The Jewish tour of Berlin is a one day tour (walking, biking or with a car) that takes between 3 to 5 hours, in which we will cover the story of Berlins Jews from the early Jewish settlements in the region to its ultimate destruction in the 1940s.

Stumbling blocks in Berlin

The tour can take a few forms depending on you preferences and time.

The tour will begin in agreed upon starting point. We could start in the center of the city and have look at the Gendarmenmarkt and talk about the beginning of Jewish settlement in Berlin. We could continue to the former textile district where we will see a monument to Jewish businesses that were destroyed during the third Reich, we would have a look at the square where the first book burning took place and experience the museum island with its infamous past as a Nazi party rallying grounds. We could then continue to have a walk in the old Jewish quarter, see the old Jewish cemetery of Berlin (opened 1671), we will learn about Jewish life underground during the 1940s in the “Otto Weidt” museum and workshop for the blind, the Jewish boy and girl school and the “AHAVA” orphanage in the Auguststraße, the impressive new synagogue (built 1866), the stage of the womens protest in the Rose street (Rosenstraße) as well as other monuments relating to past Jewish life in Berlin.

Additions to the main tour:

The train station monument “Platform 17”

Platform 17 a platform in the Grunewald train station from which the Jewish community of Berlin was sent to the death camps. At the platform we will see the many different types of commemorations that took place over the last 30 years. The memorials on site might give us some insight to the ever changing German culture of memory.

Places of memory in the Bavarian quarter

The exhibition “Places of memory” in the Bavarian quarter chronicles anti Jewish persecution in the 30s and 40s by the use of street signs in a “normal” middle class neighborhood of Berlin.

Other sites that could be added to the tour are: The monument to the murdered Jews of Europe, the museum – Topography of terror in the former headquarters of the SS and Gestapo and the monument for the Kindertransport in Train station Freidrichstraße.

New synagogue 1866

This tour is a low effort walking tour. We will be using public transport to reach some of the sites. A coffee/lunch break can be included. The tour is also open to young adults and people with disabilities.

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