Nakba exhibit ‘should be rectified,’ Heritage Minister Marc Miller says

The Canadian Museum for Human Rights in Winnipeg. Photo by Adobe Stock

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Canada’s Heritage Minister has called a new exhibit at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights about displaced Palestinians “regrettable” and “a failure,” adding it “should be rectified.”

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In an interview this week with The Canadian Press, Marc Miller said the newly opened exhibit “Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present” features both errors and omissions in its presentation.

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“There are some words in there that are regrettable,” he told the news organization. “Not identifying Hamas as a terrorist organization is, I think, a failure. And not clearly stating that, for example, Hamas intended to kill Jews is, I think, an unfortunate error in curation and should be rectified.”

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Canada has listed Hamas as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code since November 2002, making it a criminal offence to knowingly participate in or contribute to any activity by Hamas. The group was behind the October 7 attack on Israel in 2023, which killed some 1,200 civilians and soldiers.

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Miller visited the Winnipeg museum last Thursday ahead of the exhibit’s opening on Saturday, and said he was troubled by how it portrayed the conflict that started that day.

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“It isn’t up to me to speak to, or insert myself in, the curation of any particular exhibit,” he said. “But manifestly, you cannot deny the fact that this is an exhibit that is born in controversy — and perhaps some of it could have been avoided.”

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The Nakba — Arabic for “catastrophe” — is the term used for the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war surrounding the creation of the State of Israel. The exhibit, which has been several years in the making, is slated to remain open until Nov. 30, 2028.

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Jewish groups in Canada have already raised concerns over what they perceive as a one-sided narrative. In May, Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center announced it had sent a legal demand letter to the museum’s board of trustees and senior leadership.

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“Publicly funded institutions have a responsibility to approach contested historical issues with fairness, balance, and intellectual integrity,” Shurat HaDin president Nitsana Darshan-Leitner said in a statement.

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“A national human rights museum cannot become a platform for politicized narratives that risk contributing to division and misunderstanding, including here by erasing Jewish history, delegitimizing Jewish self-determination, or contributing to hostility against the Jewish community.”

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In a statement released yesterday, Noah Shack, CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs remarked: “The exhibit has broken trust between the Museum and Canadians. It is not only a failure of curation, but a failure of leadership.” He added: “Now that the exhibit is open, it is clear why museum staff and leadership went to such extraordinary lengths to prevent meaningful scrutiny by the Board of Trustees.”