Hungary Rejects Complaint About ‘Jewish List’ Leader

Far Right: Supporters of the neo-Nazi Jobbik party rally in Hungary. Image by getty images
Prosecutors in Budapest reportedly have rejected a complaint about a lawmaker who called Jews a “security risk.”
The prosecutor’s office of the Hungarian capital rejected a complaint by Rabbi Slomo Koves and Daniel Bodnar of Hungary’s Chabad-Lubavitch community over statements made in parliament in November by Marton Gyongyosi, the Associated Press reported.
Gyongyosi, who represents the ultra-nationalist Jobbik Party, said it was “time to assess … how many people of Jewish origin there are here, and especially in the Hungarian Parliament and the Hungarian government, who represent a certain national security risk for Hungary.”
The Central Investigative Chief Prosecutor’s Office said Wednesday that Gyongyosi’s remarks could not be classified as inciting to hatred, as Koves and Bodnar argued.
On Dec. 17, Hungary’s parliament passed an amendment which exposes speakers who use “abusive language” in parliament to physical removal and fines, but only if they are imposed by the speaker of the house within five days of the making of the abusive statements.
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
