Amazon removes ‘Holocaust victim’ and ‘eternal Jew’ tops
Auschwitz memorial welcomes the move by online retailer, which was selling items with antisemitic imagery
The Auschwitz Museum has celebrated a “tiny success” after Amazon UK removed an “eternal Jew” T-shirt and “Holocaust victim” tank top for sale through the e-commerce giant’s website.
The online seller had been offering what the museum described as “horrible” clothing showing a Jew from Nazi propaganda imagery from the ‘Der Ewige Jude’ (The Eternal Jew) exhibition held in Munich from November 1937 to January 1938.
Experts say the exhibits reflected the increasingly fanatical tone of antisemitic stereotypes and claimed to “expose” a world-wide “Jewish-Bolshevik” conspiracy.
The T-shirt sold through Amazon had shown the most striking image of the exhibition, an “Eastern Jew” wearing a kaftan, holding gold coins in one hand and a whip in the other. Under his arm is a map of the world, with a Communist hammer and sickle imprinted on it.
Listed under “Amazon fashion,” the seller – a brand called RugzT – said it would make an “ideal gifts for teens, men, women” but the Auschwitz Museum said it was “an example of virulent antisemitic propaganda”.
The t-shirt has been removed from @AmazonUK.
A tiny success.We wish more serious world problems and dangers could be solved as simply as just by a tweet. That hoverer is a much more challenging process of every day education that we try to pursue.
Support @AuschwitzMuseum. https://t.co/HjkyBSAHrg
— Auschwitz Memorial (@AuschwitzMuseum) August 26, 2019
RugzT creator is digital artist Rodolpho (Rudy) Gonzales, who has a particular interest in video game design and who is listed on the DeviantArt website, which describes itself as “the largest online social network for artists and art enthusiasts”.
On Monday, the Auschwitz Museum praised Amazon UK for taking action and removing the T-shirt from sale, as it did two days earlier, with another example titled ‘Holocaust Victim Tank Top T-Shirt,’ showing ‘The Last Jew in Vinnitsa’.
This is a famous photograph taken during the Holocaust in Ukraine showing a Jewish man near the town of Vinnitsa (Vinnytsia) about to be shot dead by a member of Einsatzgruppe D, a mobile death squad of the Nazi SS.
On Sunday the Auschwitz Museum called the clothing’s removal a “tiny success” but said that the items were still for sale on Amazon’s French and German websites, urging Amazon boss Jeff Bezos to “please react”.
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