Pennsylvania State Rep. Mark Gillen is pushing forward with plans to build a Holocaust museum in Berks County in the face of growing antisemitism.
The Republican lawmaker is determined to create an educational center despite facing threats and opposition.
Gillen, who has represented Pennsylvania’s 128th district, in the state’s Amish country, since 2010, recently traveled to Israel with the Jerusalem-based Harel Association, which works to help teenage immigrants from the former Soviet Union integrate into Israeli society.
During his visit, he volunteered on military bases, packing first aid kits and food parcels to support soldiers amid manpower shortages.
The Republican legislator, who is Christian, also toured Christian sites in Jerusalem’s Old City and visited the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem.
“I’m enjoying Israel very, very much. It is a very spiritual land,” Gillen said. “I’m encouraging people and lifting their spirits because I stand up for them abroad.”
The Pennsylvania representative’s commitment to preserving history extends beyond his recent trip. Gillen founded the Berks Military History Museum in Mohnton, Pennsylvania, which houses World War II artifacts.
Encouraged by the public interest in the Holocaust section of his military museum, Gillen is focusing on a new project: The Berks Holocaust Museum and Education Center. Set to be built in 2025, the museum will be funded by community contributions.
All the artifacts for the museum were loaned or bought, mainly from Europe. So far, he has acquired Warsaw Ghetto Stars of David and concentration camp uniforms. He is in the market for a WWII train car and intends to go to antique shops in Poland in the future. Josh Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania since 2023 and a friend of Gillen, has expressed his support for the project.
“I wasn’t expecting the efforts of antisemites to shut down my project,” Gillen said. The opposition became so severe that a bomb squad was placed on standby during the ceremonial groundbreaking in 2021. Following the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, Gillen faced further harassment after publishing a commentary supporting Israel and condemning Hamas in a local paper.
Online, Gillen was targeted with antisemitic slurs and Holocaust denial comments such as, “You f**king Jew piece of sh*t” and “Shove your fake Holocaust up your ass.”
“Because I’m a public official, you have to live with this,” he lamented. “They want to get inside your head, and I won’t let them. It only validated that we should be doing this.”
Gillen’s stance against antisemitism extends to his political actions. He recently removed state funding from the University of Pennsylvania, calling it a “hub of antisemitism.” The lawmaker said it was entirely unacceptable to “give taxpayer dollars to schools allowing these protests to go on in violation of their own rules of hate speech and threats.”
When approached by the university administration about restoring funding, Gillen responded, “Not unless you enforce policy changes.”
The representative also commented on the recent shooting at the Trump rally in Pennsylvania, “It hit close to home because my secretary was sitting right behind Trump where the bullets hit, and my good friends Congressman Dan Meuser and Senate candidate Dave McCormick were there.
“Assassinations are sadly a part of U.S. history, and we need to ratchet down the rhetoric that ‘the other party is the enemy’ and visceral hatred for someone on the other side of the aisle. It is a problem,” Gillen said.
He emphasized his approach to politics, saying, “When I ran for office, I never discussed my competitor; it is just not who I am. But unfortunately, this is the exception, not the rule regarding politicians.”
Originally published by Israel Hayom.