Germany’s Merkel Condemns Morsi Over Jew Hatred During Meeting

By JTA January 31, 2013

German Chancellor Angela Merkel used her meeting with Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi to criticize his past statements on Jews.

Merkel raised the issue of Morsi’s 2010 recorded statement in which he called Israeli Zionists “descendants of apes and pigs,” during their meeting on Wednesday, according to German media.

Morsi responded that the comments were taken out of context, and explained that, as a religious Muslim, he is “not against Judaism as a religion. I am not against the Jews who practice their faith.” But he said he was against religious practices in which blood is spilled, according to the Austrian paper Der Standard.

Merkel’s open criticism of Morsi’s remarks drew praise from Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, who was in Berlin to discuss the Center’s top ten list of anti-Semitic statements of 2012.

Cooper said Thursday he hoped Merkel’s confrontation of Morsi would “send a signal not only to Egyptians but to leaders in Europe who show up to commemorations to dead victims of the Holocaust but unfortunately are all too absent when it comes to standing up for the rights of Jews.”

The Wiesenthal Center’s top ten list, topped by Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, drew fire in Germany because of its inclusion of prominent journalist Jakob Augstein in the 9th position.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO