Holocaust Survivors Call On Nigel Farage to Say Sorry Over Claimed Anti-Jewish Remarks.

A collective of Holocaust survivors has called for that Nigel Farage be honest and express remorse for alleged antisemitic comments he reportedly directed toward Jewish schoolmates during his time at school.

The political party leader has said he never racially abused anyone with the aim to hurt, proposing it may have been mere "schoolyard talk".

"Being Holocaust survivors, we grasp the grave risk of hateful words – for we have experienced firsthand where such words can lead," wrote the survivors in a open letter.

"Let us be clear: praising Hitler, jeering at gas chambers, or hurling racist abuse is not teasing. Not on a schoolyard. Not under any circumstances."

A Direct Question

The correspondence asks blunt questions to the public figure: "Did you say ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ accompanied by mimicking gas chambers? Did you target your fellow pupils to anti-Jewish taunts?"

The Signatories

The group of eleven survivors features individuals with devastating personal stories from the Holocaust.

• Hedi Argent, who lost 27 members of her family.
• Simon Winston, who was imprisoned in a ghetto before breaking out in 1942 and spending 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 rescued.

Additional names on the letter include Janine Webber, Edith Jayne, Helen Aronson, Ruth Barnett, John Fieldsend, Susan Pollack, Hanneke Dye and Agnes Kaposi.

Mounting Testimony

This action is a response to the dismissal of similar accounts by more than several dozen former pupils and teachers as "fabricated nonsense" by a high-ranking official.

Since the initial report, further individuals from that era have shared their stories. Nearly thirty ex-students and educators now state they saw racist or antisemitic behaviour by him.

One prominent account comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish Bafta and Emmy-winning director, who recalls that a young Farage would approach him and repeat the phrases "Hitler had the correct idea" and "send them to the gas chambers", on occasion making a prolonged hissing sound to imitate the sound of the gas chambers.

Further Allegations

Other former pupils from diverse backgrounds have also spoken publicly with stories of personal harassment.

• Cyrus Oshidar claimed he was referred to as a "racial slur" and has labelled as rubbish the claim that such actions were without intent.
• Another pupil of Asian descent characterised him as an "avowed bigot" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell had a point" as a form of "ethnic harassment".

The Survivors' Final Appeal

The final appeal poses a final question to Farage: "If you deny saying those words, is your position that scores of witnesses are not telling the truth? If you did say them, now is the time to admit your error and say sorry."

"Those who aspire to lead our country should not ever divide people by race or religion. Anti-Jewish bigotry must never become acceptable. This moment is about personal accountability. The decision is yours, Mr Farage."