(26 Jul 2007) SHOTLIST
1. Wide exterior of Jewish Community Centre
2. Security barriers outside centre
3. Pan from construction workers to wall
4. Various of workers building wall
5. Close-up of drill machine
6. Wide pan of wall
7. Close-up of part of wall
8. SOUNDBITE: (English) Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, executive director of Jewish Centre:
"Exact replica of the Western wall in Jerusalem. It's not supposed to be a substitute. The Western wall is the Western wall, people go there to pray. When people see this they remind themselves and they get inspired. This wall, this stone is actually from Jerusalem and Hebron, it's the original stone. No two stones in the Western Wall are alike."
9. Cutaway of workers building wall
10. SOUNDBITE: (English) Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, executive director of Jewish Centre:
"We believe that in the centre of Germany which was once the essence of evil and darkness, we will bring light, we have to set a positive example that here we will once again rebuild, re-establish and renew Jewish life and spirit."
11. Low shot of wall
12. Wide interior of synagogue
13. Close-up of Talmud (Jewish book)
14. Wide interior of synagogue, pan up to ceiling with window
STORYLINE:
An accurate replica of Jerusalem's Western Wall, Judaism's holiest site, is under construction in the German capital as part of a new 6 (m) million US dollar Jewish Community Centre.
The 100-square-metre replica will be part of Szloma Albam House, which is set to open on 2 September.
The project began when a team from the Chabad-Lubavitch organisation travelled to Jerusalem to photograph a section of the Western Wall, famous for the tradition of inserting tiny prayers on paper into its many cracks.
Almost 19 tons of "Jerusalem Gold" sandstone quarried in the region arrived in Berlin on 11 July and have since been chiselled and installed to match the photographs.
The complete replica, located in the centre's entrance, will also include identical plants sprouting from the cracks.
The Western Wall replica is not meant to be used for worship, but as a symbol and reminder of the centre's mission.
"The Western wall is the Western wall, people go there to pray. When people see this they remind themselves and they get inspired," the centre's executive director, Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, told AP Television on Wednesday.
He said the centre was a symbolic part of making Berlin a central hub of Jewish life again.
"We believe that in the centre of Germany which was once the essence of evil and darkness, we will bring light, we have to set a positive example that here we will once again rebuild, re-establish and renew Jewish life and spirit," Teichtal said.
The Szloma Albam House, located on Muenstersche Strasse in Berlin's Charlottenburg neighbourhood, has been under construction for three years.
Though opening officially on 2 September, its synagogue is already open for worship and classes are being held amid construction noise.
More than 30 rabbis from around the world and high-ranking German officials will attend the opening.
Teichtal, a native of Brooklyn, New York, whose grandfather's family was killed in the Holocaust, stressed that the centre was meant for everyone, including non-Jews.
Along with a synagogue, Szloma Albam House will have a kosher restaurant, a tourist welcome centre, a library and media centre, conference
centre, seminary, youth lounge, shop, and a top-of-the-line mikvah, or ritual bath.
Ninety percent of the centre's funding was raised within Berlin's Jewish community.
Soviet Union.
Some 560-thousand Jews lived in Germany before the Holocaust.
Find out more about AP Archive: [ Ссылка ]
Twitter: [ Ссылка ]
Facebook: [ Ссылка ]
Instagram: [ Ссылка ]
You can license this story through AP Archive: [ Ссылка ]
