Family of donor who helped establish Canadian Museum for Human Rights to pause support over Palestine exhibit

Gail Asper, whose father Izzy Asper helped conceive and finance the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) in Winnipeg, said her family will stop funding the museum over concerns about the exhibition Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present, which runs until 30 November 2028. In a CBC Radio interview aired Monday, 27 July, Asper said the show lacks context, citing the absence of information about the UN’s 1947 partition plan, Jews displaced from Arab lands, and Hamas’s 7 October 2023 hostage-taking. Asper said the Asper Foundation donated more than C$23 million (about $16.3 million) toward the museum’s construction and that she personally contributed another C$1.4 million (about $1 million), but she has now indefinitely paused a C$50,000 (about $35,500) donation intended to expand Holocaust-program staffing. The CMHR said the paused funds will not affect current exhibits or programming, confirmed it has not received Asper Foundation funding since 2023, and added that the Palestine exhibition has also brought support from new donors.

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