Yule is a Germanic festival celebrated by the Nazis to replace Christmas. In 1943, prisoners in camp Westerbork were not allowed to celebrate Hanukkah, but Nazis did celebrate Yule. Perhaps that is why Westerbork is “a suitable location for JFVD to breathe new life into such a tradition that encourages a healthy sense of the people”, sneezes Hiddema in an ironic response to the Twitter message of the youth branch of Forum.
It is not the first time that the youth branch of Forum has been discredited because of anti-Semitic statements. At the end of last year, FvD almost fell apart due to anti-Semitic messages in JFVD app groups. Many FvD prominent figures at the time thought that Baudet did far too little about it.
This was followed by an exodus, after which former FvD members Joost Eerdmans and Annabel Nanninga founded their own party, JA21. This also includes ex-FvD member Nicki Pouw-Verweij. At the time, she also sent a letter to the FvD party board, because party leader Thierry Baudet was said to have expressed himself anti-Semitic during a dinner.
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Two weeks ago, Baudet himself lost a lawsuit about the comparisons between the fate of Jews during the war and unvaccinated people in the current corona policy. The judge ordered him to delete tweets in which he calls unvaccinated “the new Jews” and MPs and ministers who support the corona policy “outcasters”, “new Nazis” and “NSB members.”
Hiddema often openly criticizes his party’s references to the war. In May, FvD made a poster for Liberation Day: ‘On May 5 we commemorate 75 years of freedom’. Below that were the years 1945-2020 with a death cross. Other signatories include Viruswaarheid and Nederland in Verzet.
Hiddema called the action ‘stupid, very stupid’ and ‘not tasteful’. “I understand that you want to see the freedom-restricting measures in a broader context, but then don’t steal the logo of the May 4-5 movement. And thus do not relate the suffering of the Jews to the inconveniences of corona,” said the prominent FvD at the time. The May 5 poster was one of the reasons for Wybren van Haga, the former second man of Forum, to split off as well.