An Israeli high school student was arrested and questioned by police for doing a Nazi salute during a school trip to Auschwitz, Israeli media reported on Sunday.
The teenager from Kiryat Bialik was on his school’s field trip to Poland when he did the gesture under the entrance sign to the camp.
He was questioned for two hours by Polish police and was fined approximately NIS 1,500 after security guards observed him performing the salute. The museum also captured the incident on its security cameras; the footage was handed over to the police.
Polish police charged him with promoting Nazism, local media reported. Performing a seig heil is illegal in Poland, and carries a potential sentence of up to two years in prison.
It wasn’t a Nazi salute. It was a heartfelt and perhaps ill-advised gesture that, in the moment, could be misinterpreted as a Nazi salute. I think we shouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions.
/s
Did they drove off in a Tesla ? (asking for a friend)
I just don’t nazi it…
I’m stunned … again !! … I have visited Auschwitz and it’s impressive beyond words. At the entrance of the former gas chambers there is a sign asking to respect and remember those who died in there and keep silent in the chambers. Everyone did except for Israeli students. That is what brought the tears to my eyes. Betrayed and disrespected again, this time by their own.
Oh believe me, Israeli trips in Kraków are the worst kind of tourists in every aspect possible. They are louder than British stag parties, more obnoxious than Americans and their favourite thing is crying about antisemitism when they are removed from somewhere for causing disturbances or making a huge mess. They do not understand the idea of rubbish bins and you can trace their paths by following cigarette butts, empty crisps packets and spit.
Israelis are broadly recognized to be some of the worst tourists in the world.
Is there any chance the ones making all the ruckus and disrespect were non-Jewish Israelis? That’s not an excuse but it makes it make more sense than actual Jews being so disrespectful. And if it is young Jews doing it, can you make it make sense? Do you have some sense for why / how they might be thinking?
Keeping in mind just being bad tourists doesn’t quite explain it. Kids groups tend to be shite tourists no matter where they are from. But even I knew as a 10yo not to act stupid when visiting some of the more somber locations I went to in the US; no less as a 21yo when I visited Dachau as a non-Jew.
I never know if they are Jewish or not, the groups themselves are distinct because they are always in large groups, with multiple guides and guards, but I can’t tell Jewish or non Jewish Israelis apart just by their faces. Idk why they behave like that. It’s all ages. I sometimes see them out in the city but I heard more chilling stories about them from a guy who operates a bus transfer business to Auschwitz.
[sigh] I’ll never understand this world.
The Palestinian Arabs are too busy being bombed to go visit the holocaust museum.
About one in five Israelis are Arab - according to demographic figures.
Avoiding the obvious hot button issue, I’ll just say I was assuming the observation could have pre-dated the current war AND there are other non-jews in Israel than just Palestinians.
Israel didn’t exist before the current war. Palestine has been suffering an invasion and the occupation of its sovereign territory since 1948.
Israel is a middle eastern country with a middle eastern temperament. That is less reserved and controlled than Central Europeans. The majority of Jews in Israel are Mizrahi, descendants from Jews who fled the MENA region, not Europe. They tend to be a bit more noisy and dramatic.
It would be interesting to get the perspective of an Israeli who went on such a trip.
It’s also unclear how prevalent this issue is, or if it’s just a few cases tainting their image. There are lots and lots of Israeli school kids visiting Auschwitz. Probably more than any other nationality. So it might simply be explained by their numbers.
Yup, all fair points and why I was asking hoping OP or someone else might have insights. Thanks.
Maybe the genociders are also not jews, eh? Except for all those interviews where Israeli leaders spell it out with no possible room for denial.
This also mirrors my experience at Aushwitz. Israeli teenagers were generally being dicks around the site and then unrolled several large Israeli flags to take group photos with.
Can’t blame the teens too much as their teachers had no problem with/promoted the behaviour.
I left the place traumatised, these kids… not so much.
Everyone did except this one guy. The other students didnt do this.
Dear god I hope eel-on-musk goes to Poland and tries that. He so deserves to find out.
Edit: clarification: I’m saying I want him to be arrested somewhere that’s not the US
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Depends. Europe isn’t exactly his fan right now, so unless he gets diplomatic immunity, he could get some real charges. He would just pay them off and cry about it on twitter, but it would be a very popular action for any Euro authority to take.
I cordially invite Elon to come to Melbourne Australia and flip his favourite salute.
Its a significantly more painful $23,000 fine there, and if he does it repeatedly there’s a good chance of a 12 month prison term.
https://www.vic.gov.au/fact-sheet-nazi-symbol-prohibition
P. S. If my maths is right he can do it almost 15 million times before he runs out of money, I might have to email Vic gov to ask them to review the fine to be wealth-adjusted.
I’m not going to give some asshat teenager the same level of shit as Elon. It’s a hell of a lot more likely in that context that he really was kidding, just distastefully.
For real… we are dealing with an edgy teenager here. Put away the torches people
You could be referring to either of them
Unfortunately, you are right.
if I was talking about Elon I’d have you ready the guillotine instead of putting away torches
My grandfather did not fight in World War II for this shit. I hate this reality.
Ikr? I saw someone post one of those grandfather didn’t fight for this meme and I can help think that he would shoot the guys hold that flag you hugging
Are they sending their youth to teach them how to deal with Palestinians?
Personally knowing some young Israeli’s.
A lot of them don’t take the holocaust very seriously and tend to joke about it a lot, (maybe it’s a coping mechanism)? In any case, this is probably a case of an edgy high schooler trying to make their friends laugh.
Could be a coping mechanism. If they took it seriously they would probably have to reflect about the similarities between the Nazis and Israel.
Come on, we’re all thinking it: could also be that the student likes the thought of exterminating people. Maybe we just found a really honest zionist. How many videos have we all seen of Israelis jumping up and down and partying when they hear of their military’s war crimes?
More like they deminish it so its not a big deal so they can execute Holocaust 2.0 Palestinian Boogaloo.
Fun fact Israelis in large part are not and were not German Jewish immigrants from WW2 and in fact there was a large vocal cadre of actual Holocaust survivors that weren’t and aren’t in favor of Israel as a country created in the mandate of Palestine in large part because of the whole terrorism and murdering Muslims thing.
Yes, you are the baddies.
That’s €376.10, not nearly enough imo.
And 410.57 American freedom eagles.
That’s a first time fee
its around $23000 here in Victoria, Australia
Only in one state of Australia, Victoria. Worth mentioning.
oh right, my mistake. i actually live in Victoria so i originally thought it was a federal law somehow.
Nah it’s all good - it’s confusing because federal-level hate crime and Anti-Nazi laws came in recently also (last month). Those are all mandatory minimum prison sentences though, no fines.
This is an idiotic teenager and should have no bearing on your opinion of Israel. (I shouldn’t have to say this, but if I don’t somebody will m’accuse: please note that I’m not defending Israel.)
Ben Gvir, Netenyahu, and Smotrich go on tv all the time calling for ethnic cleansing and war crimes. Should that have any bearing on my opinion of Israel?
Don’t really want to engage with an obvious troll, but yeah when the head of state says something like that, it should tell you all you need to know. I’ve seen idiotic teenagers from all over the world say idiotic things enough to know not to judge a society by their teenagers.
If you want to ignore the obvious thats on you. And if you want to paint my citations of the facts reported in network news as “trolling” then its reality itself that you have a problem with.
wha? No, I agree with you about Netenyahu etc.
eh, yeah. I guess I am loathe to excuse a teens misbehavior when it just reinforces the criminality of his government, but broadly speaking I do agree that teens arent capable of understanding their own actions like adults should be. I get the feeling theres a lot of apologists here saying One teen doesnt represent much, and how do we know the teen is even jewish, to try to make the issue go away, and I see a lot of disenganuous arguing by the zionists so I get an itchy finger on that. Anyway, my apologies, your reasoning is sound, if inconvenient.
My point is that a teen’s behaviour doesn’t reinforce the criminality of his government, but is mostly orthogonal to it. I can see perhaps there’s a monkey-see monkey-do argument that does link a teen’s behaviour to his society’s, but Israelis are not fond of literal Nazi iconography, so I don’t think that applies here.
If you try to use sketchy arguments like this to reinforce your opinions about Zionism, it only opens you to attack. Please, try to keep a level head, or we’ll all look stupid. Rather than trying to guess if somebody is an apologist based on the consequence of their argument, maybe check if the premise is sound instead like a rational person.
(Aside: I also disagree with you about teens and self-understanding – I do think a lot of teenagers are mature and self-aware; my point is that it’s a high-variance distribution really.)
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Wow, ya know I’ve been joking that Israel is full of Jewish Nazis, but…u hh… damn
Fuck Israel
Edge Lord asked for that
No need to put a stupid teenager in prison for a longer time for being stupid, but: A day or two behind bars on top of the fine might have had a better educational effect.
He didn’t do it on accident and was fully aware of what he was doing and where he was doing it. Lock that scum up I say.
No objection then.
You must be new to the world or just lacking experience in your adult life.
I guess you’ve never seen young people support bad guys specifically because it’s provocative. They don’t know any better and to assume that this kid wants a nazi regime because he did a hitler salute is asinine.
I could see him finding real support now among those who do want a nazi regime because of how he was treated by us. We should be compassionate with these kids instead of trying to beat them into submission.
If they’re doing it to be provocative, then they know exactly what they’re doing and why it’s bad. No sympathy for Nazi supporters or those who make light of Nazi atrocities. This kid deserves the punishment.
You’re free to think that, but I respectfully disagree.
If he kept doing it, sure. But taking him aside and talking to him could be more effective and less damaging than getting the authorities involved and humiliating him to “prove a point.”
Show him that we’re on the same side. If we treat him like an enemy when he really isn’t one, he very well may become one.
Less damaging to whom? To the kid who did a Nazi salute? Sure, definitely. How about to society? Tolerance for Nazis and Nazi symbology only emboldens Nazis and weakens everyone else. Especially in these times when fascists control the most powerful country on Earth.
You’re not tolerating it by taking him aside, explaining to him why it’s not acceptable even as a joke, and warning him not to do it again.
But the thing is, this is a 17 year student from Israel. Shouldn’t they already know how serious a Nazi salute is? A fine like this teen got is an absolutely acceptable punishment that will either a) teach him not to be such a dumbass, or b) that his shitty beliefs are not tolerated.
Could easily see this radicalizing him if he isn’t already.
It’s easy to make dumb edgy jokes as a teenager without actually believing whatever you’re joking about.
Humiliating this kid like this is really just trying to make an example out of him rather than solving any problem or helping him in any way.
This could’ve easily been solved by the teacher taking him aside and explaining to him why that’s not acceptable. If he keeps doing it after being warned, then it’s fine to escalate.
If you go there and don’t already know what’s going on you failed yourself already. Stupidity does not protect against punishment.
Stupidity does not protect against punishment.
It is for children.
That’s so crazy it’s almost like people don’t like Nazis… 🤷
