Germany: SPD expresses outrage over neo-Nazi marches in Dortmund

Via DW:

Opposition politicians heavily criticized the conditions in Dortmund that led to neo-Nazi groups spontaneously marching uninhibited through the streets of the city.

The Social Democrats (SPD) on Sunday slammed both the Dortmund police and the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia, which is controlled by Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU).

"What has the state government done to distance itself from the ugly scenes of that evening, to stop them, and to protect our constitution?" the SPD wrote in its letter to state Interior Minister Herbert Reul, according to the Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung daily.

The lawmakers were especially flabbergasted because the far-right scene in Dortmund is so well known to police and has been surveilled by authorities for years.

However, on Friday, two different neo-Nazi rallies took place. Footage showed about 100 extremists who paraded through the streets holding flags of the pre-World War I German empire. They used pyrotechnics and shouted slogans like "Whoever loves Germany is an anti-Semite," and "National Socialism now!"

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France: Anti-semitic graffiti on apartment door shocks Paris

Via The Local:

Anti-semitic graffiti reading "Jewish scum live here", that was scrawled on the door of a Paris apartment building has caused shock and anger in the French capital and led to the police launching an investigation.

French police said Thursday they had launched an investigation after anti-semitic graffiti was scrawled on the door of a Paris apartment building.

"Jewish scum live here," read the graffiti, on a building in the 18th arrondissement in the north of the capital. "Notably on the third floor," it added on the other side of the door, above a drawing of a target.

A photo of the graffiti was circulating on Twitter Thursday, and a woman living in the building filed a formal complaint with the police.

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Swiss Holocaust denier Gaston Amaudruz died aged 97

Via Wikipedia:

Gaston-Armand "Guy" Amaudruz (21 December 1920 – 7 September 2018) was a Swiss neo-fascist political philosopher and Holocaust denier.

Initially a supporter of the Swiss fascist movement of Arthur Fonjallaz, he came to wider attention in 1949 when he published Ubu Justicier au Premier Procès de Nuremberg, one of the first works to question the veracity of the Holocaust.  Increasingly active in neo-fascism, he organized conferences in Malmö in 1951 which led to the formation of a pan-European nationalist group known as the European Social Movement and then led the more radical splinter group known as the New European Order later that year. This group sought the creation of a new Rome–Berlin axis to unite Europe against capitalism and communism and in January 1953 set up a European Liaison Office under Amaudruz in Lausanne to co-ordinate the work of affiliated groups. He also came an early member of the Volkspartei der Schweiz but left the party over the issue of South Tyrol (where he was opposed to irredentism). […]  

In 2000 Amaudruz was sentenced to a year in a Swiss jail for Holocaust denial and returned to prison in 2003 on similar charges. However, as of 2005 he was continuing to publish a far right journal, Courrier du continent. 

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Europe: Why does the Pope trot out antisemitic tropes?

Giles Fraser @ Unherd:

Pope Francis loves to reference the Pharisees and hypocrites in his sermons. Whether it is corruption in the priesthood or the European attitude towards refugees, it has become one of his things. Last Sunday, the Pope again used his address at the Angelus to return to this well worn theme. Admittedly, the gospel reading from Mark was all about Jesus’s reaction to the “scribes and Pharisees” who challenge Jesus’s followers for not following the Jewish law. But it was classic Francis: “The hypocrite is a liar, he’s not authentic,” he told his audience. “A man or woman who lives in vanity, in greed, in arrogance and at the same time believes and pretends to be religious and goes as far as condemning others, is a hypocrite.” Many took this to be a reference to the abuse scandals that have rocked the Church in places such as Ireland, from where he has recently returned.

There are multiple examples of Francis using ‘Pharisee’ as a term of abuse. Let one more example stand for many. Last October, at Mass in Casa Santa Marta (St Martha’s guesthouse) where he lives, he said: “Three months ago, in a country, in a city, a mother wanted to baptise her newly born son, but she was married civilly to a divorced man. The priest said, ‘Yes, yes. Baptise the baby. But your husband is divorced, so he cannot be present at the ceremony.’ This is happening today. The Pharisees, or Doctors of the Law, are not people of the past, even today there are many of them.”

Now, I don’t dissent from the general sentiment of these pronouncements. Francis is a good man, wanting to shift the Roman Church in the right direction. And nor do I think Francis is unique in laying so much emphasis on his condemnation of Pharisees and their hypocrisy – Christians have been attacking the Pharisees since the earliest days of the Christian proclamation. Hence ‘Pharisee’ long ago became a code work for religious hypocrisy in general.

But there has always been something basically racist about this association: Pharisees are Jews, and Jews are shifty, untrustworthy, hypocrites. Given the long and violent Christian persecution of Jews, today’s Christians should be far more circumspect in referencing the Pharisees as Francis regularly does.

So who were the Pharisees, and what did they stand for? 

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Germany: Why is Germany silent on Corbyn’s praise of Munich terrorists?

Via The Jerusalem Post (Benjamin Weinthal):

The barn burning revelations in the British newspaper Daily Mail in August that Jeremy Corbyn – head of the UK’s Labour Party – laid a wreath at the graves of the Black September terrorists who executed 11 Israeli athletes and a German police officer 46 years ago today (September 5) raise unsettling questions about Germany’s reaction to the events of Munich in 1972.

Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel and her social democratic Foreign Minister Heiko Maas have remained silent about Corbyn’s 2014 visit to Tunisia to commemorate the Black September Palestinian terrorists. Dr. Efraim Zuroff, director of the Jerusalem office of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, told The Jerusalem Post that Germany’s government “should have said something” because Black September murdered German police officer Anton Fliegerbauer.

“It was out-and-out terrorism in the heart of Europe, in Munich,” said Zuroff, of the Munich massacre. “This is something you would assume would get universal condemnation,” he added. […]

The German political scientist Dr. Wolfgang Kraushaar has described the Munich massacre “as a joint work of German Left radicals and Palestinian terrorists.”

Wilfried Böse, a leftist student in Frankfurt in 1969 who helped create the terrorist organization Revolutionary Cells, worked closely with Palestinian terrorists.

“There is serious information that Böse also supported the terrorists of the Black September in the Olympic attacks,” Kraushaar said. Böse was involved in the hijacking of Air France Flight 139 in 1976 that caused Israel to deploy commandos to free the hostages in Entebbe, Uganda.

Böse, who played a role in separating Jewish from non-Jewish passengers, was killed during the rescue operation.

The German left-wing terrorist group Red Army Faction leader Ulrike Meinhof cheered the 1972 murders of Israeli athletes as an expression of “anti-imperialism.”

When this reporter in 2002 asked the former head of the East German foreign intelligence section of the Stasi, Markus Wolf, if the Stasi played a role in the Munich Massacre, he declined to answer.

One could argue that Germany’s silence about Corbyn’s praise for the Black September terrorists is part and parcel of a long history of soggy appeasement toward secular and Islamic terrorism from the Middle East. West Germany’s government failed to pursue the Black September terrorists after the attack, helping to trigger Israel’s operation to hunt down the terrorists. […]

Germany allows 950 Hezbollah members to operate within its territory to fund raise and recruit new members, according to German intelligence reports released in 2018.

The Corbyn affair regarding the Black September terrorists is another litmus test on whether the German government’s counter-terrorism strategy takes the business of anti-terrorism seriously. The optics of Germany’s posture toward combating Palestinian, Hezbollah and Iranian terrorism don’t look good within the field of counter-terrorism.

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Sweden: Members of far-right party caught making anti-Semitic statements online

Via JTA:

Regional politicians from the far-right Sweden Democrats party were caught making anti-Semitic statements online, including using a picture of Anne Frank to mock Holocaust victims.

Per Olsson, who represents the party on the city council of Oskarshamn, a coastal Swedish city, posted earlier this year a picture of Frank captioned “coolest Jew in the shower room” on the Russian social network VKontakt, the Expressen daily reported Friday.

The Expressen report was part of a project in which journalists for that daily and the Expo magazine looked into the digital footprint of many politicians from various parties ahead of the country’s September 9 general and local elections.

Sweden Democrats is currently in third place according to various polls, with 18.7 percent of the vote. Its share was just under 13 percent in the 2014 elections.

The journalists also found anti-Semitic material on the social media accounts of Raghu Jacobsen, who represents the party on the city council of Stenungsund, located in western Sweden.

“As long as Rothschild controls the economy and with the modern slavery on this planet, there will be anti-Semitism. #Jews #israel,” he wrote in English in February on Twitter.

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France: Politician calls Macron ‘President Rothschild’

Obviously Mr Di Filippo would not have called President Macron, the Société Générale or BNP President. The reference to Jewish bankers is clear.

Via JTA:

A top representative of French Jewry condemned harshly what he called anti-Semitic rhetoric of a Republican politician who called the republic’s leader “President Rothschild.”

Francis Kalifat, president of the CRIF umbrella group of French Jewish communities, on Thursday wrote on Twitter that he considered “revolting” Fabien Di Filippo, The Republicans’ secretary general, message on the same platform about President Emmanuel Macron.

“Following the revolting tweet, featuring anti-Semitic language from the 1930s, of the secretary general of The Republicans,” Kalifat wrote, he has asked that party’s president, Laurent Wauquiez, to issue “a firm condemnation” and an “:exemplary sanction” of Di Filippo.

But Di Filippo on Twitter denied that he had made any anti-Semitic references in his tweet about Macron, who used to work for the Rothchild Bank after joining it in 2008.

“Naturally, the expression ‘President Rothschild’ was a reference to the past functions of banker Emmanuel Macron,” Di Filippo wrote, adding Macron was “disconnected from our realities.” His reference to the Jewish banker family “had no other connotation,” he added.

The same in the UK.  Via Guido Fawkes:

Black-t-shirted Corbyn outrider Aaron Bastani has been hitting out at former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks for calling Jeremy Corbyn an anti-Semite. His recent attack is nothing new, here are a selection of old tweets railing against Goldman Sachs, Rothschilds, Meyer Rothschild, Philip Green, Alain de Botton‏ and Peter Mandelson:

Greece: Anarchists raid Ministry in protest against Israel "genocide" of Palestinians

Via Greek City Times (H/T Watch Anti-Semitism in Europe):

Two anarchists of the anti-establishment group Rouvikonas stormed into the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in downtown Athens on Tuesday early morning after scaling the buildings gates.

The anarchists left a bag containing a Palestinian flag as well as photographs depicting Palestinians killed during recent clashes with Israel’s armed forces.

The group was protesting Greece’s cooperation with Israel and a video of the raid was posted on the anti-authoritarian website.

The footage shows two members of Rouvikonas climbing the ministry’s metal gate and entering its courtyard unimpeded. “This time, we decided to take a symbolic action, depositing a bag that contained a Palestinian flag and a few pictures, in the courtyard of the foreign ministry. They were photographs of the dead from the last ‘episode’ in the genocide of a people, triggered by the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, by a diachronically of the Greek state, the US”, Rouvikonas highlighted in a post on the anti-authority website.

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UK: Labour veteran quits the party and warns its leadership is 'becoming a force for anti-Semitism'

Via The Daily Mail:

Labour was plunged into turmoil today after veteran MP Frank Field sensationally quit blaming Jeremy Corbyn for making the party a 'force for anti-Semitism'.  

Mr Field, 76, told party bosses that after nearly 40 years as a Labour MP he was quitting the party whip and will sit as an independent. 

Labour MP Wes Streeting warned the party now faces a 'catastrophic' split as others will follow Mr Field and quit. 

In a letter detailing his decision made public tonight, Mr Field said Britain fought World War II to defeat Nazis - but under Mr Corbyn's watch that victory is being eroded.  

And in an interview with Sky News, he said he finally made the tough decision after former chief rabbi Lord Sacks accused Mr Corbyn of being an anti-Semite. 

Lord Sacks was responding to a video, exclusively revealed by MailOnline, in which Mr Corbyn told a meeting that British 'Zionists' had 'no sense of English irony'.  

Labour deputy leader Tom Watson said the resignation was a 'serious loss' for Labour and must be a 'wake up call' for the party. Mr Streeting warned that more could follow in his footsteps, telling Sky News: 'Frank Field isn't the first and I fear Frank Field wont be the last.'

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Europe: SodaStream BDS lobbyists were particularly effective in Europe

Via The Washington Times (Clifford D. May):

[...] Unsurprisingly, champions of the Palestinian cause denounced Mr. Birnbaum [SodaStream's CEO] as anti-Palestinian. In particular, advocates for BDS (the campaign to de-legitimize and demonize Israel through boycotts, divestments and sanctions) accused him of stealing Palestinian land, profiting from the “occupation” and exploiting Palestinian workers.  

“Suddenly,” Mr. Birnbaum recounted to me over dinner in Tel Aviv three years ago, “I’m a walking war criminal!”  

BDS lobbyists were particularly effective in Europe. For example, they persuaded retailers in Sweden to ask Mr. Birnbaum not to send them SodaStream products from the West Bank. Those retailers had no problem receiving merchandize made in China, a country where about a million Muslims are right now incarcerated in “re-education camps,” a country that occupies Tibet (offering no “two-state solution”), a country where persecution of Christians and other minorities continues to worsen.  

When Mr. Birnbaum needed a new and bigger factory, he decided not to build in the West Bank but instead to relocate to the Negev Desert, well within the “armistice lines,” the temporary borders drawn in 1949 when the war between the fledgling Jewish state and the Arab nations surrounding it came to a halt.

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European Union continues to fiscally back hate education against Israel

Via JNS (Michael Calvo):

By supporting Palestinian teachers’ salaries, the European Union financially participated and continues to participate in hate education; disregard for life of the Jews and others by promoting jihad; and inciting schoolchildren to become martyrs. That makes it an accomplice to the killings and injuries of innocent victims.

In May 2018, the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs and Public Diplomacy published a report titled “The Money Trail: The Millions Given by EU Institutions to NGOs With Ties to Terror and Boycotts Against Israel, An In-Depth Analysis.” Two months later, the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Frederica Mogherini replied to the report. Her main arguments being that allegations according to which the European Union supports incitement or terror are unfounded and unacceptable - that terror and boycott are two distinct phenomena.

The Israeli Ministry’s report is clear and substantiated, and Mogherini should read it again.

What is not mentioned in the report is that the European Union and its member states finance NGOs that harass Israel, Israeli officials and corporations doing business in Israel and in Europe with lawsuits. The European Union still finances the Palestinian Authority that encourages Palestinians to kill Jews. “The Palestinian Authority’s practice of paying salaries to terrorists serving in Israeli prisons, as well as to the families of deceased terrorists, is an incentive to commit acts of terror.” (Taylor Force Act).

It is well known that the Palestinian leaders have incited to kill Jews. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas even admitted that the terrorists “did what the Palestinian Authority ordered them to do” and Mohammed Dahlan confirmed that “Forty percent of the Martyrs in this Intifada belonged to the Palestinian security forces … and that the Palestinian Authority has hidden Hamas members against Israeli counter-actions.”

Those who still have doubts should see these videos.

The incitement begins in schools. Between 1994 and 2012, the European Union provided 5.6 billion euros to assist the P.A. During 2014-15, a total of more than €390 million has been allocated to the P.A. through Pegase Direct Financial Support (DFS). The aim of Pegase DFS is to assist the P.A. to meet its obligations towards its civil servants, pensioners and vulnerable families; maintain essential public services; improve public finances; and pay teachers’ salaries. Among the civil servants and pensioners who received payments from Pegase DFS during 2014 and 2015, 67 percent were working in Health and Education. 

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Germany: Most Germans have never met a Jew

Via Handelsblatt (Mark Leonard):

[…] But since 2015, when Chancellor Angela Merkel announced her policy of Willkommenskultur (“welcoming culture”) and opened Germany’s doors to refugees fleeing the conflict in Syria, unease about resurgent anti-Semitism has been growing in the German establishment, and particularly in the Jewish community. […]  

Attacks on Jews have sparked outrage from the many Germans who thought such scenes had vanished forever from their country’s streets. But, in addition to the more visible abuses, German Jews have also begun to talk about more subtle changes in their everyday lives as major German cities like Frankfurt, Hamburg, and Berlin grow more multicultural. […]

[…] most Germans have never, and will never, meet a Jew, for the simple reason that Jews constitute a vanishingly small share of the population. Frankfurt, home to the country’s second-largest Jewish community (behind Berlin), has only 7,000 Jews, out of a metropolitan-area population of 5.7 million.

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Sweden: Politician denies calling Jews ‘impure’

Via Times of Israel:

A Swedish politician from Malmo who has worked on integration of immigrants denied saying that Jews and Armenians have “impure spirits.”

Muhammad Khorshid, who represents the Liberals on the city council of the municipality in southern Sweden, told Expressen that the comment in his name from 2016 on Facebook belonged to a fake account. The person behind that account wrote in Turkish about the two ethnicities: “We call them out for their impure spirits,” the daily reported Thursday.

The issue is the subject of an internal probe within the party, the report said. 

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Russia: Swastikas daubed on Chabad center in cradle of Lubavitch Hasidic movement

Via JTA:

Anti-Semitic slogans were scrawled on the fence of a Jewish cultural center in the Russian village of Lyubavichi, the cradle of the Chabad Hasidic movement.

The inscriptions, reading “Jews out of Russia, our land” and featuring the Baltic variant of the swastika, were spray-painted on the wall of the Hatzer Raboteinu Nesieinu Belubavitch last week but reported Tuesday in the Russian-language media, the news site Cursor reported.

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Estonia: Holocaust victim memorials vandalised at Kalevi-Liiva

Via err.ee:

Sometime Saturday overnight or on Sunday, just days ahead of the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, unidentified individuals vandalised multiple Holocaust memorials at Kalevi-Liiva, Harju County, the execution site of thousands of victims of Nazism.

The memorials were tagged with a swastika, penises and antisemitic and Nazi messages as well as burned, likely using a blowtorch.

The vandalism was discovered by local residents, who notified the police, the municipal government and Estonia's Jewish community about it.

Jewish Community of Estonia chairwoman Alla Jakobson said that she was shaken and outraged by the news.

"I can't call these Nazi-sympathisers who attack the memory of innocent victims with such brutality and anger human," she said. "The memory of the dead has always been regarded with such great respect and honour in Estonia, regardless of ethnicity. An Estonian resident cannot act like this, which is why I am sure that the memorial was vandalised by people who hate Estonia, and this should also be seen as a provocation timed to coincide with the Day of Restoration of Independence of the Republic of Estonia."

Jakobson also thanked those who alerted the authorities and the Jewish community to the incident.

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