A daycare in Germany called Anne Frank Kindergarten is set to be renamed due to parents with “migrant backgrounds” finding it difficult to explain its significance to their children, The European Conservative reports.
The parents started a petition to change the name of the kindergarten, located in Tangerhütte, which has been named after Frank for 53 years.
Employees as well as the head of the daycare were also reportedly in favor of changing the name to something more “child-friendly” and “better suited to their concept.”
They claimed that the Anne Frank name was no longer aligned with the daycare’s “new focus on diversity” and that explaining the history of the name to children has been difficult for them.
The mayor of Tangerhütte Andreas Brohm stated the facility will likely be renamed “World Explorers” and claimed the discussions for the name change began before Hamas brutally attacked Israel on Oct. 7, inciting war and leading to worldwide chaos from pro-Hamas activists.
“Tangerhütte, with its educational institutions and all its civic engagement, stands for an open-minded Germany,” he said.
It is unknown if the parents who began the petition were Muslim, however, Germany has seen hundreds of thousands of Muslims enter the country due to the European migration crisis that began in 2015.
The head of the Jewish community in Saxony-Anhalt, Max Privorozki wrote in a statement to Politico: “With all due respect to the conceptual changes of the institution and the fact that the story (not a fairy tale, but a true story) of the [Anne Frank] is difficult to grasp for small children (it was just as difficult to grasp a year ago and 50 years ago), this name change creates an unpleasant aftertaste right now.”
He encouraged the parents “with a migration background” to read Anne Frank’s diaries.
Economy minister of Saxony-Anhalt, Sven Schulze, called the proposal “completely absurd, instinctive and small-minded.”
He said his party “will of course not agree to the renaming of the Anne Frank daycare centre. I hope all the other councillors won’t either.”
