81 years after the Holocaust, antisemitism pervasive in Germany, Poland

Poland and Germany, like most countries across Europe and the broader Western world, have seen a rise in antisemitic incidents over the last two years.

By Ailin Vilches Arguello, The Algemeiner

Eighty-one years after the Holocaust, antisemitism remains rampant in the heart of the former Third Reich, with rising antisemitic hate crimes in Germany and incidents targeting Jewish communities in Poland drawing widespread condemnation.

On Tuesday, as the world marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day, a group of Orthodox Israelis waiting to board a flight to Israel at Krakow Airport in Poland were physically and verbally assaulted by an airport employee in the latest antisemitic incident drawing condemnation from officials and community leaders.

The travelers were praying before boarding their flight when the employee noticed them and began shouting antisemitic slurs while demanding that they stop.

When the group members explained they were nearly finished, the assailant became even more aggressive, reportedly spitting on one person and pushing another.

As the situation escalated and the assailant grew more hostile, airport police intervened to control the scene, with the incident captured and widely shared online.

In videos circulating on social media, the airport employee is seen approaching the group aggressively, shouting, “Why are you in Poland? Go back to Israel.”

The group members are seen speaking in English, asking him to stop, as he persists in claiming that Poland is “his country.”

According to local media, airport officials have yet to release a public statement, confirm whether the employee has been suspended or disciplined, or clarify if an investigation into the incident is underway.

The airport workers’ remarks were reminiscent of comments made by Polish lawmaker Grzegorz Braun, a far-right politician notorious for his repeated antisemitic statements and outspoken criticism of Israel.

“Poland is for Poles. Other nations have their own countries, including the Jews,” Braun said during a press conference in November in Oświęcim, a town in southern Poland that is home to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp memorial and museum.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day is observed annually on Jan. 27, the date when Auschwitz, the largest and most notorious of the Nazi death camps, was liberated.

“Jews want to be super-humans in Poland, entitled to a better status, and the Polish police dance to their tune,” Braun continued.

Poland, like most countries across Europe and the broader Western world, has seen a rise in antisemitic incidents over the last two years, in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel.

Germany has been one such country to experience a surge in antisemitism.

Most recently, unknown individuals vandalized the memorial at a local synagogue in Kiel, a city in the northwestern part of the country, destroying items left by people honoring the victims of the Holocaust—including a Star of David, candles, and a photograph.

“This attack is an utterly unacceptable act of antisemitic hatred and an affront to the memory of the crimes committed under National Socialism,” Daniel Günther, the minister-president of Schleswig-Holstein, a state in northern Germany, said in a statement.

“Anyone who desecrates a memorial site like this violates historical responsibility and the core values of the state.”

“We are witnessing a growing number of antisemitic incidents. Ninety years ago, that hatred marked the beginning of the end,” he continued. “That is precisely why we cannot tolerate a single incident today. Every act must be investigated and punished under the rule of law.”

This latest antisemitic attack comes as the local Jewish community rallies to defend democracy and protest against antisemitism on International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Observed each year on Jan. 27, the day honors the six million Jews and other victims killed by the Nazis and commemorates the liberation of Auschwitz in 1945.

“Holocaust survivors around the world are asking whether democracies and their citizens are sufficiently aware of the dangers posed by the hateful rhetoric of far-right and populist politicians and parties,” Christoph Heubner, vice president of the International Auschwitz Committee from Berlin, said in a statement.

“Antisemitism has an unfortunate characteristic: it serves as an ideological bridge between right-wing extremists, left-wing extremists, and Islamists alike,” he continued. “These forces will continue to grow stronger if, as a society, we do not stop these threatening developments.”

According to newly released figures from the German Ministry of the Interior obtained by the newspaper BILD, antisemitic incidents continued to rise last year, with 2,122 offenses reported in Berlin alone, including 60 violent attacks.

This represents a significant increase of 80 percent compared with the already high number of incidents in previous years, with Berlin police recording 901 such offenses in 2023 and 1,622 in 2024, BILD reported.

“The rise in these figures is alarming, but not surprising. When politicians allow antisemitic demonstrations to go unchallenged, it emboldens certain groups and reinforces their antisemitic attitudes and attacks,” Timur Husein, a member of Parliament from the CDU, Germany’s center-right Christian Democratic Union, who requested the data, told the German newspaper.

Husein also said that the CDU is looking to strengthen Germany’s assembly laws to ban antisemitic demonstrations, which he says are responsible for a significant share of these crimes.

Earlier this month, the commissioner to combat antisemitism in the German state of Hesse sounded the alarm after an arson attack on a local synagogue in the town of Giessen, warning that it reflects a “growing pogrom-like atmosphere” threatening Jewish life across Germany as Jews and Israelis continue to face an increasingly hostile climate.