German neo-Nazis publish list of Jewish sites to mark Kristallnacht

Police launch probe into map circulated on Facebook listing 70 Berlin-area synagogues, schools, restaurants and cemeteries

By AFP 10 November 2016, 11:10 pm Edit

Illustrative: A neo-Nazi demonstration in Leipzig, Germany. (CC BY-SA Herder3, Wikimedia Commons)

BERLIN — German police launched an investigation Thursday after the addresses of Jewish institutions were published on Facebook by neo-Nazis, on the anniversary of the 1938 pogroms against Jews.

A map pointing out locations of almost 70 synagogues, Jewish kindergartens, schools, memorials, businesses, restaurants and cemeteries was posted on the Facebook page of a far-right Berlin group, reported Tagesspiegel daily.

The words “Jews among us!” appeared in the Gothic font used by Nazis on the map published on Wednesday, November 9, the day which marks the pogroms known as “Kristallnacht” or the “Night of the Broken Glass.”

“A criminal complaint was filed over suspicion of incitement,” a police spokeswoman told AFP, adding that Berlin officers were investigating.

An anti-far-right group called MBR, which had spotted the map on Facebook, together with the office of Green lawmaker Volker Beck informed the Jewish institutions listed to warn them of the neo-Nazi post, according to the Tagesspiegel.

Kristallnacht destruction in Magdeburg, Germany, November 1938 (German Federal Archive/Wikipedia Commons)

The map was a chilling reminder of the lists of Jewish addresses published on the night of the 1938 pogroms.

During attacks of November 9 and 10, Nazi thugs plundered Jewish businesses throughout Germany, torched synagogues and rounded up about 30,000 Jewish men for deportation to concentration camps.