Israeli student detained and fined for alleged Nazi salute on trip to Auschwitz
Security guards spotted member of group from Kiryat Bialik high school with arm raised; companion asserts he was just waving to spoil another’s photo of camp entrance gates
An Israeli high school student was detained by Polish police and fined for allegedly making a Nazi salute during a school trip to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp in Poland, Hebrew media reported Sunday.
The student was questioned for two hours over his actions and eventually fined 1,500 zloty ($380), the Ynet outlet reported.
However, another student on the trip told Channel 13 that the boy was only waving at someone else.
According to the student who spoke to the station, the group, from a school in Kiryat Bialik, was at the entrance to the camp and one of their party tried to take a photograph of the famous gates.
The suspect then waved at her to disrupt her efforts. Although his friend advised him to take his arm down, telling him “it doesn’t look good,” he again raised it when the photographer tried to snap a second picture.
In a video of the incident aired by the Channel 13, the suspect can be seen with his arm up, and the student who spoke to the network sharply pulls it down.
"הוא רק נופף לחברה, אמרתי לו להוריד את היד כי זה לא נראה טוב": התיעוד שהוביל למעצר התלמיד הישראלי באושוויץ | בלעדיhttps://t.co/yXcB4rL9Pf@liorvero pic.twitter.com/4WPDbarCcM
— חדשות 13 (@newsisrael13) March 9, 2025
Security guards, who were watching on security cameras, detained the suspect, despite the protests of others who were with him.
“The security guards didn’t listen to anyone, they didn’t let us speak at all. Immediately they took him away,” the student told Channel 13.
It is illegal to make the Nazi salute in Poland under laws prohibiting fascist symbols.
Guards informed local police, who opened an investigation. A teacher and a Polish guide remained with the student while he was detained.
He will remain with the group until it returns to the country at the end of the trip in two days, Channel 13 reported.
The Education Ministry said in a statement it takes “a very serious view of the unusual incident.”
תלמיד מבית ספר אורט ביאליק נחשד שעשה ״מועל יד״ בטיול באושוויץ, ונעצר על ידי משטרת פולין. התלמידים: ״הוא התכוון לעשות שלום״: אירוע חריג במהלך טיול של בית ספר אורט ביאליק, לטענת המשטרה המקומית הילד התכוון לעשות בדיחה מהסיפור והרים את ידו בכוונה לעשות מועל יד דבר שאסור על פי חוק נגד… pic.twitter.com/z24o5e7O1n
— daniel amram – דניאל עמרם (@danielamram3) March 9, 2025
The ministry said making such a gesture was “unacceptable and completely against the values of Israeli education and the significance of the trip to Poland.”
It said the student’s actions will face a thorough review when he returns to the country. Ministry officials will examine the circumstances of the incident and “put together measures to ensure that it is not repeated.”
The Auschwitz-Birkenau museum also condemned the incident.
“Committing such an act at the historical site, where Nazi Germany murdered approximately one million Jews, along with tens of thousands of Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and others, is not only deeply offensive and morally reprehensible but also a violation of the law,” the museum said in a statement reported by Ynet.
The Poland trips are meant to be a learning experience about the Holocaust. Some 25,000 Jewish Israeli high school students have gone on the trip annually in years past.
In 2023, Israel and Poland agreed to resume the visits after a three-year break caused by disputes between the two countries over curricula. The hard-right Polish government at the time, which is now out of power, had increasingly demanded a say over the content of the trips, as it cracked down on free speech regarding Polish people’s roles in the Holocaust.
The trips were again canceled for a time after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, invasion and massacre in southern Israel and the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
