Thursday 31 October 2013

Man in U.S. to be Compensated for Years of Antisemitic Abuse by Former Employer

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

For years, delivery man Adam Wiercinski suffered anti-semitic insults from his employers at a New York restaurant. This week, the court ruled that the restaurant will pay him a compensation of $900,000.

The attorney of the 50-year-old delivery man told the New York Post, "They would call him a ‘dirty Jew,’ and when he would say, ‘But I took a bath,’ they would laugh and say, ‘No, you still smell like a Jew.’” 

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Former Nazi Gestapo Chief May be Buried in Jewish Cemetary

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

The head of Hitler's Gestapo secret police and one of the organisers of the Holocaust, Heinrich Mueller, was buried in a Jewish cemetery in Berlin in 1945, a German newspaper reported Thursday. For 68 years, the fate of "Gestapo-Mueller" has been unclear but Bild, based on documents found by a historian, said he died at the end of the war and was buried in a common grave in a Jewish cemetery in central Berlin. 
 
"Mueller didn't survive the end of the war," the mass circulation newspaper quoted Johannes Tuchel, head of the Memorial to the German Resistance, as saying. "His body was interred in 1945 in the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Mitte in a mass grave," he said.

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Tuesday 29 October 2013

Manchester United Apologizes for Using Logo Resembling Nazi Swastika Along with Hitler-Inspired Slogan

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Manchester United, perhaps the most well-known soccer club ever, has issued a public apology for sending out an email to its swarms of dedicated followers recently, which brandished a new logo that strikingly resembles a swastika, and a headline that reads "New Order." 

The headline is a phrase Adolf Hitler used during a campaign in 1941 while trying to create a "European New Order," which meant the elimination of the Jewish people and promoted the prosperity of the Aryan race.  

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Monday 28 October 2013

Stats Show Quebec's Jewish Population Has Stopped Declining

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Despite a growing secularism in Quebec, most recently sparked by a bill that seeks to ban visual religious wear on public employees, the Jewish community’s decades-long exodus from Quebec seems to have plateaud.

An analysis of Canada’s 2011 census suggests that Quebec’s Jewish population had not dropped below the 90,000 threshold, a stat that was a concern for Quebec’s Jewish community.

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Holocaust Survivor's Art Collection Up For Auction

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

The art collection of a Holocaust survivor who became one of the foremost Pablo Picasso dealers goes on sale in New York next month for an expected $170 million.

The 160 drawings, paintings and sculptures owned by Jan Krugier include Old Masters and 20th century European masterpieces, as well as Latin American and African art.
 
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Holocaust Memorial App Launched in Germany

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

Smartphones in Germany are now delivering messages from the past, with a new app launched recently that shows the names and pictures of Holocaust victims to people walking by their former homes.

"What we envision is a virtual, floating museum over Munich," Martina Bachmann, spokeswoman for the app development company based in the southern German city, told AFP.

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Sunday 27 October 2013

Suspected Violent Antisemitic Attack in Australia

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Five Jews were attacked Saturday in Bondi Beach in Sydney. The victims were evacuated to St Vincent's Hospital due to injuries they sustained from the attack.

According to suspicion, eight youths attacked the victims.
 
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Belgian Museum Showcases Ships that Took European Jews Seeking Better Lives to U.S.

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters via ynetnews.com:

They were the ships that took Albert Einstein and Irving Berlin to America, two of the millions who set out from Europe around the turn of the 20th century hoping to leave behind poverty or persecution.

The steam liners of the Red Star Line, commemorated in a new museum in their Belgian home port of Antwerp, carried about two million migrants across the Atlantic between 1873 and 1934, a quarter of them Jews, and all seeking a better life.
 
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Former British Foreign Secretary Blames Jewish Money for Preventing Mideast Peace

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Former British Foreign Secretary and Labor MP Jack Straw made harsh anti-Semitics statements during a British parliament debate last week, Yedioth Ahronoth reported.

Listing the greatest obstacles to peace, Straw said that unlimited” funds available to Jewish organizations and AIPAC in the US are used to control and divert American policy in the region.
 
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Thursday 24 October 2013

Kiev, Ukraine Hosts Conference on Antisemitism

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

On the centennial anniversary of the notorious 1913 Beilis Trial – an historic, anti-Semitic show trial whose impact reverberated and was condemned worldwide, similar to the Dreyfus Affair in France during the same period – distinguished politicians, religious leaders, historians and other notable global figures met at the International Conference on Anti-Semitism on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Beilis Trial. 

The conference examined the enduring reality of anti-Semitism and decisive activities which can be undertaken to struggle against this longstanding worldwide prejudice.

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Jews Leave Turkey to Escape Growing Antisemitism

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Young Jews are emigrating from Turkey in masses, mainly to the United States and different European countries, due to growing anti-Semitism and the negative attitude in the country towards Israel.

Members of the local Jewish community are keeping mum over the situation, but off the record some of them describe an explosive situation which may erupt at any moment following careless statements.

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Tuesday 22 October 2013

Holocaust Survivor to Play Music Composed in Nazi Camp

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

The already remarkable life of Holocaust survivor George Horner is about to take another exceptional turn.

The 90-year-old pianist will make his orchestral debut with renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma on Tuesday night at Boston's Symphony Hall. And they'll be playing music composed 70 years ago at the Nazi prison camp where Horner was incarcerated. 

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Sunday 20 October 2013

Jewish Heirs to Former Art Collector Demand Restitution From Austria

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

The family of a former Jewish art collector is demanding the restitution of a Gustav Klimt masterpiece that it claims was acquired by Austria after World War II under extortion.

The family's lawyer Marc Weber told the Austria Press Agency (APA) last week that the heirs of Erich Lederer, the previous owner, had filed a restitution request with the Austrian culture ministry.
 
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Berlin Museum in Dispute With Holocaust Survivor Over Ancient Relic

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

A Holocaust survivor's family urged New York's highest court Tuesday to let them keep an ancient gold tablet that their late father somehow obtained in Germany after World War II.

Attorney Steven Schlesinger argued that the estate of Riven Flamenbaum has a legal claim, whether the native of Poland bought the relic from a Russian soldier or simply took it to compensate for losing his family at Auschwitz, the concentration camp where he spent several years.
 
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Survey Indicates Many of Europe's Jews Fear for Their Safety

FSWC Reports:

From jn1.tv via ynetnews.com:

A study by the European Agency for Fundamental Rights has found that nearly a quarter of Jews surveyed said they avoid looking conspicuously Jewish out of fear of anti-Semitism.

Some of the results of the survey were especially surprising: Forty-nine percent of Swedish Jews said they avoided engaging in such obvious Jewish activities as wearing skullcaps or other identifiably Jewish items, and 91% of Hungarian Jews surveyed said they believe anti-Semitism had risen in the past five years.

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Amazon Selling Books That Deny The Holocaust

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Online retailer Amazon has been found selling hate literature again, Kernel Magazine reports, stocking virtual shelves with books with such intriguing titles as "Did Six Million Really Die?" and "Conspiracy of the Six-Pointed Star."  

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Thursday 17 October 2013

Funeral Procession for Nazi War Criminal Blocked by Protesters

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters:

The head of Rome's Jewish community praised protesters who blocked the funeral of a convicted Nazi war criminal as Italy marked on Wednesday the 70th anniversary of the deportation of Jews from the Rome ghetto.

Erich Priebke's final resting place is now unclear after the protesters forced a suspension of his funeral on Tuesday in the Italian town of Albano Laziale. His body is lying at a military airport near Rome pending a decision from the authorities.
 
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Previously Unrecognized Leader of Sobibor Death Camp Revolt Honoured

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

Russia and Poland on Monday marked the 70th anniversary of a revolt at the Sobibor death camp led by a Red Army officer, the biggest and most successful prisoner escape under the Nazi regime.

Ahead of the anniversary, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the defense ministry to come up with a plan to "immortalize the memory of heroes who raised a revolt" at the extermination camp in occupied Poland on October 14, 1943.
 
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Tuesday 15 October 2013

Ukrainian Police Accused of Antisemitism After Alleged Police Attack on Jewish Man

FSWC Reports:

From jn1.tv via ynetnews.com:

In the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, a Jewish man named Dmitry Flekman says two men who identified themselves as police officers assaulted him at a police station while trying to extort money from him.

Flekman, aged 28, posted his story on the Ukrainian Jewish website evreiskiy.kiev.ua. 
 
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Son of Late Nazi War Criminal Provokes Outrage by Suggesting Father be Buried in Israel

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Nazi criminal Erich Priebke attracted many conflicts, rage and insults during his lifetime, but even now, four days after his passing at the age of 100, he still enrages his haters from the grave.

The latest drama surrounding Priebke, a former SS officer convicted of participating in the massacre of 335 citizens, including dozens of Jews, in Italy during World War II, is related to his burial. After the Catholic Church, the city of Rome, his adopted homeland Argentina and even his German hometown all refused to bury him, Priebke's son caused a scene when he suggesting on Tuesday that his father should be buried in Israel.

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Monday 14 October 2013

Dutch Government Seeks More Funds to Protect Jewish Institutions

FSWC Reports:

From jn1.tv via ynetnews.com:

The ruling party in the Netherlands has voiced its support for increasing funding for the protection of Jewish institutions such as synagogues and schools in Amsterdam. 

The party released a statement calling for an additional €200,000 (about $270,000)

of annual funding for security services.

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Sunday 13 October 2013

Miley Cyrus Makes Derogatory Comment About Jews During Interview

FSWC Reports:

From News Agencies via ynetnews.com:

Provocative singer-actress Miley Cyrus has managed to irritate the American music industry once again, this time implying that the industry is controlled by old Jewish men.

Upon the release of her album "Bangerz," Cyrus gave an interview to the Hunger TV website, discussing her professional choices and the way she deals with what people think about her around the world. 
 
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Newly-Weds Victims of Antisemitism by Videographer

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

In what has got to be one of the stupidest incidents of anti-Semitism we’ve come across, an English videographer is attempting to backtrack after he sent an unedited video full of racist comments to his Jewish clients.

Anthony Aurelius was hired by Stan and Claudia Gocman to shoot a video of their wedding and, when they received an unedited version of the tape, they were shocked to discover his opinions of both themselves and their Jewish heritage. 

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Nobel Prize Winner Describes His Experience with Antisemitism as Prelude to Holocaust

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

Martin Karplus, one of three scientists who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry on Wednesday, escaped the Nazis and the Holocaust aged just eight-years-old, according to his autobiography.

Karplus was born into a Jewish family in Vienna in 1930 and narrowly escaped Austria when Germany took control of the country in 1938, he wrote in a lengthy article in the Annual Review of Biophysics and Biomolecular Structure in 2006.
 
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Friday 11 October 2013

Fans of Real Madrid Soccer Team Fined for Displaying Swastika

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters via ynetnews.com:

A Spanish government commission has imposed fines of €3,000 ($4,100) each on four Real Madrid Football Club fans who displayed Nazi symbols at last month's La Liga match against city rivals Atletico at Real's Bernabeu stadium. 

The four were members of the radical "Ultras Sur" group and the symbols displayed including a swastika and the German word "Totenkopf", a reference to the Nazis' SS paramilitary organization, according to an official who asked not to be identified by name.

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100 Year Old Convicted Nazi War Criminal Under House Arrest in Italy Dies

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters via ynetnews.com:

Erich Priebke, a former German Nazi SS officer convicted of one of Italy's worst wartime massacres, died on Friday in Rome at the age of 100, his lawyer said.

Priebke had been living under house arrest in Rome after being sentenced to life imprisonment in 1998 for the killings of 335 civilians in the Ardeatine Caves near Rome in March 1944.

 
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Thursday 10 October 2013

Former Polish Foreign Minister Who Saved Jews During WWII Donates Items to Jewish History Museum in Warsaw

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

A former Polish foreign minister who helped save Jews from the Holocaust on Wednesday donated World War II documents and distinctions he received from Israel to a Jewish history museum opening in Warsaw.

The Museum of the History of Polish Jews said 91-year-old Wladyslaw Bartoszewski donated items including: fake wartime documents of Dr. Leon Feiner, a Jewish resistance leader; a ring made in the Lodz Ghetto in 1942; wartime media reports about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising; his own medal honoring him as one of the Righteous Among the Nations, a title given to non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust; and an Israeli honorary citizenship document.

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Tuesday 8 October 2013

Tottenham Soccer Fan Arrested for "Yid" Chant

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

A Tottenham fan was arrested after allegedly chanting the word "Yid" during his team's 3-0 defeat against West Ham at White Hart Lane on Sunday.

Metropolitan Police had issued a pre-match warning to supporters of both teams that they could be arrested if they used the inflammatory word during the London derby.
 
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Monday 7 October 2013

Tunisia's Tiny Jewish Community Under Siege

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

A Tunisian rights group on Wednesday accused the police of harassing the tiny Jewish community on the southern island of Djerba, saying it had come under a string of attacks.

"Tunisian Jews feel in danger, they are really afraid," Yamina Thabet, the president of the Tunisian Association Supporting Minorities, told a news conference after visiting Djerba.
 
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Sunday 6 October 2013

Actor and First-time Director, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Faces Accusations of Stereotyping Italian Americans and Jews

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s directorial debut, "Don Jon," has opened internationally to mostly rave reviews. But is the dark comedy following a "Jersey Shore" type sex addict actually promoting racist stereotypes? 

The Italian American One Voice Coalition is accusing "Don Jon" of "stereotyping and denigrating” both Italian Americans and Jews. In a press release issued on Monday, the organization’s founder, Emanuele Alfano, points out that Gordon-Levitt’s parents founded a Jewish national social justice organization, insinuating that Gordon-Levitt should be more sensitive to his film’s content.

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Denmark Confronts Questions Over Its WWII Relationship With Nazi Germany

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

As Denmark commemorates the heroic rescue of the vast majority of its Jewish population during World War II, the country faces thorny questions over its relationship with Nazi Germany.

The flight of more than 7,000 Danish Jews – around 95% of the total – to safety in neighboring Sweden in 1943 is an inspirational story from an otherwise dark chapter in Europe's history.
 
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Jewish-Greek Businessman, Now Living in Israel, Tells His Story About Dealing with Antisemitism in Greece

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

As the leader of Greece's neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party is sent to jail, Jewish-Greek businessman and philanthropist Sabby Mionis, who made aliyah to Israel several years ago, opened up about his years-long struggle against anti-Semitism in Greece

In an interview with Yedioth Ahronoth, he talked about the libels that were spread against him and of his ongoing battle to clear his name. 

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Friday 4 October 2013

Work to Repair Auschwitz Structures Will Begin Despite Funding Shortfall

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

An international foundation established to preserve the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial in Poland has fallen short of its fundraising goal, but still plans to begin repair work there, a spokesman said Thursday. 

The site includes the barracks, gas chambers and other structures of the former death camp, where Germany's Nazis killed some 1.5 million people, mostly Jews, during World War II.

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Thursday 3 October 2013

Ballet Tells Story of Holocaust Survivor

FSWC Reports:

From jn1.tv via ynetnews.com:

A frenzied flurry of hands and lights opens a ballet scene depicting the story of Adam and Eve. But the scene soon turns somber. This ballet isn’t about the biblical beginnings, but rather the horrors of the Holocaust and the price of hatred.

The ballet is based on the story of Naomi Warren, a Holocaust survivor who was held in three concentration camps and lost most of her family during World War II.

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Movie Star, George Clooney, to be Honoured by USC Shoah Festival for His Human Rights Advocacy Work

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

"Gravity" star George Clooney will be honored Thursday with the USC Shoah Foundation’s highest honor, the Ambassador for Humanity Award.

The USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education was founded by Hollywood director Steven Spielberg after completing "Schindler’s List." The Institute is "dedicated to making audiovisual interviews with survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust and other genocides a compelling voice for education and action."

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New Book Suggests Chanel Betrayed Her Jewish Partners to the Nazis in 1930s

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

A new book claims that iconic fashion designer Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel tried to betray her Jewish business partners, Paul and Pierre Wertheimer, during the rise of fascism and the Nazis in Europe in the 1930s.

In the book, "The Secret of Chanel No. 5," author Tilar Mazzeo claims that Chanel wrote to German officials arguing that their company, Les Parfums Chanel, was "Jewish property" and that it should be confiscated and then redistributed solely back to her.


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Council of Europe Passes Resolution Condemning Circumcision

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Are Europe's Jews about to launch a new struggle for the observance of the circumcision ritual across the continent? The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which represents most of the continent's states, has passed a resolution calling male ritual circumcision a "violation of the physical integrity of children according to human rights standards." 

At the end of a debate in Strasbourg, the Parliamentary Assembly ruled overwhelmingly that male circumcision and female genital mutilation are forbidden, unless the child is over the age of 15 and has given his or her consent to the practice. 

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Tuesday 1 October 2013

Former Italian Cyclist Named Righteous Gentile

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Decades after he saved Jews from the hands of the Nazis, the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem has decided to recognize Gino Bartali as a Righteous Among the Nations.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Bartali's reputation preceded him across Europe. At the time, the Italian from Florence was the most famous cyclist and was considered a national hero in his country. 
 
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Study Shows 15% of Young Adults in Britain Do Not Find Jews Trustworthy

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

A new British study on discrimination has found that 15% of young British adults don't trust Jews, while 60% feel that Muslims have a negative image in the public forum, BBC reports.

The Comres survey of 1,001 British people aged 18-24 was conducted online in June, and asked respondents questions based on age, location, education and income. 
 
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U.S. Holocaust Museum Returns Old Prisoners' Barracks Back to Poland

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

The US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington is returning one of its most powerful artifacts to Poland: A wooden barracks that housed prisoners at the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.

The Washington Post reports the barracks are being returned after the end of a long-term loan from the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum.
 
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Israeli Parliament Plans to Hold Session in Auschwitz

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Exactly 69 years after the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp, the Knesset is set to hold a special session on the site in January, marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The historic event was initiated by the management of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, which has invited Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein and all members of the Israeli parliament to participate in a discussion and memorial ceremony.

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Denmark Commemorates 70th Anniversary of Jews' Rescue

FSWC Reports:

From Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

A ceremony has been held in Denmark to mark the 70th anniversary of the evacuation of 7,300 Jews during World War II to prevent their deportation to a Nazi concentration camp.

At Copenhagen's synagogue Sunday, Jewish community leader Finn Schwarz told several hundred people it was "almost a miracle" that the October 1943 operation in Nazi-occupied Denmark dodged German patrol boats to deliver the Jews across a waterway to neutral Sweden.

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Hungary Pledges No Tolerance for Antisemitism

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters:

Hungary will use all political and legal tools available to crack down on resurgent anti-Semitism in the country, the deputy prime minister said on Tuesday, in one of the government's boldest statements yet on the issue.

"We cannot allow, especially knowing our own responsibility, anti-Semitism to gain strength in Hungary," Tibor Navracsics told a conference on European anti-Semitism in the parliament building in Budapest.

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