The Jewish Hospital in Heinz-Galinski Straße was built in 1914 by the Jewish Community and is the third successive Jewish Hospital in Berlin. The Jewish Hospital is the only institution in the whole of Germany to survive the Nazi terror and is the oldest still-existing establishment founded on a concept developed by people of Jewish belief.

The present Jewish Hospital
Today the Jewish Hospital in Berlin has 340 beds and is an intrinsic part of the Berlin hospital system. In keeping with tradition we are an open and tolerant hospital. Our medical attention, nursing care and social assistance are offered to all those who need our help, regardless of their religion, culture, heritage or colour. For the most part our patients are elderly men and women from the surrounding neighbourhood. Jewish patients come from all corners of the city and often speak Russian.
The relative size of our Hospital ensures an uncomplicated professional cooperation of all Departments. Over 20.000 people are treated each year in our trauma hospital. The specialists of all Departments are available at our Emergency Department around-the-clock. Our services include all important health care areas.

• Surgery:Trauma and Reconstructive Surgery, Orthopedic Surgery,General and Visceral Surgery, Vascular Surgery
• Internal Medicine I: Specializes in the diagnostics and therapeutics of cardiovascular diseases.
• Internal Medicine III: Gastroenterology and diabetology.
• Neurology: Center the treatment of Multiple Sclerosis Treatment.
• Psychiatry: An important focus is the addiction therapy with a long-standing tradition. A further focus is the treatment of depressions.
• The departments are completed by specialists in our medical centers (e.g. Vascular Center, Abdominal Center, Center for Heart Insufficiency).

In 2003 the hospital administration took aver the responsibility for an already-existing neighbourhood personal care home with 130 beds and in so doing strengthened the roots of our hospital in a time of financially-threatened medical facilities.

We are a multicultural hospital. Everywhere in the hospital one is likely to encounter people speaking a language other than German. Turkish and Arabic families populate the neighbourhood and the hospital employs a number of Turkish nurses. The doctors and nurses originate from a variety of countries. Many nurses and some patients are Polish. Several of our medical superintendents and senior doctors are Jewish, some speak Russian or Hebrew. Patients belonging to the Jewish Community recieve special attention from the communities` representatives and social workers. Kosher food is available. Jewish patients have priority, we will always be able to find a bed for them.

Among the important features to be found within the hospital which refer to its Jewish heritage are:

• A statue of Heimz Galinski, a post-war Jewish representative and concentration camp survivor, who won a great deal of respect in Germany for his efforts at reconciliation. His example of civil courage gives us all strength in times when threats of terror are directed against Jewish institutions.
• An inscription on the wall beside the main gate reminds everyone of the many Jewish citizens who passed through the hospital gates only to await deportation to a concentration camp. Every November 9th we meet there together with Berlin residents for a few minutes of silence to think about the horridness of those years.
• In the foyer there is a wall memorial „Remembering the Present“, a documentary of the hospitals history.
• The doorframes to the wards are marked with a Mesusa.
• A Jewish personal care home named after Hermann Strauß occupies part of the administration building. This home belongs to the Jewish Community and one of our Jewish medical supervisors is responsible for medicinal matters within the home. Hanukah, the Festival of Light, is celebrated there with guests at the end of the year with advent wreaths and Hanukah candles.
• As of 20 May 2003 we have a Synagogue on the hospital grounds, rebuilt through the financial efforts of the „Friends of the Jewish Hospital Berlin e.V.“ and open to all.

The Jewish Hospital in Berlin – The Beginnings

The first Jewish Community Hospital was founded in 1756 in Oranienburger Straße. That makes the Jewish Hospital, along the the Charité, the oldest and most historic hospital in Berlin. The original building was four storeys high, with a width of 20 windows and contained twelve rooms. The doctor was Marcus Herz, also known as a philosopher. After some reorganisation the hospital was renamed a „Jewish Community Nursing Institution“ and had as its main task, along with the Charité, the care of the poor, the emphasis being on healing, nursing and helping the needy. In 1857, representatives of the Jewish Community decided to rebuild the hospital with the assistance of Eduard Knoblauch, the architect of the Synagogue in Oranienburg Straße.

The Jewish Hospital in August Straße

The new hospital in August Straße was opened in 1861. In Berlin and throughout Germany the hospital had the reputation of being a modern institution, a leading example in the care of patients as well as teaching and research. Famous doctors such as Ludwig Traube, Bernhard von Largenbeck, Hermann Strauß and James Israel treated patients in this Jewish hospital. Between 1885 and 1900 the population of Berlin increased rapidly from 1,315,000 to 1,888.000. The number of Jews in the city grew from 64,383 to 92,206. Not unlike today, many of the new Jews in the city came from East Block countries, more likely to be poor than wealthy. The number of patients grew correspondingly as well as the spectrum of treatment and knowledge of diseases. Again it was time for a larger hospital, the third such, this being the building you are now visiting.

The Jewish Hospital during the National Socialist Years (1933 – 1945)

Hermann Strauß and Paul Rosenstein are representative of a number of famous doctors who were employed in „Wedding“ after the Nazis came to power in 1933. The tradition of the Jewish Communizty Hospital stopped. The Jews were politically, socially and physically persecuted. The Jewish doctors lost their qualifications to practice medicine and were only allowed to treat Jewish patients.
The hospital was misused as a place to collect and billet Jews prior to sending them on to concentration camps. It was a Ghetto, but also a refuge for hiding people. Up until the end of the war in 1945, the hospital walls are said to have hidden some 800 – 1000 persons. On 11 May 1945 a child was born in the Jewish Hospital, the first sign of things getting back to normal.
After the war Jewish life in Berlin awoke again, but most of the survivors of the Holocaust wanted to leave the city, to leave Germany. The remaining small community was not able to support a hospital with 400 beds. In 1963 the Jewish Hospital became a foundation trust „Stiftung des bürgerlichen Rechts“.

The 250-year history of the Jewish Hospital Berlin symbolises the highs and lows of German – Jewish history and culture in Berlin. Famous names in medical science and research are associated with the Jewish Hospital. The Jewish Hospital is not a memorial. It is much more a place to keep memories alive.