Letter

In response to Never again – so the world pledged

Genocide denial and Spanish Jewish organisations

In 1985, an Auschwitz survivor sued a prominent Holocaust denier in the Spanish courts for libel – and won. The result of that victory and public demand was that the Spanish penal code was amended to make genocide denial a criminal offence.

An article in Spain’s El Pais by Federico Zukierman Merlin, a member of JCall Spain-Another Jewish Voice, points out that the secretary-general of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain, has effectively denied that genocide is taking place in Palestine.

Its board of directors did not dissociate itself from his statement. It is quite possible that some Jewish leaders in Spain will end up being prosecuted under the same law that they so strongly promoted. The ironies of history never cease to amaze.

— Kieran Tapsell from Stanwell Park