Far-Right Group Seals Appeal Among Discontented Hungarians
To launch its campaign for Hungary’s parliamentary election, the far-right Jobbik party, accused by critics of anti-Semitism, chose as its venue a former synagogue with a plaque on the wall commemorating 500 local Jews killed in the Holocaust.
The reaction was unsurprising: opponents turned up outside the synagogue in the city of Esztergom to protest at Jobbik’s presence, they heckled party leader Gabor Vona as he arrived, and the confrontation was broadcast on the evening news.
It was seen as another publicity coup for Jobbik on its path to entrenching itself on Europe’s political landscape, and for not much more than the $50 hourly cost of renting the former synagogue, now a municipal community centre.
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