Shoah Survivors Demand Nigel Farage to Make Amends Over Claimed Anti-Jewish Comments.

A group of Holocaust survivors has insisted that Nigel Farage admit the facts and issue an apology for reported anti-Jewish taunts he reportedly directed toward Jewish pupils during his school days.

The Reform UK leader has previously stated he never targeted anyone with the aim to hurt, proposing it may have been mere "childish teasing".

"As Holocaust survivors, we comprehend the profound danger of hateful words – for we have experienced firsthand where such words ultimately lead," wrote the survivors in a open letter.

"It is crucial to understand: expressing admiration for Hitler, jeering at gas chambers, or shouting racist insults is not banter. Not among children. Not ever."

A Direct Question

The correspondence puts forth direct questions to the party leader: "Did you say ‘Hitler was right’ and ‘gas them,’ and mimicked gas chambers? Did you expose your peers to antisemitic abuse?"

The Survivors

The collective of 11 survivors contains individuals with deeply traumatic 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 breaking out in 1942 and living through the rest of the war in hiding.
• Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, who was sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau and later moved to Bergen-Belsen, where she was liberated.

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 intervention follows the characterisation of related testimony by more than several dozen ex-schoolmates and teachers as "fabricated nonsense" by a senior party figure.

Since the initial report, more contemporaries have come forward. Nearly thirty ex-students and educators now claim they witnessed bigoted conduct by him.

One prominent allegation comes from Peter Ettedgui, a Jewish Bafta and Emmy-winning director, who said that a teenage Farage would come near him and utter the phrases "Hitler was correct" and "gas them", at times making a prolonged hissing sound to simulate the sound of poison gas.

Additional Claims

Other former pupils from diverse backgrounds have likewise come forward with allegations of personal harassment.

• Cyrus Oshidar claimed he was branded a "Paki" and has labelled as rubbish the claim that such actions were not meant to hurt.
• Another student of Asian heritage characterised him as an "avowed bigot" who would use the phrase "Enoch Powell was right" as a form of "racial bullying".

A Concluding Demand

The missive from survivors asks a concluding challenge to Farage: "By denying saying those words, do you mean that 20 former classmates and teachers are not telling the truth? If the words were spoken, now is the opportunity to take responsibility and apologise."

"People who seek to govern our country should under no circumstances create division by background or belief. Antisemitic hatred must never be normalised. This moment is about ethical duty. The decision is yours, Mr Farage."