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German-funded event equating Nakba with Holocaust postponed; not good enough, say activists

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“Due to pressure applied by media such as World Israel News and the pressure we applied with our protest, we are happy to hear that the event was postponed, and we will not stop our fight till it is canceled.”

By Atara Beck, World Israel News

A German-funded program planned for Wednesday evening  equating the ‘Nakba’ with the Holocaust has been postponed largely due to protests initiated by the Im Tirtzu Zionist organization.

The activist group had planned a large demonstration at the Tel Aviv site and sent out press releases urging an end to German funding of anti-Israel propaganda.

‘Nakba’ – Arabic for ‘catastrophe’ – is the term used by Palestinians who mourn the creation of the Jewish state and observe ‘Nakba Day’ on Israeli Independence Day.

“The Foreign Ministry expresses shock and disgust in the face of the blatant cheapening of Holocaust and the cynical and manipulative attempt to create a linkage whose entire purpose is to defame Israel,” Israel’s MFA stated.

The event was to be hosted by the radical-left Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in cooperation with the German government-funded Goethe Institute in Tel Aviv on Wednesday evening, November 9. Indeed, the date coincides with Kristallnacht – the Night of the Broken Glass – when, on November 9-10. 1938, Nazis carried out a pogrom against Jews throughout Germany and Austria.

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By late Tuesday afternoon, the program was postponed until November 13, but activists are working to have it canceled altogether.

“The remembrance of the Shoah and the commemoration of the victims is a major concern of the Goethe-Institut, to which we devote ourselves in numerous projects. We regret that the choice of date for a panel discussion has currently caused irritation,” the institute said in a German-language statement.

“The Goethe-Institut stands for understanding and dialogue. That is what the planned discussion is about.”

According to Joshua Lent, director of External Relations for Im Tirtzu, “Due to pressure applied by media such as World Israel News and the pressure we applied with our protest, we are happy to hear that the event was postponed, and we will not stop our fight till it is canceled.”

The WIN report, published Tuesday afternoon, “was one of the first released in English, and it created an uproar,” Lent told World Israel News Tuesday evening.

Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan said that such an event is an “intolerable distortion of the Holocaust.”