Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas caused shock in Germany Tuesday when, standing beside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin, he accused Israel of committing “holocausts” against Palestinians over the years.
Scholz did not react verbally to Abbas’s comment in the moment, though he grimaced at the use of the word, which Abbas uttered in English. Scholz later said the use of the term in such a context was “unbearable.”
That was later. He didn't say anything at the time, or make any move to contradict Abbas when it mattered. He just "grimaced".
Asked whether as Palestinian leader he planned to apologize to Israel and Germany for the attack ahead of the 50th anniversary, Abbas responded instead by citing allegations of atrocities committed by Israel since 1947.
“If we want to go over the past, go ahead,” Abbas, who was speaking Arabic, told the reporters.
“I have 50 slaughters that Israel committed….50 massacres, 50 slaughters, 50 holocausts,” he said, taking care to pronounce the final word in English.
Abbas was responding to a reporter’s question about the upcoming anniversary of the Munich massacre half a century ago. Eleven Israeli athletes and a German police officer died after members of the Palestinian militant group Black September took hostages at the Olympic Village on September 5, 1972. At the time of the attack, the group was linked to Abbas’s Fatah party.
It's caused quite the scandal in Germany:
Germany’s popular BILD newspaper published an outraged website-leading story about the incident, under the title “Antisemitism scandal at the federal chancellery.”
It expressed shock that “not a word of dissent [was said] in the face of the worst Holocaust relativization that a head of government has ever uttered in the chancellor’s office.”
"Abbas relativises (trivialises) the Holocaust, and Scholz says nothing."
Der Spiegel, Welt, Junge Freiheit and other media oulets also ran headlines noting Scholz’s silence during the press conference.
Germany has long argued the term should only be used to describe the Nazis’ singular crime of killing six million Jews before and during World War II.
As does anyone with a decent moral compass.
[h/t Simon]
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