Boston Dedicates Interactive Digital Tour at New England Holocaust Memorial

BOSTON — July 22, 2026 — Boston leaders dedicate digital upgrades to the New England Holocaust Memorial amid a surge in local antisemitic violence. Governor Charlie Baker and Mayor Kim Janey joined Holocaust survivors, clergy, and civic leaders Wednesday at the six-tower memorial on Congress Street to launch a new interactive mobile tour and rebuilt website featuring a global virtual walk-through, funded by the Kraft Family Foundation's Final Whistle on Hate Initiative and the Ingersoll-Brown Fund. The ceremony came days after a rabbi was stabbed eight times outside a Brighton synagogue and two residents were murdered in Winthrop in what authorities described as a racially and antisemitically motivated attack. Jeremy Burton, Executive Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, said the project — planned more than two years ago — "could not be more appropriate" given recent events. Holocaust survivor Janet Singer Applefield and Addison Dion, granddaughter of the late memorial co-founder Stephen Ross, spoke on the urgency of digital preservation as the survivor generation diminishes. Roger Brooks, President and CEO of Facing History and Ourselves, cited a "significantly diminishing" knowledge of the Holocaust among young Americans as a direct driver of rising antisemitic incidents.