Auschwitz (illustration)
Auschwitz (illustration)Thinkstock

The Jewish newspaper Joods Actueel based in Antwerp filed a complaint to Belgian’s watchdog on journalism against the De Morgen daily, after it published a Holocaust denier’s claim that no one died in Nazi gas chambers.

According to JTA, the monthly’s editor-in-chief Michael Freilich claims De Morgen and the newspaper’s interviewee Siegfried Verbeke broke a 1995 legislative law that forbids claiming the Holocaust did not happen.

Verbeke, a far-right sympathizer with multiple convictions for inciting racial hate against Jews and denying the genocide, published an interview earlier this month which said: “of course gas chambers existed, hundreds of them. To disinfect the clothes of people who went through them. But gas chambers designed to kill people never existed, no.”

ICGK, Belgian’s state authority for combatting discrimination, said it was investigating Verbeke over his statement and Antwerp Mayor Bart De Wever voiced his support for prosecution.

Freilich complained to the Belgian Council for Journalism over a “violation of ethics” regardless of whether De Morgen is charged with breaking the law, saying, “De Morgen is for all intents and purposes an accomplice in this offense, and should answer for its actions”

“Even in the United States, where freedom of expression is greater than in Europe, a major paper would not consider interviewing David Duke,” said Freilich regarding the infamous American Holocaust denier.