Dutch MP ordered to remove social media posts comparing unvaccinated to Jews

A Dutch MP, Thierry Baudet has been ordered by the court to erase his social media posts where he drew comparisons between COVID restrictions to the Holocaust. On Twitter, Baudet, who is the leader of the Forum for Democracy party, stated that unvaccinated people were the new Jews and those who look away from the exclusions were the new Nazis. The post saw an outrage on social media and Holocaust survivors and Jewish organisations filed legal action in response to his posts.

The judge ordered him to remove the posts within 48 hours or face a daily fine of €25,000 (£21,100). The judge found his post necessarily and upsetting for Holocaust survivors and their families, according to BBC. The court ruled that the comparison is incorrect and that Baudet has talked rudely and illegally about Holocaust survivors. Not only Baudet has been ordered to delete four social media posts within 48 hours but he was also prohibited from reposting any photographs related to the Holocaust or the Coronavirus.

'Baudet made a comparison that is factually incorrect and wrongly used'

According to AP News, the judge stated that by trying to compare the situation of unvaccinated citizens with the fate of Jews in the 1930s and 1940s in the post, Baudet made a comparison that is factually incorrect and wrongly used. The judge further said that Baudet politicised the human suffering of Jews in the Holocaust and their memories.

Baudet's counsel stated that his posts' intentions were in no way to offend people, stir hatred, or insult them, but rather as an expression of a politician in a public debate concerning the curtailment of the freedoms of the unvaccinated, according to BBC. Baudet termed the verdict incomprehensible and vowed to appeal.

Because of the Dutch government's COVID-19 limitations, which prohibit entry to specific venues for the unvaccinated, Baudet equated those who are unvaccinated to Holocaust victims in a series of social media posts in November. He also uploaded a photo of a Nazi concentration camp with the post, according to BBC. Four Holocaust survivors and Jewish organisations filed charges against him, accusing him of minimising the Holocaust. Six million Jews were killed during the Holocaust, which was a Nazi plan to exterminate Europe's Jewish population.

(Inputs from AP News)

Image: AP