A far-right Polish lawmaker poured a fire extinguisher on a menorah, the seven-branched candlestick symbol of Judaism, in parliament on Tuesday, an act that Prime Minister Donald Tusk immediately condemned.
“Something unacceptable has happened. “It's a shame,” Tusk told reporters as Parliament Speaker Szymon Holownia excluded Grzegorz Braun, a lawmaker from the far-right Konfederacja party, from a parliamentary session.
AFP
The menorah was lit in Parliament on the occasion of the celebrations of the Jewish festival of Hanukkah (Festival of Lights) in the presence of Jewish personalities.
AFP
In video images reported in Polish media, Mr Braun can be seen dousing the menorah and filling the parliamentary chamber with a cloud of firefighting foam.
The President of the Parliament (Lower House) condemned this act as a “slap in the face of the Polish Parliament”.
“As long as I am President of Parliament, there will be no tolerance for anti-Semitism, for deviance and for racism,” thundered Mr. Holownia, interrupting the debates.
At the end of a meeting of the Parliamentary Bureau, Mr. Holownia pointed out that Mr. Braun had received the highest financial sanctions and that a lawsuit would be filed against him in court. He said the deputy faces up to two years in prison.
[ 🇵🇱 POLOGNE ]
🔸️ Polish MP Grzegorz Braun, known for his positions considered extremist, extinguished burning candles with a fire extinguisher in the Polish Parliament on the occasion of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. pic.twitter.com/K1vBEnSuBX
— (Small) Think Tank (@L_ThinkTank) December 12, 2023
“Shame! A member of the Polish Parliament just did this. “A few minutes after we celebrated Hanukkah there,” Israeli Ambassador to Poland Yacov Livne said on social media, posting a video of Mr. Braun holding out the menorah .
The majority of political groups, including the populist nationalist Law and Justice party (PiS), condemned this act.
The Lower House of Parliament debated Prime Minister-elect Donald Tusk's morning keynote address. In the afternoon she must hold an almost guaranteed confidence vote on her pro-European government, ending eight years of populist-nationalist power in Poland.
In May, Grzegorz Braun attacked Polish-Canadian Holocaust historian Jan Grabowski, a professor at the University of Ottawa, with a microphone during a conference in Warsaw.