Shoah Survivors Demand Nigel Farage to Say Sorry Over Claimed Anti-Jewish Remarks.

A group of Holocaust survivors has publicly demanded that Nigel Farage admit the facts and issue an apology for alleged anti-Jewish taunts he is said to have made toward Jewish students during his youth.

The Reform UK leader has said he never targeted anyone with malicious intent, proposing it may have been mere "childish teasing".

"As Holocaust survivors, we understand the grave risk of bigoted language – for we have experienced firsthand where such words can lead," wrote the survivors in a letter.

"It is crucial to understand: lauding Hitler, mimicking gas chambers, or directing racial slurs is not banter. Not among children. Not under any circumstances."

A Direct Question

The correspondence poses blunt questions to the party leader: "Are the claims accurate that you stated ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ while mimicking gas chambers? Did you subject your fellow pupils to antisemitic abuse?"

The Survivors

The collective of eleven survivors includes individuals with harrowing personal experiences from the Holocaust.

• Hedi Argent, who saw the murder of 27 members of her family.
• Simon Winston, who was held in a ghetto before fleeing in 1942 and living through the rest of the war in hiding.
• Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, who was imprisoned at Auschwitz-Birkenau and later incarcerated at Bergen-Belsen, where she was freed.

The remaining survivors include Janine Webber, Edith Jayne, Helen Aronson, Ruth Barnett, John Fieldsend, Susan Pollack, Hanneke Dye and Agnes Kaposi.

Growing Accounts

This public letter follows the rejection of related accounts by more than two dozen or more former pupils and teachers as "made-up twaddle" by a high-ranking official.

After the story broke, additional former pupils have spoken out. Nearly thirty former pupils and teachers now claim they witnessed prejudiced actions by him.

One prominent account comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish Bafta and Emmy-winning director, who recalls that a teenage Farage would sidle up to him and utter the phrases "Hitler had the correct idea" and "send them to the gas chambers", at times including a long hiss to imitate the sound of gas chambers.

A Broader Pattern

Other former pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds have likewise spoken publicly with accounts of targeted insults.

• Cyrus Oshidar claimed he was called a "Paki" and has dismissed the idea that such actions were devoid of malice.
• Another pupil of Asian descent portrayed him as an "blatant racist" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell was correct" as a form of "ethnic harassment".

The Ultimate Question

The survivors' letter puts forth an ultimate dilemma to Farage: "By denying saying those words, do you mean that scores of witnesses are lying? If the words were spoken, now is the moment to take responsibility and apologise."

"Individuals who seek to govern our country should under no circumstances create division by race or religion. Antisemitic hatred must never become acceptable. This moment is about personal accountability. The choice is your own, Mr Farage."