Netherlands: Soccer fans ridicule child Holocaust victims on Twitter

Via JTA:

Avram and Emanuel Rosenthal, 5 and 2 years old respectively, were rounded

up to be murdered shortly after their picture was taken in Lithuania in 1944

Soccer fans in the Netherlands used a picture of child victims of the Holocaust to taunt a rival team in what Dutch activists against racism called a new low for anti-Semitic rhetoric in sports.

The photo featuring two toddlers wearing a yellow star was widely circulated on Twitter under the hashtag #anti020week. The digits are the Amsterdam-area dial code, which in soccer jargon references the city’s main soccer club, Ajax. The picture, in which one child appears to be nearing tears, also featured the caption “When 020 had only one star.”

The children pictured, Avram and Emanuel Rosenthal, 5 and 2 years old respectively, were rounded up to be murdered shortly after their picture was taken in Lithuania in 1944.

Shared by many supporters of the Feyenoord team of Rotterdam, the photo offers an extreme example of how fans of Ajax rivals mock the memory of the Holocaust. Ajax players and supporters are often called “Jews” in recognition of the large Jewish community that had existed in the Dutch capital before 80 percent of its members were murdered in the Holocaust by Germans and Dutch collaborators. Some Ajax fans self-identify as Jews.

Past incidents included songs about burning Jews and the SS, and the use of gas and Hamas, but using archival photos of individual victims is unusual.

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