Jewish Museum Berlin Ends Collaboration with Guide Udi Raz for Referring to the Human Rights Situation in the West Bank as ‘Apartheid’ During a Museum Tour

On October 25, 2023, the Jewish Museum Berlin ended its collaboration with freelance Israeli tour guide Udi Raz for describing the human rights situation in the West Bank as ‘apartheid’ during a tour.

Raz worked for the museum since April 2023 as a guide specializing in Jewish people in Germany after 1945. During tours, she led visitors through the Israel Room, a section of the museum devoted to relations between Jewish people, Israel and Germany. “There, I describe the different attitudes of the two states and their bilateral relations, starting from the 1950s until 2008 [...] when Angela Merkel declared the protection of Israel to be a ‘matter of state’ [‘reason of state’; Staatsräson] for Germany.”

She also shared her own experiences as a Jewish Israeli now living in Germany. “I tell them I come from Haifa, and then ask: ‘Where is Haifa?’ Visitors usually say either Israel, or Palestine, or both. I emphasize that it’s absolutely fine for me that the place I come from has more than one name, because many Palestinian people also live in Haifa.” She spoke about the West Bank and shared personal experiences of demonstrating there with Palestinians against the border wall. She discussed discrimination, including how she, a Jewish Israeli, could cross the wall but Palestinians could not, and how Palestinians were barred from political participation in the Occupied Territories. It was in this context that she referred to reports by organizations such as Amnesty International which describe this reality as an ‘apartheid system’. Raz had been using this term in her tours since starting her job at the museum.

Shortly after October 7, the museum published a statement positioning itself clearly in support of Israel. It assured workers however that they were still allowed to talk about ‘tricky’ subjects, and that they shouldn’t be afraid – even if their views differed from those expressed by the museum. It came as a surprise, therefore, when on October 25 Raz was informed she would receive no further commissions due to her use of the term ‘apartheid.’

Since then Raz has spoken out in multiple interviews about her dismissal and accusations of antisemitism leveled against those who criticize Israel, including Jewish people like herself: “[...] in a situation like the one we are seeing right now, the masks just fall. [...] We know exactly who stands on the side of international law, who stands for humanism, who recognizes human rights – including those of non-Jewish people. And the way in which accusations of antisemitism are dealt with is in itself antisemitic – for example, the claim that Jewish people are not able to imagine a future in which they can live in peace with Palestinians.”