Holocaust Survivors Urge Nigel Farage to Make Amends Over Alleged Anti-Jewish Statements.
A collective of Holocaust survivors has insisted that Nigel Farage tell the truth and apologise for alleged antisemitic abuse he is said to have made toward Jewish pupils during his school days.
The political party leader has previously stated he never targeted anyone with the aim to hurt, proposing it may have been mere "childish teasing".
"Being Shoah survivors, we comprehend the deadly peril of words of hatred – because we have experienced firsthand where such words ultimately lead," declared the survivors in a missive.
"Let us be clear: expressing admiration for Hitler, jeering at gas chambers, or shouting racist insults is not banter. Not on a schoolyard. Not ever."
An Unequivocal Demand
The letter poses straightforward questions to the party leader: "Are the claims accurate that you stated ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ and mimicked gas chambers? Did you expose your peers to anti-Jewish taunts?"
The Survivors
The collective of 11 survivors includes individuals with harrowing personal histories from the Nazi genocide.
- Hedi Argent, who saw the murder of 27 members of her immediate and extended family.
- Simon Winston, who was confined to a ghetto before breaking out in 1942 and spending the rest of the war as a fugitive.
- Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, who was sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau and later moved to Bergen-Belsen, where she was freed.
Other signatories include Janine Webber, Edith Jayne, Helen Aronson, Ruth Barnett, John Fieldsend, Susan Pollack, Hanneke Dye and Agnes Kaposi.
Growing Accounts
This public letter is a response to the rejection of related testimony by more than two dozen or more ex-schoolmates and teachers as "fabricated nonsense" by a senior party figure.
After the story broke, more contemporaries have spoken out. Twenty-eight former pupils and teachers now assert they saw racist or antisemitic behaviour by him.
One notable testimony comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish Bafta and Emmy-winning director, who said that a teenage Farage would sidle up to him and utter the phrases "Hitler was right" and "send them to the gas chambers", on occasion adding a hiss to mimic the sound of gas chambers.
Additional Claims
Additional alumni from minority ethnic backgrounds have additionally come forward with accounts of direct abuse.
- Cyrus Oshidar said he was called a "racial slur" and has labelled as rubbish the idea that such actions were without intent.
- Another student of Asian heritage portrayed him as an "avowed bigot" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell had a point" as a form of "racial bullying".
The Survivors' Final Appeal
The missive from survivors poses a final question to Farage: "If you deny saying those words, do you mean that 20 former classmates and teachers are not telling the truth? If you did say them, now is the opportunity to admit your error and apologise."
"Those who aspire to lead our country should never create division by ethnicity or faith. Hatred of Jews must never be normalised. This moment is about moral responsibility. The choice is yours, Mr Farage."
