It was just a few days until Passover and Hungary’s Chief Rabbi had a problem. A lorry load of matzah destined for Ukrainian refugees had been impounded, and the London rabbis in charge of delivery had no idea where it had gone.
The problem, he recalled this week, seemed intractable to the Brits. But Rabbi Slomó Köves rang up the interior minister, who he knows personally, and the matzah was released the very next day.
It is a minor episode in the recent history of Hungarian Jewry, but indicative of the friendly relationship enjoyed by communal leadership and the government. In Budapest for a few days, I was gripped by an apparent paradox: a thriving Jewish community under one of Europe’s most authoritarian leaders.
Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz-led government, which won re-election in April, stand accused of kneecapping the courts, restricting media freedom, and breaching the rule of law.
Horrified detractors have pointed to his ties to Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile, the Board of Deputies is among many critics who accuse Orbán of employing antisemitic tropes for electoral gain in the government’s campaign against Jewish-Hungarian billionaire George Soros.
In Budapest, however, I heard again and again from Hungarian Jews of a “renaissance” of Jewish life in the country. I spoke to Rabbi Köves, a Hungarian-born Chabadnik who was raised in a secular family before studying at yeshivot abroad.
As a visibly Jewish man, does he experience antisemitism on the streets of Budapest?
“No, not at all,” he answers. “Actually I get much more positive remarks than I get negative remarks.
“I’m not saying that there’s no antisemitism at all in Hungary. But when it comes to antisemitic assaults in the last few years, it has totally disappeared from Hungarian public life.”
Chief Rabbi Koves
Chief Rabbi Slomó Köves (Getty Images)
In Western Europe, by contrast, a Belgian Holocaust survivor attending the European Jewish Association (EJA) conference in Budapest tells me that Antwerp’s Jews have been told to cover their kippot with baseball caps to avoid attacks.
The government’s defenders point to Hungary’s strong relationship with Israel. In particular there is Orbán’s bond with Benjamin Netanyahu, who has called his Hungarian counterpart “a true friend of Israel”.
Israel’s ambassador to Hungary, Yacov Hadas-Handelsman, issued praise this week for the country’s supportive stance on kosher slaughter and circumcision. Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén emphasised Hungary’s growing business ties with Israel.
History casts a long shadow here. The wartime regime deported and murdered Jews even before German occupation began, yet even today still has its admirers.
Walking through the streets around my hotel the contradictions are readily apparent. A nearby square features a statue of Archangel Gabriel, a Hungarian national symbol. Above swoops an eagle, talons extended. The statue’s perceived depiction of Hungarian innocence led one Shoah survivor to say he would return an award from the government, so angry was he at its historical “whitewashing”.
Just a few streets from there, however, sits the recently restored Rumbach Street Synagogue.
The Moorish-style building was recently restored with a £9.2million grant from the Hungarian state. Around the corner is a Jewish theatre, Golem, dedicated to pushing contemporary Jewish culture forward.
Rabbi Köves is optimistic about the future of Hungarian remembrance. “Hungary has a lot to do, but do not forget there were 40 years of Communist regime, so Hungary is 40 years behind.”
Outside communal leadership, however, Jewish opinion is less sanguine. I walked through Buda with a Jewish-Hungarian woman who asked that I not use her name.
She told me: “Antisemitism is in the atmosphere.” She had experienced it only online, but her friend, a visibly religious man, was recently a victim of an antisemitic attack.
“Before Fidesz antisemitism was not so open.
“I am from a Jewish family myself. We believe in education, in learning, and free debate. Now we are not a democracy. Orbán himself said we are an illiberal democracy.”
Before leaving, I visit Hungary’s Deputy State Secretary Vince Szalay-Bobrovniczky, an Orbán ally responsible for civil society relations.
On a visit to the UK in 2019, he responded to the accusation that Fidesz was antisemitic, saying it was “a simple lie” and insists they have backed compensation for Holocaust survivors and their descendants, and paid for the renewal of synagogues.
“The Jewish community is in security in Hungary,” he continued: “Jewish people leave countries like France, Belgium, or even maybe the UK because of atrocities from Muslim communities there.”
Jews are publicly backed by the state while other migrants are demonised; the strictly Orthodox are content, but others worry about creeping authoritarianism. Leaving Mr Szalay-Bobrovniczky’s office, I felt that Hungary’s contradictions remained unresolved.
