The boy who cried Nazi

Advocate Mark Oppenheimer, Johannesburg

If the story reflected reality, I would be the first to congratulate Basson for uncovering a serious case of anti-Semitism on campus. However, it has since come to light that the images were pulled from a video of the girls singing an ode to the head of their residence.

The routine parrots lyrics from mid-2000s pop songs, and has a range of choreographed dance moves which include swaying hips, snapping fingers, and imitations of doves and bunny rabbits. The girlish choral singing is accompanied by a very talented black soloist extolling the virtues of her primaria. Viewed in context, no sane person would assume that the girls’ salute had anything to do with a devotion to Hitler or an aversion to Jews. The full video can be viewed on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUi-lioemPo.

On 25 April 2015, then University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) SRC leader Mcebo Dlamini publicly stated, “What I love about Hitler is his charisma and his capabilities to organise people. We need more leaders of such calibre. I love Adolf Hitler.” When asked to explain his comments, he said, “I find it very absurd that people expect me to regard their enemies as my enemies. I will write what I like on my Facebook”, and he was not on the social-media platform to “nurse Jewish people’s feelings”, asking, “Who told them they deserve special treatment?”

After Dlamini was arrested for inciting violence on campus, protestors graffitied the words, “Fuck the Jews” and “Kill a Jew” onto a university building at Wits.

Basson has styled himself as a warrior in the fight against racism and anti-Semitism, but his website, News24, regularly publishes columns written by Dlamini. The most recent one was published at the end of February, and another was published last year praising the slogan, “One settler, one bullet.”

As Jews, we need to fight against genuine cases of anti-Semitism, but we also need to be wary of people that cry “Nazi” without evidence, especially when they give platforms to those that “love Hitler”.