Screenshot oude website Joods Monument. Ontwerp en ontwikkeling door Mediamatic.
A person "lives on" as long as memories of him or her are preserved. During the Shoah, more than 100,000 Dutch Jews were murdered, of whom only vague or no memories remain. Children who survived the war often had little or no idea of their parental family, and grandchildren had no idea what their grandparents were like.
This was the inspiration for a digital monument for the Jewish community in the Netherlands: to paint a picture of the Jewish community, Jewish families, and individual Jews on the eve of the deportations.
The Digital Monument to the Jewish Community in the Netherlands was initiated in 2000 by historian and emeritus professor Isaac Lipschits (1930-2008). The project was funded by a contribution from the Dutch Association of Insurers. A foundation was established to manage the finances and oversee the implementation. Commissioned by this foundation, the International Institute of Social History compiled a digital monument. The website was designed and built by Mediamatic and went online in April 2005. In March 2006, the site was transferred to the Jewish Historical Museum. Since then, the JHM has managed and maintained the monument.
In September 2010, the Jewish Monument Community was launched in addition to the Digital Monument. The Community was funded by the Stichting Collectieve Maror-gelden Nederland (Collective Maror Funds Foundation Netherlands) and by the European Union's Active European Remembrance program. Mediamatic was again the web agency that created the site.
Since 2013, the monument has formally been part of the Jewish Historical Museum.
In 2016, the Digital Monument Jewish Community website and the Jewish Monument Community were replaced by a new website, the Jewish Monument: joodsmonument.nl. The renovation was made possible by a grant from the Claims Conference, the Nora Salomons Fund, the BankGiro Loterij, and the B.A. Kok legacy. Driebit designed and built the renovated Jewish Monument.
In 2017, the online Jewish Monument won the prestigious European Design Award.
In 2025, it underwent another overhaul. The design was brought more in line with other digital manifestations of the Jewish Cultural Quarter. Furthermore, the user experience was improved, and family relationships were more prominently displayed on the victim pages. The name was also changed from Jewish Monument to Digital Jewish Monument. This was to make it more distinct from other monuments.
