Sydney Jewish Museum
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A museum in Australia’s largest city Sydney that is mostly about the Holocaust, but also has sections focusing on Jewish culture and Jews’ contribution to the Australian military, as well as a learning centre and temporary exhibitions.
More background info: For general background see under Holocaust and other associated memorial sites such as Auschwitz and the other various concentration camps and death camps, as well as other eminent Holocaust museums such as the USHMM or Yad Vashem.
The Sydney Jewish Museum, housed in the historic Maccabean Hall, is Australia’s second-oldest Holocaust and Jewish museum after the Melbourne Holocaust Museum, which goes back to the 1980s. The Sydney counterpart was founded in 1992. But before it became this museum it was already a hub of Jewish life and commemoration. Initially the focus was on Jewish ANZAC soldiers who had fought (and died) in WW1, in Gallipoli as well as on the Western Front (see the Somme or Ypres).
After WWII it also became a centre for arriving Jewish migrants, who for example received English lessons here. The hall also hosted Jewish festivities, weddings and memorial services.
Like its Melbourne counterpart, the Sydney Jewish Museum goes back to the initiative of Holocaust survivors in Australia, in particular one John Saunders. The artefacts on display are for the most part objects donated by Holocaust survivors and victims’ families.
In addition to being a museum, this institution also hosts all manner of events, runs an education centre and offers a wide range of webinars on its website.
What there is to see: Before going in, note the old and new names on the facade: at the top it says “The Jewish War Memorial”, below and over the entrance door it says “Sydney Jewish Museum” – the latter is indeed the current name, the other is the older designation, which they must have decided to simply leave in place (see history above). Inside the building is another large relic from the previous main purpose of the site, a large black marble “honour roll” with the names of Australian Jewish volunteer soldiers who lost their lives in WW1 and WWII.
Once you’ve cleared security and paid your admission fee (see below) you are invited to first explore the ground-floor exhibition about Jewish culture and life before heading upstairs to the Holocaust section. But since I had come specifically for the latter, I only skimmed the first part. It has Jewish religious objects, charts of Eastern European migration in the 1920s, a mock street (ca. 1:3 scale) with Jewish-owned shop fronts and other businesses, and, as if to prepare for the upstairs part, a chart detailing the relative proportions of Jews who did or didn’t survive the Holocaust. Unsurprisingly the figures are the worst for Poland, where “the world that was” (for Jews) was all but obliterated by the Nazis.
There’s also a separate section on the ground floor that is specifically about the history of the building the museum is housed in, the Maccabean Hall and the Jewish life it has seen. It celebrates the centenary of this institution in 2023.
The Holocaust section is then reached by means of a seemingly “hovering” staircase on the outside of which countless names are engraved, given names only, mostly in Latin script but a few also in Hebrew. As a panel explains, these are the names of Jews who migrated to Sydney to begin a new life after surviving the Holocaust.
The main exhibition is divided into the usual chronological and thematic subsections, from the Nazis’ seizing power in Germany, the increasing discrimination and repression of Jews, the yellow stars they had to wear, the “Kindertransporte” (by means of which Jewish children were sent to safety in, primarily, Great Britain), the stereotypes about Jews and how these were exploited in Nazi propaganda, how Jews went into hiding or assumed false identities, the pogroms of November 1938 … and then the full-scale mass murder, first in the form of mass shootings (e.g. in Skede or Babi Yar), then in the industrial killing centres of the “Final Solution”.
For someone like me who has visited countless Holocaust exhibitions in well over a dozen different countries, the basic chronology of the Holocaust is very familiar, so I only skim-read some of the relevant text panels. For me the exhibition had its most informational value where it had a specifically Australian perspective. This included the reluctance on official Australian government sides to let in Jewish refugees. One is quoted as having said that “as we have no real racial problems, we are not desirous to import one” – as if this was really about a racial issue (it’s almost echoing the Nazis’ classification of Jews as a “race”) and as if there were no Aboriginals in Australia. In the end a meagre quota system was allowed for up to 15,000 Jews to be admitted to Australia over the course of three years. Nothing compared to those millions affected in Europe.
Another unsavoury aspect was that Australia, like Britain and the USA, repressed so-called “enemy aliens” (i.e. people, whether naturalized or not, who had come from, or had ancestry in, countries the Allies were at war with, so here mainly Germans and Italians). Not only were their rights severely restricted, many even ended up in internment camps (cf. the Japanese American Relocation Centers in the USA!). Thus German Jews often found themselves interned together with anti-Semitic German Nazis! I hadn’t known about that aspect, so learning this was a real eye-opener.
On the other hand there was a remarkable act of solidarity triggered by the 1938 November pogroms (“Kristallnacht”) on the part of an Aboriginal elder who led a delegation of the Australian Aborigines’ League to the German consulate in Melbourne where they tried to hand over a petition protesting against the “cruel persecution” of Jews in Germany. This didn’t achieve anything, but I found it remarkable that people who themselves were denied basic human rights at the time so fought in solidarity with Jews at the other end of the globe.
Much of the exhibition consists of classic text-and-photo panels but there are also various artefacts on display, from documents to refugees’ soft toys, and from drawings to victims’ suitcases. Amongst the grimmest objects are rifle cartridges excavated from massacre sites and a blanket woven from human hair (obtained from concentration camp inmates; the blanket was worn by a survivor of Bergen-Belsen at the time of liberation who later donated the item to the museum). A nearby heap of shoes on display, on the other hand, is only a symbolic mock-up.
In addition there are also various interactive stations with touchscreens. For example one provides information about the various groups of victims other than Jews (e.g. homosexuals, Sinti & Roma, Jehovah’s Witnesses, etc.). Another station gives an overview of the different types of camps, of which six are identified: obviously concentration camps and death camps (called “extermination camps” here) but also transit camps, POW camps (see Sandbostel), juvenile camps and euthanasia killing centres (see T4). Delving deeper you can then access details about dozens individual camps, together with quotes from survivors.
One subsection is dedicated specifically to child victims with a whole wall of names, many with photos, quite a few without. Also part of this section is a water feature that is to symbolically stand for tears.
The specific Australian perspective is applied again towards the end of the exhibition with stories about the arrival in Australia of Holocaust survivors and the new lives they forged in Sydney. One subsection features various artefacts that played a personal or practical role in the survival of the individual or family in question.
At the end of the exhibition comes a whole room with the walls covered in death notices in golden letters on black plaques, so it’s like a graveyard or columbarium. Those honoured include both Holocaust victims and survivors who passed away later.
In addition to the main exhibition there is also a separate exhibition with a timeline that charts in parallel a) the development of human rights declarations in the UN, b) equivalent developments in Australia regarding declarations and laws (e.g. with regard to Aborigines’ rights), and c) major human rights violations and genocides over the course of the 20th century (including the Cambodian and Rwandan genocides) and up to the year 2017.
In the centre of the room are circular screens dedicated to various minority groups, and on another wall visitors can leave little slips of paper (blank pieces of paper and pens are provided) in response to questions like “what do human rights mean to you?” or “what can you do to promote human rights?” Responses vary, and include quite a few feeble ones. My “favourite” is one that got itself entangled in grammatical pitfalls: “why do we always do things that hurt each other?” … things hurting other things?!? You can guess what’s actually meant, but it somehow got derailed.
There is also a part for temporary exhibitions, and at the time of my visit (August 2024) it was a photo exhibition entitled “Into the Heartless Light of Darkness” and was based on a collection of photos taken by a photographer with good connections to Israel who was commissioned by the museum to travel to the country to document the aftermath of the 7 October attacks on Israel by Hamas, with mass murder and abductions of Israeli civilians. The photos showed sites of the atrocities as well as new memorials and victims’ relatives’ protests and campaigns. It is not clear, however, for how long this exhibition will remain in place (the website doesn’t state an end date at the time of writing in early December 2024).
Back downstairs there’s also another extra exhibition and memorial room for Jewish veterans of WW1, as well as Jewish Australians’ contributions to later campaigns in the Australian military. The title of this exhibition is “Serving Australia”. Individual panels detail various campaigns these Jewish servicemen were involved in from the Boer Wars to WW1 and WWII and also later operations, e.g. in the Korean and Vietnam Wars, as well as the Gulf Wars and participation in UN peacekeeping missions in various parts of the world. Other panels focus on a range of individuals. One section is devoted to women, another to men who served in ways other than in the armed forces (in so-called “Employment Companies”, e.g. at wharves or railway yards). There’s also a subsection about POWs, and a few objects are on display, including a medical kit and the uniform and medals of a soldier killed in Afghanistan in 2008.
All in all, it’s definitely a worthwhile place to go and visit. Compared to its counterpart in Melbourne, this Sydney museum is perhaps not as rich in terms of original exhibits and hence a bit less graphic, but on the other hand its scope is somewhat wider and goes beyond the Holocaust. The military glorification in the final section is perhaps a little too much for some, though. But what impressed me in particular in the Holocaust exhibition was the focus on those specifically Australian aspects. It was those that I personally learned the most from.
Location: in the Darlinghurst district of Sydney on the corner of Burton Street and Darlinghurst Road.
Google Maps locator: [-33.8790, 151.2203]
Access and costs: not hard to locate; a mid-range admission fee is charged.
Details: From Sydney’s CBD (Central Business District) it’s walkable. From the south-western corner of Hyde Park walk down Oxford Street, then make a turn slight left into Burton Street and carry on until the museum appears on the left-hand side (it’s a ca. 10-15 minute walk). The nearest public transport is provided by bus along Burton Street, either line 311, which has the Green Park stop just round the corner, or line 389 which has a stop at the National Art School (see below) just one block away.
Opening times: Sundays to Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Fridays only to 3 p.m.; closed Saturdays (Sabbath), over Christmas and New Year as well as on various Jewish holidays. There are quite a few of the latter, so it’s advisable to check ahead (best directly on the sydneyjewishmuseum website).
Admission: 18 AUD (various concessions apply). Nominally free for children under 10 years old, yet the museum clearly states that it does not recommend visits by anyone under 11, and that all children should be accompanied by an adult at all times. You can buy tickets in advance online or at the door.
As with almost all such Jewish institutions, security is tight, airport-style, and bags will be searched and must be left in the lockers provided.
The museum also offers guided tours (at no additional charge); these take place regularly at 1 p.m. on weekdays and at 10.30 a.m., 11.30 a.m. and 1.30 p.m. on Sundays. Groups of six people or more should prearrange tours in advance.
Time required: I spent about an hour and a half in this museum, but as I was able to skip certain sections whose content I was already quite familiar with, that may not be wholly representative. If you want to read all there is to read and explore everything that the interactive screens have to offer, then you will certainly need a lot longer, possibly up to half a day.
Combinations with other dark destinations: in general see under Sydney.
The nearest other dark-tourism site featured on this website is the ANZAC Memorial, which is within easy walking distance from the Jewish Museum, and from there it’s also not far to Hyde Park Barracks.
Right across the road to the south-west of the museum is the historic former Darlinghurst Gaol. The interiors are these days occupied by the National Art School, but you can still see the typical prison architecture of the cell blocks, the central observation tower and the grand gate.
Combinations with non-dark destinations: see under Sydney.
