EU condemns ‘unacceptable’ Abbas Holocaust remarks

BRUSSELS

The European Union condemned Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on April 2 for “unacceptable remarks” he made in a speech linking the role of Jews in the banking sector to the Holocaust.

Abbas, who has faced accusations of anti-Semitism in the past, suggested in an address to a meeting of the Palestinian National Council on Monday night that Jews’ relations with banking had led to hostility against them.

The EU joined U.S. and Israeli officials in condemning the comments.

“The speech Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas delivered on 30 April contained unacceptable remarks concerning the origins of the Holocaust and Israel’s legitimacy,” a spokesman for the EU’s diplomatic service said in a statement.

“Such rhetoric will only play into the hands of those who do not want a two-state solution, which President Abbas has repeatedly advocated.”

The row comes as relations between the U.S. and the Palestinian leadership have broken down over the controversial American plan to move its Israeli embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.