According to Amherd, anti-Semitism must be combated resolutely
Published: Friday, Jan 26th 2024, 14:10
Back to Live Feed
Anti-Semitism must be fought with all our strength. This is what President Viola Amherd said on the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust. Remembering this and the victims of National Socialism is a historical responsibility.
"The rise in anti-Semitism in light of the terrorist attacks by Hamas against the Israeli civilian population on October 7, 2023 must therefore be combated resolutely and with all our strength," said Amherd on the occasion of the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz on Saturday.
Regardless of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the military operations in Gaza and other occupied territories, it is unacceptable for Jewish citizens in Switzerland to be attacked or to feel threatened, Amherd was quoted as saying in the statement from the Department of Defense, Civil Protection and Sport (DDPS). Anti-Semitism, like other forms of hatred against people because of their race, ethnicity or religion, has no place in a democratic society.
Demonstration alienates the SIG
For the Secretary General of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities (SIG), Jonathan Kreutner, the day of remembrance is also marked by the events of October 7, 2023, "which came as a lasting shock to many people in Israel, but also to Jews in the diaspora".
The fact that a pro-Palestine demonstration was taking place in Zurich on the same day greatly disconcerted the SIG, he wrote in response to an inquiry. The use of the anti-Semitic fighting term "From the river to the sea" in the demonstration call for Israel to be wiped out. It is appalling that a demand for peace is being undermined in this way. Demonstrators should clearly distance themselves from this.
National Council President Eric Nussbaumer (SP/BL) tweeted on the occasion of Remembrance Day that education plays an important role in the fight against anti-Semitism and forgetting the Holocaust.
On January 27, 1945, the Soviet Red Army liberated the Nazi extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. The extermination camp west of Krakow in Poland was one of several extermination and concentration camps in Nazi Germany's sphere of influence, where at least six million Jews from all over Europe were murdered on German orders, alongside Sinti and Roma, homosexuals, political prisoners and other victims of persecution.
©Keystone/SDA
English 
German 
French 
Spanish 
Arabic