Matt Keane chats with Olga Horak   Photo: Henry Benjamin/J-Wire

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean said the NSW Liberal and Nationals Government was committed to honouring the memories of the six million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust, while also promoting and celebrating Australian Jewish culture.

“The Sydney Jewish Museum gives a voice to victims of the Holocaust and to the incredible survivors who still guide visitors through the exhibitions and help educate and inspire thousands of school children each year,” Mr Kean said.

“The museum is crucial to ensuring that the atrocities of the Holocaust are never repeated and that racism and hatred have no place in Australia or anywhere else.”

The $6.5 million commitment will add to the $3.5 million already invested by the NSW Liberal and Nationals Government in the project.

The Museum’s CEO, Kevin Sumption, told the gathering: “Today, the museum welcomes 55,000 visitors a year most of those school students who learned about the Jewish community, Jewish life, the Jewish heritage in Sydney, and they hear t messages of our Holocaust survivors.”

Talking about the increase in government funding, he added: “It will allow us to continue to combat racism faith-based intolerance and antisemitism. The project that the museum is working on is to allow us to expand the museum’s ability to talk to Sydneysiders from about 55,000 to over 100,000 a year. And this will occur by effectively building a new museum. To complement the Holocaust Museum, we will have a museum that we currently call the Centre for Contemporary Jewish life. This new facility will include programs that celebrate Jewish life, and its culture. It will respond to a changing world with programs that challenge racism, that challenge faith-based intolerance and challenge antisemitism.”

Joining the function were Holocaust survivors Olga Horak, Yvonne Engleman and Paul Drexler.

Treasurer Matt Kean told them: “I want to thank you, Yvonne, Olga, and Paul, for the incredible work you do in educating and inspiring the next generation to combat racism and intolerance in every form in Australia and beyond. Your leadership is incredible. You’re living such a powerful legacy. And I want to thank you on behalf of all of us who care about tolerance and respect across our country and indeed across the world.”

Yvonne Engelman said: “This country has given us an opportunity to start a new life, and then we never spoke about the past. But after a while, we felt we have to teach and get involved in what we have lived through. This is my 31st year here, and I feel very strongly that we must continue to teach the young people and tell them what it really was like. To me, it’s very, very dear to my heart. And I feel very privileged that at this age, I’m still able to come here and talk to the young people.”

Olga Horak: “It is difficult to explain how I feel in words to explain how I feel. This became to me like a second home. O I’ve been involved with this project over the years. I  feel like a mother watching a child growing up. And I admire that child for the wonderful success. This is how I look at that museum. I’d been a volunteer as a survivor for five years before this establishment existed. I’m still trying to be active, although my later years have interfered. I’ve tried to steal time if I’m asked to be active, and I still offer my services. And it is a wonderful situation that we have young people taking over from us. So I have a lot of information to teach the young generation and not to hate because hatred is ugly. Hatred caused the tragedy which happened in the 20th century. And I hope that will never ever happen again.”

Paul Drexler added: “We’ve gone back to when antisemitism is on the rise, and I thought I’d left antisemitism.  I remember, as a small boy, people were throwing stones at windows because we were Jewish. And these are frightening times. So I can speak to these kids. And a lot of them I find that I’ve never heard of the Holocaust.”

Minister for Multiculturalism Mark Coure said the NSW Liberals and Nationals are proud to partner with the Jewish community to strengthen the state’s multicultural and multi-faith society.

“The Sydney Jewish Museum stands to ensure that, as a society, we learn and remember the terrible lessons of the Holocaust. This investment continues this important work, while also providing new spaces to better tell the stories of Jewish- Australians,” Mr Coure said.

President of the Sydney Jewish Museum Greg Shand said the recent upsurge in anti- Semitism only serves to highlight the importance of the Museum seeking to double its impact by doubling the number that visit annually.

“The support of the Government, for which the Museum is enormously grateful, will contribute in a material way to creating a larger, state-of-the-art facility, and will greatly assist the Museum in achieving this objective,” Mr Shand said in a message.

President of The New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies David Ossip said: “The Holocaust is also a story which is universal and a story about the danger of hate and discrimination, and dehumanising and other and what started with the Holocaust didn’t begin with the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a combination of perpetuating stereotypes and allowing hate to grow and to foster without anyone standing up and saying this isn’t acceptable.”

NSW Jewish Board of Deputies CEO Darren Bark said as Holocaust survivors dwindle, keeping their stories alive and educating future generations about the horrors of the past has never been more important.

“Today’s announcement will help the Sydney Jewish Museum open its doors to twice as many Australians, particularly school students, showing them where racism, hate speech and intolerance can ultimately lead,” Mr Bark said.

“We thank the NSW Government for its commitment to stamping out anti-Semitism and discrimination and ensuring that the worst atrocities in our history are not forgotten, and never repeated.”