Berlin Holocaust memorial
Photo: AP
Shoah memorial restaurant stirs conflict
Private entrepreneur's plan to build mega-restaurant opposite Berlin Holocaust commemoration site rouses controversy
BERLIN - About a year after it was first opened to the public, the central memorial for the victims of the Holocaust in Berlin continues to stir conflict. This time, controversy was triggered by a plan to build a large fast food booth next to the memorial that will serve visitors to the place, Israel's leading daily Yedioth Ahronoth reported Monday.
More than 3.5 million people visited the monument ever since it was unveiled last year, and the place has become one of the main tourist attractions in the German capital.
In the last few months, portable food stands have been placed near the memorial. In a bid to dispose of the stands, the monument's administration authorized the construction of a large permanent structure where food and souvenirs will be offered for sale to tourists.
The monument's board granted a private entrepreneur the concession to build a small restaurant near the memorial, but it now claims that instead of a modest structure, the entrepreneur plans to erect a gigantic, 115-meter long restaurant opposite the site.
"The size of the restaurant will dwarf the commemoration site and dishonor it," Leah Rosh, who initiated the foundation of the memorial, said Sunday. Head of the Jewish community in Berlin, Gideon Yoffe, also expressed his objection to the new enterprise. "The building will undermine the site's dignified character and bestow on the place an amusement-park atmosphere," he said.
