The West German government will sponsor a center for German studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Bernhard Doell of the Ministry of Science and Research announced here.
He said it would be heavily subsidized by the federal government, which has increased its budget for such undertakings worldwide.
There has been a department of German studies at the Hebrew University for more than 20 years. The new center will include research in the German language, literature and German history.
The Bonn government sponsors similar centers in London, Paris, Rome, Florence and Washington.
Ten years ago, such an undertaking in Israel would have been unthinkable, for historical and political reasons.
But times have changed. One indication is the success of the German cultural center in Tel Aviv, with a branch in Jerusalem.
Unlike similar West German institutions abroad, the Tel Aviv center went for years under the name “Cultural Center,” without advertising its nationality for fear of stimulating negative emotions.
Five years ago, the center was renamed the Goethe Institute, which identified it as a branch of the worldwide, state-financed institution, based in Munich, for the promotion of the German language and general knowledge about Germany abroad.
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