In Berlin Christoph Heubner, Executive Vice President of the International Auschwitz Committee, made a statement concerning the growth of conspiracy theories in the debate surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic:
"The increasing surge of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic is leaving Holocaust survivors utterly aghast: Once again it’s the Jew’s fault. It is hardly surprising that in this particular crisis situation Holocaust deniers and anti-Semites are taking the opportunity to spread their toxic lies in society and combine their perfidious conspiracy theories with people’s fears.
For Holocaust survivors it is an undignified and unbearable situation, when people from the centre of society take to the streets in demonstrations with their justifiably critical questions to governments and parties, but do this alongside Holocaust deniers and anti-Semites. Each and every protest devalues itself when it is joined by marchers who deny the million-fold murder of the Jewish families of Europe, or are consumed by anti-Semitic hatred. And worse still, in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, bishops in the Catholic Church are now edging their way towards the right-wing extremist and antidemocratic conspiracy hysteria. This is a fatal signal for the democratic cohesion of the societies in Europe."