Camp Westerbork Remembrance Center is too small to accommodate all school classes that want to visit the center to learn about the Holocaust. But there is no money for expanding the center. Member of Parliament Wieke Paulusma (D66) wants the cabinet to pay the required amount, more than 50 million euros. “The government says that Holocaust education is so important, then you must be able to arrange this.”
“The memorial center plays a very important role in Holocaust education,” says the politician who grew up in Odoorn. “School classes come here every day. This is the place where stories become tangible, here you can see what happened. I think the center should be ready for the future. All classes that report should be able to be accommodated. That is possible now No. But it is unacceptable that they have to refuse school classes.”
Good Holocaust education in the Netherlands is seen as essential. Schools are therefore obliged to pay attention to it. And after the violence by pro-Palestinian groups against Israeli football supporters in Amsterdam last year, that call has only increased.
State Secretary Mariëlle Paul (VVD), like Paulusma, was in Hooghalen yesterday for the Name Reading. “The Second World War has been happening longer and longer. That is why these kinds of moments of commemoration and good education about the Holocaust and the horrors of the war are important.”
“If you know what people have had to endure due to exclusion and hatred, if you know about the violence and murderousness with which people were killed, then hopefully this will contribute to having more respect for each other and in society as a whole.”