THE JEWISH COMMUNITY

The 80,000 Jews living in Hungary, out of a total population of 10.55 million, constitute the largest Jewish community in Eastern Europe outside the borders of the former Soviet Union. The great majority live in Budapest, with smaller communities in large urban centers such as Miskolc and Debrecen, as well as in smaller cities.

The Federation of Jewish Communities is the main body of Hungarian Jewry. Several major organizations are active in Hungary, especially the Lauder Foundation, whose summer camps attract youth from across Central and Eastern Europe. The Hungarian Jewish Cultural Association publishes a monthly, Szombat (Saturday), and conducts a wide variety of cultural and educational activities. The quarterly Mult es Jovo (Past and Present) publishes original and translated essays on a wide variety of topics. The bi-weekly Uj Elet (New Life) is the official publication of the Jewish community, and its content also reflects the religious revival among some segments of the Jewish population.

In December 2000, a formal agreement was signed between the Hungarian government and the Jewish community promoting the “political, social and economic stability of Hungarian Jewry.” This was the first such agreement in Hungary since the mid-nineteenth century. The agreement pledges commemoration of the Holocaust and the introduction of Holocaust education into the school curriculum. The Hungarian government has signed communal accords with most other faiths in Hungary.

A Hungarian constitutional court in December 2000 nullified a 1999 law which had allocated what the court termed “a shameful sum” of US$100 in a lump payment to relatives of Holocaust victims. This is in contrast to the $3,000 awarded victims of communist excesses.

In January 2001, the French government donated 3.2 million francs to the Jewish community in Hungary to assist it in establishing a Holocaust documentation center and permanent exhibition in a former synagogue building in Budapest (see ASW 1999/2000).

POLITICAL PARTIES AND EXTRA-PARLIAMENTARY GROUPS

Since the 1998 elections, the Hungarian parliament has become a forum for the nationalist, xenophobic and veiled antisemitic rhetoric of the Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIEP) (for the elections, see ASW 1998/9). The MIEP hopes to become a decisive factor in the survival of the present right-center coalition in the general elections scheduled for May 2002. Analysts believe that the silence of the governing FIDESZ party regarding the extremist, sometimes antisemitic, rhetoric of MIEP leader Istvan Csurka is motivated by electoral calculations. Although, officially, FIDESZ leaders have rejected the idea of a coalition with the ultra-nationalist MIEP, their support might be vital if the balance between the left and the center-right is upset by electoral gains of the Hungarian Socialist Party (HSP), which led the coalition between 1994 and 1998.

The Independent Smallholders Party, led by Jozsef Torgyan, has moderated its populist rhetoric since joining the coalition government in 1998, and racist and antisemitic undertones have been noticeably absent (see ASW 1999/2000). Torgyan, who is minister of agriculture and regional development, declared at a conference on Jewish issues organized by the Jewish community in Debrecen in June 2000 that it was impossible to imagine Hungary and its achievements in the past without the Jews. By early 2001 the party was undergoing significant changes as Torgyan’s leadership was challenged and weakened by internal power struggles and economic scandals.

The number of neo-Nazis is small, but they are visible in public demonstrations on national days or anniversaries linked to World War II. The most notorious neo-Nazi group is the Hungarian Welfare Association, which has appeared under various names and in different forms and which adheres openly to the legacy of the Hungarian fascist Arrow Cross movement, led during the war by Ferenc Szalasi.

Skinhead numbers have not increased in the last few years and their activities might even have diminished. Nevertheless, this violent sub-culture with its neo-Nazi symbols continues to be a visible threat to public order. As in other East European countries, the skinheads act as “shock troops” of Hungarian extremism, manipulated by politicians who seek to project a more respectable image. In February 2000 and 2001, Hungarian police battled groups of local neo-Nazis who were celebrating the anniversary of the attempt by Hungarian and Nazi troops in 1945 to break out of Soviet-besieged Budapest. Following these displays of neo-Nazi power, the authorities promised to clamp down on such demonstrations. The marches in 2000 and 2001 were much smaller in scale than in 1999, but have become an annual display of neo-Nazism and Holocaust revisionism.

A principal defender of the skinheads is former parliament member Izabella B. Kiraly, president of the small Hungarian Interest Party whose organ is Kottot Keve (Tied Sheaf). The party signed a “brotherhood” agreement with the Iraqi Ba’ath Party, and a delegation from Saddam Husayn promised its support (Kottot Keve, 3/2001). At the signing Dr. Tugyi Lajos, claiming to quote from “US President Benjamin Franklin [sic],” said that his “prophecies on the Jews” had become a reality, and “our duty is to stand by Saddam Husayn who dares to oppose the attempts by the Zionists to rule the world.”

ANTISEMITIC AND RACIST ACTIVITIES

Antisemitic manifestations in 2000 remained on the same level as the previous year. In November 2000 some 30 tombstones were damaged by vandals in Budapest’s main Jewish cemetery. Antisemitic slogans and symbols were reported by the Hungarian media at soccer matches and public events. In June 2000 the ADL appealed to the Hungarian prime minister to take legal measures against soccer fans who displayed antisemitic and racist behavior. A commonly used slogan is, “The train is leaving for Auschwitz.”

There were also antisemitic manifestations during the MIEP demonstration in Budapest in March 2000 commemorating the 1848–49 revolution (see ASW 1999/2000).

Globalization was a major target of attack by extremists such as Csurka, who accused Jewish interests of enslaving Hungary spiritually, morally, financially, militarily and politically. Csurka’s party, which has representatives on the boards of directors of the public broadcasting commission and the media, has been active in “unmasking” the “socialist-liberal [read ‘Jewish’]” spirit in the media. There has been a campaign to cleanse the media in Hungary since the collapse of the communist regime, and the struggle between leftist and nationalist forces for positions of influence seems to have intensified. The Pannon Radio station is identified with the MIEP line, and “Sunday Journal,” a popular Sunday radio show on Hungarian state radi, become a major forum for airing nationalist and extremist views, as well as criticism of Jewish issues.

The racist, antisemitic and Holocaust denying monthly Hunnia changed its format in early 2000, appearing as a smaller, bi-monthly journal (see ASW 1999/2000). Despite the transformation, it continues to advertise publications and video cassettes with antisemitic material, and to print articles similar to those in the earlier version.

The weekly Magyar Demokrata has become a regular forum for the publication of antisemitic, anti-Israel and anti-Zionist articles. Since the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifada , it has accused Israel of committing war crimes. Following the protest of a group of Roma families against Hungary, the paper lashed out for weeks against the Jews and Israel. The basic message of such articles, as well as of Magyar Forum and similar publications, is that while Jewish-Israeli capital flows into Hungary and influences the Hungarian market, Jews are slandering Hungary in various ways in order “to buy cheap.” Yet , while the Jews complain about antisemitism and support activities by the Roma, they actually fare quite well, relative to the size of the community (see, for example, Magyar Demokrata, 13/2001). Further, the Jews have total, or almost total, control of the economy and other centers of power and influence, and their attempt at destabilizing Hungary is part of their overall strategy.

In this context, articles dealing with the size and impact of Israeli-Jewish financial interests in Hungary are published in almost every issue of Magyar Demokrata and Magyar Forum. In the west of the country, the MIEP organized a press conference to protest the selling of land to foreigners. The headline of the report was “We do not want to share the fate of the Palestinians” (Magyar Forum, 7 Sept. 2000). Another frequent topic is the constant growth in the Jewish “mafia” from the former Soviet Union who import their violent sub-culture into Hungary (see, for example, Magyar Demokrata, 20/2000).

Among the numerous articles slandering Israel following the outbreak of the intifada was a report in Magyar Forum (19 Oct. 2000) on “blood donations in Hungary for wounded Palestinians.” The report stressed that the humanitarian gesture took place following the paper’s presentation of a long list of allegedly lethal Israeli actions against the Palestinians.

ATTITUDES TOWARD THE HOLOCAUST AND THE NAZI ERA

As in previous years, much extremist activity was focused on attacks on any type of memorial activity related to the Holocaust in which Hungarian participation was recalled, and on Jewish demands for compensation from Hungary. Frequent mention was made of the “communist holocaust” in which Jewish communist leaders were allegedly involved (see ASW 1999/2000). The incorporation of activities in the school curriculum commemorating and educating about the Holocaust was vehemently rejected by extremists. Kiraly B. Izabella wrote in Kottot Keve (3/2001) that “instead of a memorial day we demand justice,” adding that in the new textbooks Hungarian children would learn that “their grandparents were a bunch of antisemitic, fascist and racist Hungarians, while the most miserable but also the most gifted nation on earth are the Jews.”

Csurka’s MIEP party representatives in parliament and in the Budapest city council opposed all remembrance activities on Holocaust Day 2001 with a variety of arguments but not those of Holocaust deniers. Rather they attacked the alleged manipulation of the Holocaust against the Hungarian nation by Jewish elements, especially local Jewish community leaders.

The Hungarian parliament held a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony attended by Prime Minister Viktor Orban ( Uj Elet, 1 May 2001). Members of Csurka’s parliamentary faction were absent from the proceedings.

RESPONSES TO RACISM AND ANTISEMITISM

Relations between the Hungarian population and the authorities with the Roma minority remained problematic, despite government pledges to ease tensions by promoting cultural and educational activities (see ASW 1999/2000).

Protest activities by Roma, especially at the gates of the European Union offices, focused attention on their situation in Hungary. The official position is that the government is doing its best to cope with the issues involved; extremists link the Roma issue to the Jewish support given them.

As part of Hungary’s commitment to fight racism and antisemitism given at the Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust in January 2000, memorialization of the Holocaust and Holocaust education were incorporated into the school curriculum in 2001.