The German government has summoned the Palestinian representative in Berlin in protest over a comment by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas accusing Israel of committing 50 Holocausts since it was founded.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz stood alongside Mr Abbas as the president of the Palestinian Authority made the comment, and later faced criticism for not immediately pushing back.
Mr Scholz said overnight on Wednesday that he was “disgusted by the outrageous remarks”.
Mr Abbas rowed back his remarks on Wednesday, in a statement saying he didn’t deny the Holocaust ordered by German Nazis that killed six million Jews during World War II and was referring to “crimes and massacres” carried out by Israelis since the 1948 war between Israel and the Palestinians.
The statement, published by the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency, said Mr Abbas’s comments at the news conference with the German chancellor weren’t intended “to deny the singularity of the Holocaust that occurred in the last century” and said he “condemns it in the strongest terms”. “What is meant by the crimes that President Mahmoud Abbas spoke about are the crimes and massacres committed against the Palestinian people since (1948) … These crimes have not stopped to this day.”
Steffen Hebestreit, Mr Scholz’s spokesman, said the incident cast a “dark shadow” over Germany’s relations with the PA. He added that he regretted ending Tuesday’s joint press conference immediately after Mr Abbas’s comments without giving Mr Scholz a chance to respond.
Read the article by Bojan Pancevski and Fatima Abdulkarim in The Australian.