"Israel" summons Russian Ambassador over Hitler remarks
3 Min Read
The Ambassador was summoned for a "tough talk" over Sergey Lavrov's remarks that Adolf Hitler had Jewish roots, which"Israel" of course could not handle.
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Yair Lapid during the final stage of the Blue and White election campaign in "Tel Aviv", September 14, 2019 (Anadolu Agency)
On Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid denounced the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, for suggesting that Adolf Hitler had Jewish roots.
Lapid said the Russian Ambassador to "Israel" should be summoned for a "tough talk" due to Lavrov's words, which he said on Sunday on an Italian TV.
"It is an unforgivable, scandalous statement, a terrible historical mistake, and we expect an apology," Lapid told Ynet.
The Russian Embassy did not comment.
On Italy's Rete 4 channel, Lavrov was asked how Russia could "denazify" Ukraine when the President of the country itself is Jewish.
"When they say 'What sort of nazification is this if we are Jews', well I think that Hitler also had Jewish origins, so it means nothing," Lavrov said, speaking through an Italian interpreter.
Read more: Zelensky's rallying cry for Jews: His last shot in a losing war
"For a long time now we've been hearing the wise Jewish people say that the biggest anti-Semites are the Jews themselves," he added.
Last month, the Ukrainian Parliament compared what is happening in Ukraine to what happened in Nazi Germany in the 1940s.
The elephant in the room
While Zelensky compares the Russian operation to Nazism, an openly neo-Nazi Azov Battalion looms in the background, away from the western media spotlight.
The Azov Battalion is a part of the Ukrainian National Guard - a wing of the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs, an authorized, legitimate part of the Ukrainian security apparatus - and, openly Nazi.
The Battalion flaunts its Nazism very openly and is even notoriously known for a video in which they crucified a soldier, tortured him, and burnt him alive.
The Ukrainian National Guard has recently published a video on its official Twitter page, boasting about Azov fighters greasing their bullets with pig fat to be used against Muslim Chechens on the Russian side. These fighters are a target of Putin's denazification campaign in Ukraine.
The video comes as a direct threat to Muslims who hold the Islamic beliefs that lard is an impure substance prohibited for their consumption.
The United States and Canada over the years have aided the neo-Nazi units with weapons and training, strengthening their presence in Ukraine, while NATO does not raise the alarming issue of Nazism in Ukraine, which Zelensky has lost control of.
