Did Belgian interior Minister Condone Nazi Collaboration?

Belgium SS Leon Degrelle with Goebbles.

Did Belgian interior Minister Condone Nazi Collaboration? (Forward).

A representative of Flemish Jews asked a deputy prime minister of Belgium to clarify statements in which he appeared to condone the actions of Nazi collaborators.

Jan Jambon, who is also Belgium’s interior minister, made the statements during an interview which was published last week in the La Libre Belgique newspaper.

During the interview, Jambon, who is a member of the New Flemish Alliance party, was asked about his participation in 2001 at a rally organized by the far-right association Sint-Maartenfonds, whose mission statement is to support Flemish Belgians who fought on Nazi Germany’s side in World War II. 

Commenting about these veterans, he said: “The people who collaborated with the Germans, they had their reasons. I did not live in those times.”

After the Oct. 13 publication of the interview, Jambon rejected any interpretation of his words as condoning Nazism or collaboration with Nazi Germany and apologized to anyone who was offended by them.

But Raphael Werner of the Flemish Forum of Jewish Organizations told the Antwerp-based Joods Actueel newspaper that the forum wants to meet with Jambon and discuss the issue more thoroughly.

“Then we could hear for ourselves what are the positions of the minister, not only about collaboration but also about the sensitive questions connected to it,” he said, according to an article published on Oct. 14.

Some 66,000 Jews lived in Belgium when Germany invaded in 1940, according to Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. Of them, 34,801 were imprisoned and or deported. More than 80 percent of those deported died.

Belgium, a federal bi-national state, comprises three autonomous regions: The Dutch-speaking Flemish Region; the French-speaking Walloon Region; and the central Brussels region.Read the full story here.

Related: Belgian Senate recognizes authorities’ role during Holocaust

ADL leader Foxman: Anti-Semitism At Its Worst Since World War II.

ADL leader Foxman: Anti-Semitism At Its Worst Since World War II.HT: Ynet.

Anti-Defamation League chief Abe Foxman believes that anti-Semitism is at its height since the Holocaust, and threatens the lives of Jews all around the world.

“I think when we take a look at what’s going on, I think the assessment is that anti-Semitism, not only in Europe, but globally, is probably the worst that it’s been since World War II,” Foxman said in an exclusive interview to Ynet.

“Europe is where the Jewish people have paid the highest price for anti-Semitism, and it’s sort of an old-new phenomenon,” he said, defining it as “nationalists, anti-government people, neo-fascists, neo-Nazis of anti-immigration and anti-government coming together with a glue and cement of anti-Semitism. I think it’s a serious threat to Jewish life.”

As to whether European leaders are making sufficient effort to stop anti-Jewish activities, Foxman said that, “Sometimes they are and sometimes they’re not.”

He added that incorporating representatives of racist organizations into governments is certainly not helping. “We have to continue to remind them that to accept into their governments neo-Nazi, neo fascist anti-Semitic groups is to give it legitimacy.”

Belgium - Again antisemitic incident on train "Ladies and gentlemen, you are on the train to Auschwitz."

Belgium - Again antisemitic incident on train ""Ladies and gentlemen, you are on the train to Auschwitz."HT: JoodsActueel.

"Ladies and gentlemen, you are on the train to Auschwitz. All Jews are asked to step out to take a little shower" rail passengers were told on the Brussels-Liège on 31 January via the public address system on the train. The train was approaching the station at the time of Ottignies. SNCB confirmed the facts.

A Jewish passenger aboard this train reported the incident to the Brussels MR politician Vivivane Teitelbaum. Teitelbaum put the story of this recent incident on her blog after another traveler let her know that this kind of "plaisanteries" often heard on this train. "Apparently the 'young people' have a key to the cabinet with the public address system accesses".

In the spring of 2012 there was a similar incident on the train when the passengers were told that they were welcome on the train to Auschwitz and that all Jews were asked to step out at Buchenwald. SNCB then promised to take measures to prevent a recurrence.

NMBS spokesman Bart Crols said in a reaction to Jewish News that the closet with the public address system was indeed closed, but that the perpetrators despite of the increased vigilance did manage to 'break open' the closet. Yet the NMBS now two weeks later still filed no complaint for this intrusion. Our question is how this is possible let spokesperson Crols know that before a complaint is filed, the railway company to follow its own internal procedures. Our observation that this is ridiculous because you report a burglary immediately and file a complaint with the police or an investigating judge Crols responded: "I need to find out whether the complaint meanwhile is effective written down and i'll let you know" then we are nothing more SNCB heard.

Editor Michael Freilich said, "it is increasingly clear that the minister should intervene. And a complaint to the Centre for Equal Opportunities has no sense. When it comes to anti-Semitism CEOOR will be sweeping the incident under the carpet or you slide them on the back burner. "

Belgian Senate recognizes authorities’ role during Holocaust.

Belgium SS Leon Degrelle with Goebbles.

Belgian Senate recognizes authorities’ role during Holocaust.(TOI).A Belgian Senate committee adopted a resolution acknowledging the country’s complicity in the murder of Jews during the Holocaust.
The Senate’s committee on institutional affairs voted in favor of the resolution on Jan. 9, according to Belga, a local news agency.
“Some Belgian authorities practiced collaboration unfitting of a democracy,” the resolution read, “with tragic consequences for the Jewish population.”
The resolution also encourages the Belgian government to “examine the possibility of giving a statute” to Jews and Roma who were “deported for racist reasons” and to orphans of the Holocaust. It does not specify what that statute should be.
As the factual basis for the statement, the resolution referenced a 1,100-page report entitled “Obedient Belgium,” completed in 2007 by the Center for Historical Research and Documentation on War and Contemporary Society. The Senate tasked the federal research body with compiling the report in 2002.
An article in the newspaper La Libre Belgique cited political instability as the main reason for a six-year delay in the adoption of the report.
To come into effect, the resolution needs to pass in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, where it is expected to receive the support of a large majority.
Last year, the mayors of Antwerp and Brussels for the first time apologized for their municipalities’ role in the deportation of Jews from Belgium in 1942.
Some 66,000 Jews lived in Belgium when Germany invaded in 1940, according to Yad Vashem. Of them, 34,801 were imprisoned or deported. More than 80 percent of those deported died.Hmmmm......"Never Again".Read the full story here.