Creation of the Monument Shalom Israel  

On 22 March 2013, the ad with the Blossom of Shalom of the Jerusalem Friedensmal appeared on the front pages of the Jerusalem Post and HaAretz. It was in Jerusalem that it was first publicly presented. I was in Safed in Israel at the time and Jewish friends living there surprised me with the newspaper (image). The ad appeared when US President Obama visited the state of Israel before Passover. Internationally, the ad appeared full-page on the back of the title pages. I had not expected this incredible size of the ad, with the weight and placement on the front pages, but with a 3 - 5 cm ad somewhere in the middle of a rather thick newspaper. The joy was great and the gratitude for this perception!

The text of the ad „The opposite of the Holocaust is in a sense the idea of Jerusalem” reflects the message embodied by the Jerusalem Friedensmal. In the context of a civilization break, the "idea of Jerusalem" is remembered. So it's more than a memorial to the pain of the past. It's about to live, Chai - even in the German-Jewish relations - in the present! It's about living what was learned from a dark past.

This front page ad was the inauguration of the Jerusalem Friedensmal in Israel. Please note that in the advertisement I translated the German "Jerusalem Friedensmal" into the English "Jerusalem Peace Memorial". However, since it makes sense to work internationally with only one name of the memorial, I call it today only "Jerusalem Friedensmal".