While in Oswiecim Christoph Heubner, Executive Vice President of the International Auschwitz Committee commented on developments in the anti-Semitic scandal surrounding the Bavarian politician and vice premier Hubert Aiwanger and his explanation strategy:

"The political havoc that Hubert Aiwanger is causing day in day out, despite his attempted explanations and excuses, and the divisions in society that he is fuelling with his egomaniacal tirades, are constantly on the increase and are now spreading throughout the entire federal republic. Each of the politician’s public appearances, whether in a beer tent or at a fairground, erupts in demonstrative applause for his leaflet statements. These appearances also attempt to underscore his accusations that he is the victim of a ‘smear campaign’ that aims to ‘annihilate’ him politically. In itself, the choice of the term ‘annihilate’ (Vernichtung) in this context is an unbearable, blatant insult to the survivors of the Holocaust who experienced first-hand the horrors resulting from such terminology. All of the events over the past few days are being met with loud cheers from the far-right in Germany. On the other hand, they are causing shifts and splits in the image that Holocaust survivors had up to now of German politics and society’s culture of memory which has been strongly supported.