FAQS for Visitors

Welcome to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority.

The first tour described here is designed for visitors planning a 3-hour visit to Yad Vashem. Those coming by car, or those who plan to stay for a longer period, can scroll down for tours that also include other sites.

At the Information Desk, located in the Visitors’ Center, you can obtain further material about different tour routes, and purchase a map for a minimal fee. You can also download a map by clicking here.

Yad Vashem is situated on Har Hazikaron (the Mount of Remembrnace) in Jerusalem, adjacent to Mt. Herzl. Yad Vashem can be reached via Herzl Boulevard, Kiryat Hayovel Street or Ein Kerem Street (map). After passing through the entrance gate and then the bus parking lot on your right, you will reach the Entrance Plaza. If you came by car, you can park in the underground car park, the entrance to which is located about 10m away from the Entrance Plaza.

We suggest that you begin your visit with Yad Vashem’s new Visitors’ Center, or Mevoah, situated at the entrance to the Yad Vashem site. The ground floor level of the Visitors’ Center serves as a meeting and gathering place, and an information and orientation center. Staff members at two information stations supply material on different tour routes, and maps can be purchased for a minimal fee. All four sides of the Mevoah look out onto different sites within the complex, and the views of Jerusalem beyond. On the lower ground floor, with its panoramic view of the valley, you will find toilet facilities and the dairy Cafeteria. Yad Vashem’s bookstore - the Book and Resource Center, is located to the right of the Visitors’ Center, and offers a wide range of books, media tools and mementoes.

Upon exiting the Visitors’ Center, you will walk onto the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations – an avenue of trees planted in honor of those non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust. The first tree on the right of the avenue was planted in honor of Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat who saved the lives of tens of thousands of Jews in Budapest in 1944-45. A few steps further along on the same side, but on the second row of trees, you will see the tree planted in honor of Oskar Schindler.

Looking leftwards, in the direction of the slope, you will notice the entrance to the new Holocaust History Museum – a triangular prism-like building of exposed concrete that transects the mountain. The wooden entrance bridge will lead you down into the new museum. The Holocaust History Museum tells the story of the Holocaust from a uniquely Jewish perspective, using original artifacts, documents, testimonies, films, diaries, letters and works of art, with a strong emphasis on the personal stories of individual victims. As you approach the end of the museum (we recommend that you allow at least 2 hours for a tour of the museum) go into the new Hall of Names, where the names of approximately 3 million Holocaust victims are commemorated (the campaign to collect the names of Holocaust victims continues to this day). The museum’s exit opens up dramatically onto a panoramic view of Jerusalem. Turn left into the Square of Hope, a good spot for rest and reflection. You can also buy refreshments at the cafeteria in the square.
The Holocaust Art Museum is situated on the east side of the Square of Hope. This museum, the largest of its kind in the world, contains approximately 8,000 works of art, the majority of which are from the Holocaust period. Upon exiting the Holocaust Art Museum, turn left into the Exhibitions Pavilion. For those of you visiting with young or teenage children, we recommend the Learning Center and the Visual Center. The Learning Center is fitted with computer terminals and earphones enabling individual or paired study. Here, visitors can see, hear and read opinions on the “major questions” expressed by Holocaust survivors, religious leaders and thinkers, writers, artists, historians and prominent researchers. In the Visual Center, you can watch documentaries and films on the Holocaust. You can also choose from thousands of taped testimonies collected by Yad Vashem, and the testimony collection of the Survivors of the Holocaust Visual History Foundation. In the synagogue, situated across from the Holocaust Art Museum, you will see Torah Arks and religious artifacts from synagogues destroyed or damaged during the Holocaust. The synagogue is an functioning house of prayer for those wishing to hold memorial ceremonies or pray. Go up the escalator or elevator to the Hall of Remembrance. Visitors from all over the world come here to pay their respects to the victims of the Holocaust, and to identify with their memory. An Eternal Flame burns at the center of the memorial, next to which lies a crypt containing ashes of Holocaust victims brought from the death camps.

On the other side of the Hall of Remembrance, continuing on the same path, you will see a grey pillar towering above all the other buildings at Yad Vashem. This Pillar of Heroism pays tribute to the courage of all those who fought against the Nazis. Walk a few steps further and you will reach the last stop on your tour: the Children’s Memorial. This unique monument commemorates the approximately one and a half million children who were murdered in the Holocaust. The flickering memorial candles are reflected infinitely in the darkened space, creating the impression of millions of stars shining in the firmament. The names, ages and places of birth of murdered children can be heard in the background.

As you emerge from the Children’s Memorial, turn right into Janusz Korczak Square. The sculpture depicts the Polish Jewish educator, Janusz Korczak, who ran an orphanage in the Warsaw ghetto, standing in the center of a group of children and holding them in a protective embrace. The path continues from the square and then splits off to the left, leading to the Visitors’ Center and out of Yad Vashem.

Upon exiting the Children’s Memorial, go down the steps to the road that encircles Yad Vashem*. On your right, you will see the Hall of Remembrance, and on the right, the exit of the Holocaust History Museum. Cross the road and go down towards the large and impressive monument whose massive stones create a space in the form of a Star of David, pierced through the middle by a sword. This Memorial to the Jewish Soldiers and Partisans was built to mark the 40^th anniversary of the Allied victory over Nazi Germany, and pays tribute to the one and a half million Jewish fighters and partisans who fought against the Nazis and their collaborators.

From there, walk down the steps on your right, pass the giant vase sculpture and turn left with the path towards the Partisans’ Panorama. At the center of this look-out point you will see a sculpture in the form of a tree, which bustles with life in the form of hundreds of figures – men, women and children – camouflaged amongst its many branches. The partisans depended on the forests as a place of refuge and shelter, the hiding places afforded by the trees offering a chance for survival. To the right of the Panorama, you will notice steps leading down into the woods. Amongst the trees you can find wooden huts resembling those in which the partisan fighters hid while in the forests (highly recommended for groups with children). Return to the Panorama and join the path that leads down the mountain to the Valley of the Communities. Visitors with cars can reach the Valley of the Communities by road (map). This monumental site is built in the form of a labyrinth, with courtyards and pathways, openings and dead ends. The names of over five thousand communities that were destroyed or barely survived the Nazi onslaught are engraved on its towering walls – a monument to the Jewish world that once flourished, and is no more.

After visiting the Valley of the Communities, follow the road up to the Garden of the Righteous Among the Nations, and from there, climb up the winding path to the Memorial to the Deportees. An original cattle-car stands at the center of the memorial site. Appropriated by the German Railway authorities it was one of the many to be used by the Nazis to transport Jews to the death camps. The memorial is built on an iron track that juts out from the slopes of Yad Vashem into the Judean hillside, suspended between Heaven and earth. The cattle-car is perched on the edge of the severed track, paused on the brink of the abyss. Although symbolizing the journey towards annihilation and oblivion, facing as it does the hills of Jerusalem, the memorial also conveys the Jewish people’s return to life after the Holocaust.

From the cattle car, follow the road and then turn left. After a bend in the road, you will see the Swedish Ambulance on your right. Keep going back up in the direction of the Hall of Remembrance. From there, follow the road, pass the Pillar of Heroism and go down to the road that curves right, leading to the Visitors’ Center, the parking lot and out of Yad Vashem.

We recommend that those visitors with cars exit Yad Vashem via the road that encircles Yad Vashem, thereby passing several more sites on the way out.

Route:
Upon exiting the underground parking lot, turn left and follow the road turning left. You will drive past the Children’s Memorial on your left, and will see the panoramic view on your right. As you continue, you will cross the new Holocaust History Museum, and will be able to see the tip of the museum structure bursting from the mountain and opening up onto a majestic vista of the Jerusalem hills. You will then pass the Memorial to the Jewish Soldiers and Partisans, and after a bend in the road, you will see the Swedish Ambulance on your left. This was one of 36 Swedish buses that entered Germany during the war and took approximately 27,000 prisoners including several thousand Jews, from the concentration camps. Keep following the signs to the exit. If you drive slowly, you will see two monuments on your left, that were established in tribute to Le Chambon (France) and Nieuwlande (Netherlands), two villages whose entire populations worked to save hundreds of Jews during the Holocaust. From there, turn left to exit Yad Vashem, or right to reach the Valley of the Communities. (map)

* Visitors interested in submitting archival material, or in looking at archival material and/or books on the Holocaust are invited to visit the Archives and Library, the world’s most comprehensive repositories of documentary material and books on the Holocaust. The entrance to the Archives and Library is from the Family Plaza (see map).

Walking Tour of Yad Vashem Complex