Holocaust Victims Urge Nigel Farage to Say Sorry Over Alleged Antisemitic Remarks.

A group of Holocaust survivors has publicly demanded that Nigel Farage tell the truth and express remorse for alleged antisemitic abuse he is said to have made toward Jewish pupils during his youth.

The political party leader has previously stated he never targeted anyone with the aim to hurt, proposing it may have been mere "playground banter".

"Being Holocaust survivors, we understand the grave risk of words of hatred – because we have witnessed where such words inevitably end," declared the survivors in a open letter.

"It is crucial to understand: lauding Hitler, mocking gas chambers, or directing racial slurs is not banter. Not on a schoolyard. Not under any circumstances."

A Direct Question

The letter puts forth straightforward questions to the party leader: "Are the claims accurate that you stated ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ while mimicking gas chambers? Did you target your classmates to antisemitic abuse?"

The Survivors

The group of 11 survivors includes individuals with deeply traumatic personal histories from the Nazi genocide.

• Hedi Argent, who lost 27 members of her immediate and extended family.
• Simon Winston, who was confined to a ghetto before escaping in 1942 and living through the rest of the war in hiding.
• Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, who was sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau and later incarcerated at Bergen-Belsen, where she was liberated.

Additional names on the letter include Janine Webber, Edith Jayne, Helen Aronson, Ruth Barnett, John Fieldsend, Susan Pollack, Hanneke Dye and Agnes Kaposi.

Mounting Testimony

This intervention comes after the rejection of corroborating accounts by more than several dozen ex-schoolmates and teachers as "complete fiction" by a senior party figure.

Since the initial report, more contemporaries have come forward. Twenty-eight people connected to the school now state they witnessed bigoted conduct by him.

One notable testimony comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish award-winning director, who recalls that a young Farage would come near him and utter the phrases "Hitler was right" and "gas them", on occasion including a hiss to simulate the sound of poison gas.

A Broader Pattern

Additional alumni from diverse backgrounds have likewise shared experiences with stories of targeted insults.

• Cyrus Oshidar stated he was called a "racial slur" and has labelled as rubbish the idea that such actions were not meant to hurt.
• Another pupil of Asian descent portrayed him as an "avowed bigot" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell had a point" as a form of "racial bullying".

The Survivors' Final Appeal

The final appeal puts forth an ultimate challenge to Farage: "Should you continue to deny saying those words, do you mean that 20 former classmates and teachers are fabricating their stories? Should the allegations be true, now is the moment to take responsibility and apologise."

"People who seek to govern our country should not ever divide people by ethnicity or faith. Hatred of Jews must never be normalised. This moment is about personal accountability. The choice is your own, Mr Farage."