An antisemitic cartoon shared on Austrian Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache’s Facebook page six years ago has been removed as Sebastian Kurz makes his first official visit to Israel as chancellor.
The cartoon showed a sweaty, overweight feasting banker with a hooked nose and Star of David buttons on his jacket, as a government minister tops up his wine glass. Across from him is a starving man, embodying the people.
The far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) leader wrote as a caption to the cartoon that it represented the redistribution of Austrian taxpayer money towards European “financial speculators” and “banking lobbies.”
The post’s removal, first reported by Haaretz, is one of a number of cosmetic changes Mr Strache and the FPÖ have made since their return to government in December 2017.
Mr Strache has rebranded himself as pro-European and told Die Presse on Sunday that “it is our responsibility to keep the atrocious Nazi period in our consciousness.”
The vice chancellor established a commission earlier this year to investigate his party’s links with greater German nationalist fraternities.
In January it was revealed that the FPÖ’s leading candidate in Lower Austria was a member of a fraternity whose songbook contained racist, antisemitic, pro-Nazi lyrics.
Mr Strache has also looked to distance the party from far-right magazine Die Aula (The Auditorium), saying last month that it is “no organ of the FPÖ.”
Human rights organisation SOS Mitmensch said Neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers have been among the contributors to Die Aula.
It has published articles insulting Holocaust survivors and glorifying Nazism, even as Mr Strache and other leading FPÖ politicians gave interviews to the magazine, the group said.
The Jewish community and the Israeli government maintain a non-cooperation policy with the FPÖ and its ministers, including Mr Strache and foreign minister Karin Kneissl.
On his visit to Israel, Chancellor Kurz said Sunday: “Austria and Austrians carry a heavy burden for the shameful crimes committed during the Shoah.
“We Austrians know that we are responsible for our own history,” Mr Kurz said.
