The German Foreign Ministry announced on July 18 that they are investigating a German diplomat for a liking a series of anti-Israel tweets, including one from avowed white nationalist David Duke railing against “Jewish supremacists,” the Associated Press reports.
Christian Clages, who heads the German mission to the Palestinian territories, liked an April 10 Duke tweet stating, “On this day 71 years ago, Jewish supremacists invaded the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin, where they slaughtered men, women and children. Innocent Palestinians were mutilated, raped and paraded through Jewish neighborhoods before being summarily executed.” Clages also liked a reply to Duke saying that “Zionist” should replace the word “Jewish” in Duke’s tweet.
According to Jewish Virtual Library, there was no evidence of a massacre and no evidence of rapes when the Irgun, an underground Jewish organization, targeted Deir Yassin during the 1948 War of Independence to cut into the Arab forces’ attempt to block a key supply route between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
Clages also liked tweets glorifying Palestinians attacking Israeli soldiers and asking if Israel would “occupy the moon.”
The ministry said in a statement to the AP that they “emphatically” disavow the tweets that Clages liked.
“The content is unacceptable and contradicts the views of the German government,” They said.
The ministry also said they would investigate the likes and “then determine consequences,” but pointed out that Clages has “distanced himself from the tweets.”
A German intelligence agency released a report in June stating that there was a 71.4 percent increase in anti-Semitic violence in Germany in 2018 from the year prior and a 20 percent increase in anti-Semitic incidents overall in the country.
