An Israeli high school student was arrested and questioned by police for doing a Nazi salute during a school trip to Auschwitz, Israeli media reported on Sunday.
The teenager from Kiryat Bialik was on his school’s field trip to Poland when he did the gesture under the entrance sign to the camp.
He was questioned for two hours by Polish police and was fined approximately NIS 1,500 after security guards observed him performing the salute. The museum also captured the incident on its security cameras; the footage was handed over to the police.
Polish police charged him with promoting Nazism, local media reported. Performing a seig heil is illegal in Poland, and carries a potential sentence of up to two years in prison.
Edge Lord asked for that
Fuck Israel
Personally knowing some young Israeli’s.
A lot of them don’t take the holocaust very seriously and tend to joke about it a lot, (maybe it’s a coping mechanism)? In any case, this is probably a case of an edgy high schooler trying to make their friends laugh.
Fun fact Israelis in large part are not and were not German Jewish immigrants from WW2 and in fact there was a large vocal cadre of actual Holocaust survivors that weren’t and aren’t in favor of Israel as a country created in the mandate of Palestine in large part because of the whole terrorism and murdering Muslims thing.
Could be a coping mechanism. If they took it seriously they would probably have to reflect about the similarities between the Nazis and Israel.
Come on, we’re all thinking it: could also be that the student likes the thought of exterminating people. Maybe we just found a really honest zionist. How many videos have we all seen of Israelis jumping up and down and partying when they hear of their military’s war crimes?
could be a coping mechanism
it’s not. it’s just a nazi do’in nazi shit.
It makes sense, essentially by remaining oblivious and reductive about one act you can then allow yourself to also be blind to your own current amoral actions. Essentially it’s easier to stay dense than it is to actually face the reality you are a part of.
no. No I think they know what side of that conflict they would have been on. because it’s the side their ancestors were on-literally, look at what the zionists were doing during the run-up to world war two. it’s so bad. then look at how they treated holocaust survivors after. also not great.
I think most teenagers are not nearly so self-aware. Most people see things as in-group/out-group, simple as that. Doing a nazi salute was probably meant as am (ignorant) way to defy authority; teen most likely was not thinking about palestine at all.
it’s not defying authority, and you’re thinking of american teens. zios absolutely do. they sing songs about killing them in school as young children. this is not a defiance of authority, it’s perfectly acceptable in that culture. expected, even.
No – nazi salutes are not acceptable in Israeli culture. Nazi salutes are the ultimate anti-semitic gesture. Why would those be “expected”?
you just said why. also, I’m pretty sure saying “from the river to the sea, palestine will be free” is the ultimate antisemitic gesture.
It’s not that deep. Lots of teenagers do edgy stuff just because it’s edgy and not allowed.
He’ll look back in 10 years cringing about himself.
It’s not that deep. Lots of teenagers do edgy stuff just because it’s edgy and not allowed.
Thank goodness we can arrest them for it. Imagine the objective harm & deprivation of rights or peaceful access to opportunities or resources that teenage edginess causes to society. Right?
zionists do not regret being nazis. they just do more nazi shit.
The world is not that black and white my dude, go outside sometimes
sure, yeah, im sure there’s an oskar schindler or something among them, but nazis are, generally speaking nazis.
Touch grass, man. When people call zionists nazis, they mean they are genocidal ethno(-religious) fascists. They don’t literally mean they speak german, sport swastikas, heil hitler, and hate jews. Zionists despise literal nazis. I can’t believe this actually has to be explained.
they don’t tend to speak german at a higher rate than the general population, that part is true. many prefer a burning cross or killing star to a swastika, that’s true. the ones that aren’t also old fashioned nazis, which are increasingly common.
the rest of what you’re saying is bullshit. the current head zio is a literal hitler apologist. look outside before asking me to touch grass, please.
Are they sending their youth to teach them how to deal with Palestinians?
My grandfather did not fight in World War II for this shit. I hate this reality.
This happens a lot more than you’d think. I experienced something similar in Dachau and the guide told me if someone does something unhinged/disrespectful during a tour there’s a 9 out of 10 chance it’s a descendant of a holocaust victim. She didn’t say why she thought that is but she said it’s something that puts the staff on edge whenever there’s an Israeli group visiting. I’m surprised they got the cops involved though.
Not nazi salutes, but Hasidic tour groups in the US has a similar reputation for disrespectful behavior. They’re also the most visibly Jewish group to passerbys, so they drag the whole group’s image down with them and embolden anti-semites.
This is an idiotic teenager and should have no bearing on your opinion of Israel. (I shouldn’t have to say this, but if I don’t somebody will m’accuse: please note that I’m not defending Israel.)
Ben Gvir, Netenyahu, and Smotrich go on tv all the time calling for ethnic cleansing and war crimes. Should that have any bearing on my opinion of Israel?
Don’t really want to engage with an obvious troll, but yeah when the head of state says something like that, it should tell you all you need to know. I’ve seen idiotic teenagers from all over the world say idiotic things enough to know not to judge a society by their teenagers.
If you want to ignore the obvious thats on you. And if you want to paint my citations of the facts reported in network news as “trolling” then its reality itself that you have a problem with.
wha? No, I agree with you about Netenyahu etc.
eh, yeah. I guess I am loathe to excuse a teens misbehavior when it just reinforces the criminality of his government, but broadly speaking I do agree that teens arent capable of understanding their own actions like adults should be. I get the feeling theres a lot of apologists here saying One teen doesnt represent much, and how do we know the teen is even jewish, to try to make the issue go away, and I see a lot of disenganuous arguing by the zionists so I get an itchy finger on that. Anyway, my apologies, your reasoning is sound, if inconvenient.
My point is that a teen’s behaviour doesn’t reinforce the criminality of his government, but is mostly orthogonal to it. I can see perhaps there’s a monkey-see monkey-do argument that does link a teen’s behaviour to his society’s, but Israelis are not fond of literal Nazi iconography, so I don’t think that applies here.
If you try to use sketchy arguments like this to reinforce your opinions about Zionism, it only opens you to attack. Please, try to keep a level head, or we’ll all look stupid. Rather than trying to guess if somebody is an apologist based on the consequence of their argument, maybe check if the premise is sound instead like a rational person.
(Aside: I also disagree with you about teens and self-understanding – I do think a lot of teenagers are mature and self-aware; my point is that it’s a high-variance distribution really.)
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They skipped over how old this person is. Somehow I think this is a teen doing dumb stuff.
Teens doing dumb stuff isn’t a hall pass. Actions have consequences. Those consequences take this into account and often are mitigated but still enforced
Most of the time I would agree with this. If a teen gets caught stealing or vandalizing I think they need to be taught a lesson. However, this feels like something done just to break the rules which is on point for most teens.
I’d rather see teens getting away with stealing or vandalism than with normalizing Nazi shit (especially at a place like Auschwitz)
Nazi shit, from an israeli teen. I can’t wrap my head around chocking such a onion worthy act getting written off by “boys will be boys”.
Actually now I think on it, almost any time I hear about “dumb teen” stuff I think they get away with way more then what is healthy for society.
It’s about the fact that teenagers have underdeveloped reasoning skills and deserve some leniency while they develop their sense of right from wrong. As well just, if your goal is there being a net reduction of nazis in society, then imprisoning a teenager for throwing the salute is probably not going to achieve that.
Teens have a perfectly functional frontal cortex thing is they are still figuring out when to actually use it. They can be perfectly adult one moment, or in a particular area, and completely stupid in the other. Visiting Auschwitz, one might presume, would be a situation where an Israeli teen isn’t a rage of hormones. Be that when racing shopping carts.
Sense of right and wrong develops way earlier.
the fact that teenagers have underdeveloped reasoning skills
I can get that to a degree (like a 13 year old) but by 15 or 16 I expect about the same level of adulting as a US midwestern adult (not really a super high bar but enough to know that doing a nazi salute in a place dedicated to the memory of the victims of nazis while on a school trip from the only nation made up of the primary target of those same nazis, might be a life changing act).
I just don’t get the level of coddling that is now going on with an increasingly older limit of what is considered children. I remember working my first part time job at 13 and told by older people then they moved out at the same age (so I should stop complaining or some such), and now I am told about 25 year old “kids”. Its nuts, these are functioning people and although yes some stupid actions are expected when young there is no reason to not hold people to at least a modicum of responsibility.
The fact that a 16yo has worse reasoning skills than an adult is fairly well researched. I wouldn’t call them a child though. But as a society we decided long ago that an <18yo isn’t held to the same standard of criminal liability as someone 18 or older. I don’t really know that I’ve seen what you’re referencing with 25 year olds being called kids. I just think there are too many folks in this thread that seem to think a high school student should go to prison for something like this.
It wasn’t a Nazi salute. It was a heartfelt and perhaps ill-advised gesture that, in the moment, could be misinterpreted as a Nazi salute. I think we shouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions.
/s
Mr. Mangione had a heartfelt and perhaps ill-advised gesture against a CEO.
🤣
I just don’t nazi it…
I’m stunned … again !! … I have visited Auschwitz and it’s impressive beyond words. At the entrance of the former gas chambers there is a sign asking to respect and remember those who died in there and keep silent in the chambers. Everyone did except for Israeli students. That is what brought the tears to my eyes. Betrayed and disrespected again, this time by their own.
This also mirrors my experience at Aushwitz. Israeli teenagers were generally being dicks around the site and then unrolled several large Israeli flags to take group photos with.
Can’t blame the teens too much as their teachers had no problem with/promoted the behaviour.
I left the place traumatised, these kids… not so much.
Everyone did except this one guy. The other students didnt do this.
Oh believe me, Israeli trips in Kraków are the worst kind of tourists in every aspect possible. They are louder than British stag parties, more obnoxious than Americans and their favourite thing is crying about antisemitism when they are removed from somewhere for causing disturbances or making a huge mess. They do not understand the idea of rubbish bins and you can trace their paths by following cigarette butts, empty crisps packets and spit.
Israelis are broadly recognized to be some of the worst tourists in the world.
Is there any chance the ones making all the ruckus and disrespect were non-Jewish Israelis? That’s not an excuse but it makes it make more sense than actual Jews being so disrespectful. And if it is young Jews doing it, can you make it make sense? Do you have some sense for why / how they might be thinking?
Keeping in mind just being bad tourists doesn’t quite explain it. Kids groups tend to be shite tourists no matter where they are from. But even I knew as a 10yo not to act stupid when visiting some of the more somber locations I went to in the US; no less as a 21yo when I visited Dachau as a non-Jew.
Maybe the genociders are also not jews, eh? Except for all those interviews where Israeli leaders spell it out with no possible room for denial.
The Palestinian Arabs are too busy being bombed to go visit the holocaust museum.
Avoiding the obvious hot button issue, I’ll just say I was assuming the observation could have pre-dated the current war AND there are other non-jews in Israel than just Palestinians.
Israel didn’t exist before the current war. Palestine has been suffering an invasion and the occupation of its sovereign territory since 1948.
About one in five Israelis are Arab - according to demographic figures.
Israel is a middle eastern country with a middle eastern temperament. That is less reserved and controlled than Central Europeans. The majority of Jews in Israel are Mizrahi, descendants from Jews who fled the MENA region, not Europe. They tend to be a bit more noisy and dramatic.
It would be interesting to get the perspective of an Israeli who went on such a trip.
It’s also unclear how prevalent this issue is, or if it’s just a few cases tainting their image. There are lots and lots of Israeli school kids visiting Auschwitz. Probably more than any other nationality. So it might simply be explained by their numbers.
Yup, all fair points and why I was asking hoping OP or someone else might have insights. Thanks.
I never know if they are Jewish or not, the groups themselves are distinct because they are always in large groups, with multiple guides and guards, but I can’t tell Jewish or non Jewish Israelis apart just by their faces. Idk why they behave like that. It’s all ages. I sometimes see them out in the city but I heard more chilling stories about them from a guy who operates a bus transfer business to Auschwitz.
