Holocaust and Human Rights Center

We believe that by engaging with the complexities of the past through personal and collective narratives, we can empower a new generation to protect the integrity and dignity of all human beings.

The HHRC bridges the gap between historical scholarship and community action. We actively host survivors, scholars, and experts to ensure that history remains a living dialogue and a shared story within our classrooms and the broader Middlesex County community. Through symposiums, interactive programming, and strategic partnerships, the Center addresses the most pressing human rights issues of our time by analyzing the historical patterns that lead to genocidal ideologies and injustices.

Our ultimate goal is to transform historical awareness into a powerful tool for empathy and social justice. By fostering a more tolerant and just global community, the HHRC continues the legacy of its founders—using the stories of the past to build a world where the rights of all people are recognized and protected.

Featured Exhibits and Initiatives

Survivor Voices Project

Launching next year, this initiative will focus on documenting and preserving the stories of second and third-generation Holocaust survivors.

Voices of Perth Amboy

An ongoing oral history project dedicated to preserving local community narratives and institutional history.

Art from the Holocaust – Yad Vashem Exhibit

In an upcoming collaboration co-sponsored with the JCC, Middlesex College will host Art from the Holocaust, a powerful traveling exhibition from Yad Vashem. Created by Jewish artists in hiding, ghettos, and concentration camps between 1939 and 1945, these historic artworks serve as a living testimony of survival and a profound declaration of the indomitable human spirit.

Past HHRC Events

A Town Known As Auschwitz: The Life and Death of a Jewish Community

This poignant exhibition, created by the Museum of Jewish Heritage: A Living Memorial to the Holocaust, depicted the vibrant, lesser-known Jewish history of Oświęcim—the Polish town the Nazis would rename Auschwitz. This campus event was proudly funded by an Action Grant from the New Jersey Council for the Humanities.

Voices and Votes: Democracy in America

Middlesex College hosted this immersive Smithsonian Institution traveling exhibition that brought critical conversations about civil and voting rights directly to the campus community. Through the innovative curriculum of their Community Engaged Learning course, Middlesex students were able to construct the displays and participate in training in historical content and public speaking to serve as the exhibition’s official docents.

Darfur: The Forgotten Genocide

Niemat Ahmadi, genocide survivor and founder of the Darfur Women Action Group, will tell her story and talk about the ongoing struggle to end the genocide in Darfur. The genocide in Darfur, Sudan has been ongoing since 2003 and shows no sign of stopping, with more than 480,000 people killed and 2.8 million displaced. As an eyewitness to atrocities, Niemat Ahmadi has worked to bring awareness to the massive human rights abuses and the genocide in Darfur, fleeing Sudan only after two attempts on her life.

Surviving Auschwitz: The True Story of a Young Prisoner During the Holocaust

Michael Bornstein is one of the youngest survivors of the Auschwitz death camp. At the age of four, he managed to evade murder in the most notorious death camp of The Holocaust. Recently, Mr. Bornstein and his daughter Debbie Bornstein Holinstat wrote the book Survivors Club detailing his incredible story. Both will recount Mr. Bornstein’s story of being a prisoner at Auschwitz.