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The square in front of the House of Representatives is to be named after Margot Friedländer next year.
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"It must never happen again": Margot Friedländer worked tirelessly to ensure that it would not be forgotten. (Archive photo)
The square in front of the Berlin State Parliament will be named after Holocaust survivor Margot Friedländer.
This was decided by the Senate at its most recent meeting. The honorary citizen of Berlin died on May 9 at the age of 103. If everything goes according to plan, the square in the heart of Berlin will bear her name by the first anniversary of her death at the latest. Mayor Kai Wegner emphasized: "By naming the previously unnamed square in front of the House of Representatives Margot Friedländer Square, Berlin is sending a powerful message against anti-Semitism, against forgetting – and for democracy and human dignity."
Wegner and Parliament President Cornelia Seibeld had already announced corresponding plans at the end of November. The state parliament then officially adopted the address Margot-Friedländer-Platz 1, Seibeld said when presenting the plans in the House of Representatives. The idea came from the President of the Parliament. It was clear that Friedländer deserved a special honor and a special place, she said. She was not only an honorary citizen of Berlin, but above all a very special, warm-hearted woman who had given generations of schoolchildren in Berlin irreplaceable memories.
Margot Friedländer (1921-2025) came from a Jewish family in Berlin. She was deported by the Nazis to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. After liberation in 1945, she moved to the USA with her husband. It was not until she was 88 that she returned to the German capital. She is buried in the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Weißensee.