Shoah Survivors Urge Nigel Farage to Make Amends Over Claimed Anti-Jewish Remarks.

A group of Shoah survivors has called for that Nigel Farage admit the facts and express remorse for alleged antisemitic taunts he reportedly directed toward Jewish schoolmates during his school days.

The political party leader has said he never insulted anyone with malicious intent, framing it may have been mere "childish teasing".

"As Holocaust survivors, we understand the deadly peril of hateful words – because we have seen where such words inevitably end," declared the survivors in a missive.

"We must be unambiguous: lauding Hitler, jeering at gas chambers, or hurling racist abuse is not banter. Not on a schoolyard. Not under any circumstances."

A Pointed Inquiry

The document asks straightforward questions to the party leader: "Are the claims accurate that you stated ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ and mimicked gas chambers? Did you subject your classmates to antisemitic abuse?"

The Survivors

The group of eleven survivors includes individuals with devastating personal experiences from the Holocaust.

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

The remaining survivors include Janine Webber, Edith Jayne, Helen Aronson, Ruth Barnett, John Fieldsend, Susan Pollack, Hanneke Dye and Agnes Kaposi.

Mounting Testimony

This action comes after the rejection of corroborating testimony by more than two dozen or more ex-schoolmates and teachers as "complete fiction" by a senior party figure.

After the story broke, further individuals from that era have shared their stories. Twenty-eight ex-students and educators now state they observed racist or antisemitic behaviour by him.

One notable allegation comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish-born Bafta and Emmy-winning director, who recalls that a young Farage would approach him and say the phrases "Hitler was right" and "gas them", on occasion including a long hiss to simulate the sound of gas chambers.

Further Allegations

Other former pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds have additionally spoken publicly with allegations of direct abuse.

• Cyrus Oshidar claimed he was called a "Paki" and has labelled as rubbish the idea that such actions were not meant to hurt.
• Another pupil of Asian descent characterised him as an "open racist" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell was correct" as a form of "racial intimidation".

The Ultimate Question

The survivors' letter poses a final challenge to Farage: "If you deny saying those words, is your position that 20 former classmates and teachers are lying? Should the allegations be true, now is the time to take responsibility and say sorry."

"People who hope to lead our country should under no circumstances create division by race or religion. Hatred of Jews must never be normalised. This moment is about personal accountability. The decision is your own, Mr Farage."