Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen opposes a bill seeking to ban the nonmedical circumcision of boys, saying “Danish Jews must continue to be part of Denmark”, JTA reports.
Frederiksen, of the ruling Social Democrat party, made the statement during an interview Thursday on TV2 about a bill submitted last month in parliament by a leader of the left-wing Forward party, which seeks to outlaw the circumcision of minors without medical reason as done by Muslims and Jews.
Frederiksen appeared to reference the fate of Danish Jews during the Holocaust, when hundreds of boat owners smuggled thousands of Jews to safety in Sweden and beyond the reach of the Nazi occupation.
“Many Jews do not find it compatible to live in a country where circumcision is banned,” she said. “I simply do not believe that we can make a decision in which we do not live up to the promise we made, namely that the Danish Jews must continue to be part of Denmark.”
Several major political parties have said they support a ban, which has widespread popular support in Denmark by those who believe it amounts to child abuse and opponents of Muslim immigration.
Two years ago, a petition calling for a ban on male circumcision in Denmark went to parliament after organizers amassed more than the 50,000 signatures required to bring it to a vote.
However, the Danish Health Minister later clarified that her government would work to combat a bill proposing to ban circumcision in the country.
In early 2018, Iceland dropped a controversial bill which would have banned circumcisions for minors and would make those performing circumcisions on children – as well as parents who arranged circumcisions for their children – liable for jail time.
(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)