Award-winning architect Frank Gehry is no stranger to international acclaim for his remarkable designs. This week, however, he should be applauded for what he is not doing. That’s because he announced he will not build the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem, according to the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz.

The center was to be placed on the site of a former Muslim cemetery in Jerusalem’s city center. While part of that land is already a parking lot, there still are some nearby Muslim graves, which is adjacent to a well-traveled park. Placing this structure here is simply incongruent with the center’s desire of spreading the broader moral messages of the Holocaust.

For the record, Mr. Gehry announced that he was withdrawing due to a request by the center to reduce the building’s scope as well as financial disagreements. Americans for Peace Now quickly wondered about that explanation. “The exit from the project of its celebrity architect offers Israel and the SWC a wonderful face-saving opportunity—a chance to change course and come up with a new plan on a new site,” noted Lara Friedman, APN’s director of policy and government relations.

Regardless, this setback for the Wiesenthal Center should serve to increase the pressure on it to select a new sight in the city – and potentially find Israeli Arab partners to ensure that such an error does not occur again.