WARSAW, Poland (JTA) — Polish Culture Minister Bogdan Zdrojewski and Warsaw Mayor Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz were awarded the Irena Sendler Memorial Award.

The award is given by the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture. Wednesday’s ceremony was held at the Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

Zdrojewski said at the ceremony that the museum is the most important embassy of two nations – Polish and Jewish. “The embassy which has also another important purpose – education. It should also be the university of empathy, sensitivity, tolerance, openness, history.”

“I was very determined to build this museum. It seemed to me that it would be a very special place of communion and reconciliation,” said Gronkiewicz-Waltz.

During the ceremony, Shana Penn, executive director of the Taube Foundation, received the Knight’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland.

Since 2008, the Irena Sendler Memorial Award has been given to Poles who have contributed to the preservation of Jewish heritage and the promotion of Jewish culture in Poland.

Previous recipients include: Janusz Makuch, director of Jewish Culture Festival in Krakow; Jan Jagielski, chief archivist of Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw; former Polish president Aleksander Kwaśniewski; Righteous Among the Nations honoree Magdalena Grodzka-Guzkowska; Prof. Maria Janion of the Institute of Literary Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw; and Dr. Jolanta Ambrosewicz-Jacobs of Jagiellonian University in Krakow.