Hitler emojis on shorts: Owner protesting

Tamir Leshem, Cape Town

Journalists need to get their facts straight. I am Tamir Leshem, the one who took the photograph of the Hitler face when I saw it in The Lot in Claremont, and not in the Sea Point branch as reported.

Chloe Sarah Shain is reported to have been the one to alert the Jewish community about the faces. Chloe is my partner and I asked her to write (the story of the Hitler faces) on my behalf to the Jewish community Facebook group because I am an Israeli and needed help to write in English. 

It is really sad that the article makes Ashleigh Battle, owner of The Lot chain the victim, rather than facing the fact that she allowed, by negligence, these shorts to be sold.

She is portrayed as a naive victim who cannot be blamed for not knowing what her shop is selling.

Not knowing does not justify mistakes. In fact, not knowing is even more dangerous. It is really sad that the reporter never consulted Chloe to get the full story and understand the facts.

In fact, we never even knew that this article was written until recently. What happened to unbiased journalism? What happened to getting consent from those you wrote about? Is that legal?

It seems that Battle somehow managed “to flip the story” to ensure that her business was not compromised.

I am a third generation Holocaust survivor; I grew up in a house where the memory of the Holocaust was forever present and forever haunting our daily lives.

When I walked into The Lot and saw these shorts, I could not believe that something like this can still happen.

The pain and the humiliation I felt when the shop assistant laughed and said: “Yes, it’s Hitler”, is something I can’t forget.

Maybe the owner was “naïve” and “unaware”, but the people working for her were completely aware of what they were selling. This should have been what the article was about.

Lastly, nobody “ran” to Facebook; I consulted the Jewish Board of Deputies first (during the year-end holidays) and they said they could not do anything until their offices opened again in January. It was only then that we went to Facebook and actually, going to Facebook is what put us in touch with the owner (of The Lot) and got the shorts to be removed.

The article portrays Chloe as the perpetrator “for speaking out”! We never knew that’s the price of doing the right thing.

• The Jewish Report stands by its story. We did our best to get all the sides – Editor.