel Aviv Gay and Lesbian Association Center in the central part of the city, Haaretz reported.
It will include a concrete pink triangle along with a bench and a plaque providing information on the persecution of gays during the Holocaust. Gays were forced to wear an identifying pink triangle on their clothing in the same way that Jews were forced to wear a yellow star.
The inscription on the memorial will read: “To the memory of those persecuted by the Nazi regime for their sexual preference and gender identity.”
Attorney Eran Lev, a member of the municipal council from the Meretz party, came up with the idea for the memorial.
“This will be the first and only memorial site in Israel to mention the victims of the Nazis who were persecuted for anything other than being Jewish,” Lev told Haaretz. “As a cosmopolitan city and an international gay center, Tel Aviv will offer a memorial site that is universal in its essence. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not a monument but a place — a place of quiet that will invite visitors to sit, contemplate, reflect and be in solitude.”
Memorials to the gay victims of Nazi persecution exist in Berlin, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Sydney and San Francisco, according to Haaretz.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
