The museum closed during the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK and reopened for two days a week in July 2021, but visitor numbers and income did not recover.

[7] The museum housed a major international-level collection of Jewish ceremonial art including the Lindo lamp, an early example of a British Hanukkah menorah.

[8] The building included a gallery entitled Judaism: A Living Faith, displaying the museum's noted collection of Jewish ceremonial art.

This collection had been awarded "designated" status by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council in recognition of its outstanding national importance.

[8] The museum's Holocaust Gallery included items and filmed survivor testimony from Leon Greenman,[9] who was one of the few British subjects to be interned in the death camps section at Auschwitz.