Franz Schonhuber, chairman of Germany’s extreme right-wing Republican Party, has brought charges against a Jewish writer on allegations that the writer had issued a public call for his murder.
Schonhuber cited an article by Ralph Giordano that included the statement: “It is outrageous that nobody does Schonhuber in immediately.”
A former member of the Waffen SS, Schonhuber said the comment represented nothing less than a public call to commit a crime.
The prosecuting attorney in the northern city of Kiel has opened an investigation against Giordano. But an Interior Ministry spokesman for the state of Schleswig Holstein, which has Kiel as its capital, has criticized the investigation, saying Giordano probably meant to make a political statement rather than call for the murder of Schonhuber.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
