Posted on 01/29/25
| News Source: JPost
A European Union Parliament’s moment of silence for the victims of the Holocaust on Wednesday was interrupted by a Polish member accusing Israel of a Jewish-conducted genocide in Gaza.
“Let’s pray for the victims of the Jewish genocide in Gaza,” far-right, monarchist Confederation of the Polish Crown chairman and MEP Grzegorz Braun twice shouted during the moment of silence.
Far-right Polish MEP Grzegorz Braun disrupted a Holocaust memorial in the EU Parliament, shouting about Gaza during a minute of silence. President Roberta Metsola ordered his removal to applause. pic.twitter.com/Y1iscHJ4gh
— The Jerusalem Post (@Jerusalem_Post) January 29, 2025
As performers prepared to play Maurice Ravel’s “Kaddish” violin and piano piece based on a Jewish prayer of the same name, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola expelled Braun from the chamber’s applause.
Braun later added on social media that he did not disturb the ceremony for International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp but had rather supplemented the proceedings.
“I shared the comment that apparently all victims are equal, but some are more equal than others,” Braun said on X/Twitter.
Fellow Polish MEP and European People’s Party member Lukasz Kohut condemned Braun on social media as a “disgusting creature” for desecrating the minute of silence.
Dutch Reformed Political Party MEP Bert-Jan Ruissen called Braun antisemitic on X and urged the “highest possible sanction” that the EU body could impose.
The European Jewish Congress described the incident as a “vile display of antisemitism in the heart of European democracy.”
“Disrupting a solemn moment of silence with hateful rhetoric is not only a grave insult to the memory of the Holocaust victims but also a disturbing reminder that the same antisemitic narratives that fueled history’s darkest times continue to persist today,” said the EJC. “Such open hatred cannot be ignored or tolerated.”
The EJC noted that Braun had once used a fire extinguisher to put out Hanukkah candles in the Polish parliament, defending his actions as restoring “normality.”