http://metimes.com/2K1/issue2001-35/reg/israeli_mp_demands.htm
Israeli MP demands ambassador to Helsinki be recalled
Middle East Times
JERUSALEM, AUG 31
Israeli MP Tommy Lapid demanded Friday that the Israeli ambassador to
Helsinki be recalled to protest against Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki
Tuomioja's comments comparing the Israelis to the Nazis.
"These comments are shocking, and I demand that our ambassador in
Helsinki be recalled until this minister publicly apologises. As a
matter of fact, Finland was the only Scandinavian country to fight
alongside Hitler against the Russians", Lapid told public radio.
"It is unthinkable that like the Arabs and Muslims do, the
representative of a developed western country should use the
atrocities of Auschwitz (extermination camp) and the Shoah (the
genocide of the Jews by the Nazis) to back up his positions", he
added.
For his part the leader of the left-wing opposition Meretz party,
Yossi Sarid, told radio: "As a Jew, and as a left-wing person in love
with morality and justice, Mr. Erkki Tuomioja, I ask you to publicly
go back on your comments, because they stink".
The Finnish foreign ministry denied Thursday that Tuomioja had
compared the Israelis to the Nazis, adding he had only compared their
policies.
"He is not comparing the Israelis with anybody, but their policies in
relations to the Palestinians resemble those they were themselves
victims of in the 1930s," ministry spokesman Yrjo Lansipuro told AFP.
Tuomioja told the Finnish weekly news magazine Suomen Kuvalehti last
week that he was "appalled that Israel's policy line is to crush,
humiliate, suppress and impoverish the Palestinians."
"What else can it result in than endless hatred?," he asked.
"It is especially difficult to understand Israel's action because the
Jews, if anybody, should know how horrible it is when an entire people
is the object of persecution.
"It is quite shocking that some implement the same kind of policy
toward the Palestinians which they themselves were victims of in the
1930s," he concluded.
AFP
