Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem
The Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem () is the Simon Wiesenthal Center-planned Museum of Tolerance at the center of West Jerusalem between Zion Square and the neighborhood of Mamilla. The project was re-designed on a more modest scale than originally planned. The construction started in 2004, where Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger was invited to break ground on 30 April, and is still continuing. The three-acre, 185,000 square foot campus is scheduled to open in 2023. The completed project will include two main museum exhibitions, a children's museum, conference center, a 500-seat banquet  hall, an 800-seat lecture hall, a 1,000-seat outdoor amphitheater, two viewing theaters, as well as other accommodations and exhibits. Design. The first design for the Center was originally designed by Frank Gehry, was to include a museum, a theater, a conference hall, a library, and an educational center. The design of the Center had been seen as unique for Israel and, as such, has been met with many opponents and proponents. The center was subsequently designed, on a more modest scale, by the Yigal Levy architects' office in Jerusalem in cooperation with the Aedas British-Singapore architectural firm  Building. Those who are in favor of the Center, including former Jerusalem mayor Uri Lupolianski, maintain that it will bring tourists to the city, while its opponents (excluding the Muslim gravesite objection) argue that it will stand out and draw attention away from the traditional architecture of neighboring streets and that of the city in general. Former deputy mayor of Jerusalem Meron Benvenisti has said that the museum's "geometric forms that can't be any more dissonant to the environment in which it is planned to put this alien object." Location controversy. The museum's building on a part  of the ground of what was once the corner of a Muslim cemetery, but which since the 1960s has been a parking lot, faced criticism from many Palestinians, Muslims around the world, and some Israeli and American Jews. The Mamilla Cemetery, of which a part of the project will be built over, contains the graves of Islamic figures, as well as several Mamluk tombs. The SWC asserts that the cemetery was long ago deconsecrated by Islamic leaders, and that secular Arab leaders prior to the creation of the State of Israel had planned various development projects there. After controversy concerning  its location on part of the land of a burial site came to head, its construction was frozen by a Supreme Court order issued in February 2006. In November 2008, the Israeli Supreme Court decided to allow construction to proceed, noting that this corner of the cemetery had been transformed into a parking lot "as long ago as the 1960s" and that Jerusalem has been inhabited for roughly 4,000 years, and many ancient sites have been built over. Construction had been stayed several times by the courts before allowing it to continue. In autumn 2008, the Israeli Supreme Court cleared  the way for the project. The Muslim groups who initiated the legal action which resulted in the Supreme Court order to freeze all construction had been undergoing mediation with representatives of the Center. Former Supreme Court president Meir Shamgar served as the mediator.