German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in an interview airing Tuesday that police have to guard every synagogue, Jewish school and day care center in her country.
“We have always had a certain number of anti-Semites among us. Unfortunately, there is to this day not a single synagogue, not a single day care center for Jewish children, not a single school for Jewish children that does not need to be guarded by German policemen,” she told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour.
“Unfortunately, over the years we have not been able to deal with this satisfactorily that we can do without this,” Merkel added.
“But we have to face up, indeed, to the spectors of the past. We have to tell our young people what history has brought over us and others and these horrors, why we are for democracy, why we try to bring about solutions, why we always have to put ourselves into the other person’s shoes, why we stand up against intolerance, why we show no tolerance towards violations of human rights, why article 1 of our basic law — human dignity is inviolable — is so fundamental to us.”
Merkel’s comments came in response to a question from Amanpour about the rise of political parties associated with nationalism, populism and anti-Semitism throughout Europe.
Last week’s European Union parliamentary elections saw several anti-immigrant parties gaining seats.
The anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party finished behind Merkel’s center-right alliance and a green party.