News Releases 2018
“Psychic or neuropsychic condition, schizophrenia, long addiction to cannabis, pathological anti-social personality, incapacity to conform to social norms, impulsiveness, propensity to violence... cannot stand a long and difficult criminal court case... unfit to stand trial.”
Paris, 15 July 2018
On 28 February, the investigating magistrate in the case of the 4 April 2017 savage murder of 65 years old doctor, Sarah Halimi, accepted an expert analysis that her murderer was fit to stand trial.
Moreover, Kobili Traoré’s action, in stabbing her and throwing her from her third-floor balcony to her death, while screaming “Allahu Akhbar,” was acknowledged as, indeed, “an act of antisemitic character.”
On 18 June, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, wrote to French Interior Minister, Gérard Collomb, lamenting that “the current defence system is inadequate,” protesting an attack on a teenage girl student by three North Africans outside her Jewish School... noting the withdrawal of the military presence guarding synagogues, Jewish schools and other institutions.
Read more: Are the Jews Responsible for Psychosis? That is...
Evian-les-Bains, 11 July 2018
An international gathering of experts was held in Evian on the 80th anniversary of the notorious 1938 Conference on Jewish refugees from Nazism. The Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, was invited to keynote.
The original pre-war conference had been planned to be held in the diplomatic hub of Geneva, but due to the Swiss claim of “neutrality,” it was moved across the lake to French Evian-les-Bains.
Today’s “Evian Revisited,” or as dubbed by Samuels, “Evian II”, was organized by Elihu “Hugh” Baver of New Hampshire, USA, and a number of sponsors led by the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice. It took place in the Hotel Royal, the site of “Evian I.”
Highlights from Samuels’ address
"Publicly condemn Roger Waters' venom presented under Barclaycard sponsorship!"
"Failing counter measures, we will urge our members to consider transferring their accounts to a bank that promotes prosperity - not hate."
Paris, 11 July 2018
In a letter to Barclaycard CEO, Barry Rodrigues, Simon Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, expressed outrage at the 6 July Hyde Park “hate concert”, that kicked off the "Barclaycard British Summer Time” music festival.
Samuels pointed to the political performer, Roger Waters, as "addressing the audience of families with small children wielding a banner inscribed 'F--k the Pigs!', followed by slogans on screens iconizing Russia, Putin, Iran and Julian Assange and an array of slurs against Israel."
Roger Waters wielding slogan "F--k the Pigs!"
(photos courtesy Richard Millett).
Paris, 9 July 2018
Simon Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr.Shimon Samuels, opened the proceedings, noting that, “this unique Holocaust essay competition programme, co-organized by the Association Verbe et Lumiere-Vigilance (VetL-V) together with the Simon Wiesenthal Centre-Europe, (CSW) and the Russian Holocaust Centre (RHC) is now in its fourteenth year and annually invites to Paris the five student winners from across the former Soviet Union, to present their research findings at UNESCO.”
The 2018 laureates are respectively from Moscow, Vladimir, Orel, Petrozadovsk and Berlin (the latter a German intern at the RHC in Moscow). These were chosen from well over 2,000 submissions.Attended by the delegations of Russia, Canada, Germany and Israel, the proceedings were opened by Dr. Stefania Giannini, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Education. She commended the laureates' initiative as an opportunity for UNESCO’s agenda in Holocaust education", speaking of the organization's Holocaust Education Policy Guide and newly published Teachers’ Guide on Antisemitism and agreeing to consider joining Verbe et Lumiere-Vigilance, the Wiesenthal Center and the Russian Holocaust Centre, in editing for publicaton, the fourteen years' winning essays. Dr. Giannini quoted from the students’ papers, asking if they sought an academic career as encouraged by the network of UNESCO University Chairs.
Read more: 14th Annual Holocaust Essay Awards for Russian...
"Sweden-Israel Friendship Association Director and Woman Leader Assaulted Defending Israeli Flag."
"The Centre stands in solidarity with its courageous Swedish friends who will withstand threats and violence in the name of truth and faith."
Visby, Swedish Gotland, 5 July 2018
Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels - together with Israeli Ambassador to Sweden Ilan Ben-Dov and Swedish M.P. Mikael Oscarsson - had opened the Centre's exhibition "People, Book, Land: the 3,500 Year Relations of the Jewish People with the Holy Land" at the Almedalen Festival in Visby, capital of the rugged Swedish island of Gotland.
(3rd and 4th from the left) Dr. Shimon Samuels
with Israel Ambassador to Sweden Ilan Ben-Dov,
together with members of the Sweden-Israel Friendship Association.
Read more: Neo-Nazis Attack Wiesenthal Centre Exhibition at...