A photoshopped image of Home Secretary Suella Braverman laughing in front of the Auschwitz death camp has been condemned as "utterly disgraceful" by MPs and Jewish activists.
The original image of Braverman laughing was taken over the weekend during a visit by the Conservative frontbencher to a refugee detention centre in Rwanda during a two-day visit to the Central Africa country.
Some Twitter users imagined the picture as encapsulating the current attitude towards migrants entering the UK.
LBC Radio host and political commentator James O'Brien said: "Exactly 200 years after William Wilberforce founded the Anti-Slavery Society, here’s Suella Braverman at a facility to which she hopes to deport trafficked victims of modern slavery."
Responding to O’Brien, the Home Secretary said: “I invite him to come to Rwanda before he cast aspersions on this beautiful, welcoming country.”
After the image of Braverman was superimposed to appear in front of the Nazi camp where more than a million people were murdered, it was taken down from Braverman’s Twitter feed.
A doctored image of Home Secretary Suella Braverman wearing a Nazi armband (Credit: Twitter)
A still from the movie Schindler's List with Suella Braverman superimposed over it (Credit: Twitter)
Many notable figures and politicians expressed their outrage at the flippancy with which others compared Braverman’s policies to the atrocities of the Holocaust.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman edited to be standing in front of the infamous Auschwitz entrance (Credit: Twitter)
Former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron condemned the doctored image, tweeting: “I’m incandescent at the Home Secretary’s witless and wicked policies on asylum – but to liken them to the Holocaust, or to tweet photoshopped pictures of her with a backdrop of Auschwitz, is utterly disgraceful and completely undermines your case.”
Ex-Labour MP Mike Gapes tweeted:”I am not going to retweet the image. But I am sickened by those who are comparing Cruella Braverman visit to detention facilities in Rwanda to visiting Auschwitz. The Tories may be incompetent liars who act unlawfully- but they are not Nazis #stopminimisingtheholocaust."
Jewish actress Tracy Ann Oberman also tweeted: “Please stop using Nazis/Nazis terminology to discuss anything you don’t like or disagree with. Please – in living memory we have family who were killed, murdered, butchered by the Third Reich and Nazi allies. It’s so disrespectful. Please find better words. Not false comparables.”
Deputy Chair of the Conservative Party Lee Anderson condemned those who hurled “awful abuse” at Braverman, saying “These talentless, ignorant, wannabe politicians should hang their head in shame,”
Braverman was in Rwanda to promote the UK government’s plan to deport asylum seekers to the African country, as part of a controversial deal signed last April by her predecessor, Priti Patel.
