Hungarian Government official under fire after claiming “Europe is George Soros’ gas chamber”
A Hungarian Government official has caused outrage after comparing a prominent Jewish political activist and philanthropist and Holocaust survivor to Hitler in an article published over the weekend.
Hungarian ministerial commissioner Szilard Demeter made the comments about George Soros, a financier and controversial activist, in an opinion article published on 28th November in the pro-Government outlet Origo. The article addressed a conflict over the European Union’s next budget, which member states Hungary and Poland are blocking. Mr Demeter referred to the two countries as “the new Jews.”
“Europe is George Soros’ gas chamber,” Mr Demeter wrote. “Poison gas flows from the capsule of a multicultural open society.” Mr Soros founded the Open Society Foundations, a grant-making network that has courted controversy over its political activities.
Mr Demeter, who is a ministerial commissioner and head of the state-owned Petofi Literary Museum in Budapest, was appointed by Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, to oversee culture in the country.
Mr Demeter compared Mr Soros to Hitler, calling him “the liberal Führer” and said that Mr Soros’s “liber-aryan army deifies him more than did Hitler’s own.”
The article drew outrage from Hungary’s Jewish community, with one group calling it “tasteless” and “unforgivable” and describing the article as “a textbook case of the relativisation of the Holocaust” and “therefore incompatible with the Government’s claim of zero tolerance for antisemitism.”
Prime Minister Orban is facing calls to fire Mr Demeter.
Mr Soros, the Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor, is a frequent target of Mr Orban’s Government for his political and philanthropic activities that favour liberal causes.
Mr Demeter responded to the backlash in a statement on Sunday, promising to withdraw the article. Acknowledging the criticism it had drawn, he said “the Nazi parallel could unintentionally hurt the memory of the victims.”
There is plenty of scope to criticise or support Mr Soros’ activities without resorting to appalling antisemitic tropes and innuendo or for diminishing the Holocaust, in order to do so.
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