WASHINGTON, January 16, 2010 (WAFA)- Famed architect Frank Gehry pulled out of a plan to build a 'Museum of Tolerance' on top of an ancient Muslim cemetery in Jerusalem, Americans for Peace Now (APN) said, today.

APN repeatedly called on the Simon Wiesenthal Center to move the planned museum to another site. Now that Gehry has backed out we have a new opportunity to get the Wiesenthal Center to do the right thing.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center's insistence, thus far, on building this museum on top of graves is appalling, APN said, this is the same organization that draws its moral authority from the Holocaust, and does its work in the name of a man who worked tirelessly to bring the guilty to justice.

Construction on this site is also dangerous; the opening of a tunnel in Jerusalem's Old City a decade ago inflamed passions that led to unrest in which nearly 100 people died, including 16 Israeli soldiers. This planned museum has already sparked riots.

Frank Gehry's exit from the project provides the Wiesenthal Center a face-saving way to reconsider its plans, APN concluded