The ultra-right-wing bloc Alianza por la Unidad Nacional began to disintegrate in 1997 when a number of components left. One of them, the DISPAR (Dios y Patria) university association formed, together with several other groups, the Frente Social Español. A serious anti-Semitic incident was the attempt to set fire to the Jewish community building in Barcelona in July. The website NeuvOrden has begun disseminating anti-Semitic and Holocaust propaganda in Spanish through the Internet server of the American white supremacist group Stormfront, headed by Don Black. The Spanish government approved setting up a commission to investigate possible gold transactions between the Third Reich and Spain.

THE JEWISH COMMUNITY

The Federacion de Comunidades Israelitas de España (Federation of Jewish Communities in Spain) represents Jewish interests to the government. B'nai B'rith and WIZO have offices in Spain, and there are also several cultural organizations established by immigrants form Latin America and other countries. A cultural journal, Raices (Roots) appears regularly.

EXTREMIST MOVEMENTS AND HATE GROUPS

On November 29 a new bloc of the extreme right was announced: the Frente Social Español (Spanish Social Front), composed of Patria Libre (Free Country -- which had previously split from the AUN); Falange Española Nacional Sindicalista (National Syndicalist Spanish Falange); Falange Española Frente Nacional Sindicalista (Syndicalist National Front Spanish Falange); Vasco Navarros por España (Navarran Basques for Spain); Vanguardia Española (Spanish Vanguard) and DISPAR.

The Europa bookshop and the Barcelona publishing house of the neo-Nazi Circulo Español de Amigos de Europa (Spanish Circle of Friends of Europe - CEDADE) continued to operate, despite the dissolution of the group in 1993 (see previous reports). However, the bookstore no longer sells books and other products that infringe upon the rights of individuals (see also below).

Cabezas Rapadas (Skinheads) and to a lesser extent, Bases Autónomas (Autonomous Bases - BBAA), carried on their violent activities in the cities, although to a lesser extent: according to police reports, the number of assaults in Madrid declined from 166 in 1996 to 90 in 1997, the majority committed by skinheads.

Disciples of the Belgian Nazi Leon Degrelle, a source of inspiration for Spanish neo-Nazism, created the Rex organization -- named for Degrelle's Belgian Rexist Movement -- in Spain, a cultural association dedicated to rehabilitating the Waffen SS general who died in 1994. The association publishes a magazine edited by the lawyer José Luis Jerez Riesco, who was Degrelle's close collaborator.

Evidence of Spanish links to international Islamic terrorism was revealed in 1997. In April, the police in Valencia arrested 11 Algerians who forged identity documents for members of the militant Groupe Islamique Armé (GIA), especially those operating in France. Some of the suspects had direct contacts with the GIA leader in Algeria. The police suspected that the arrested persons may have provided support in the preparation and execution of terrorist acts. Two weeks later, the police raided seven apartments in Barcelona occupied by GIA militants, and arrested at least four persons.

ANTI-SEMITIC ACTIVITIES

Propaganda

Until 1997 Spanish neo-Nazis could only receive materials in Spanish on the Internet from American servers, such as Don Black's Stormfront, Cyberhate or the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Now, right-wing propaganda from Spain is being transmitted through Stormfront from the electronic address NuevOrden, created by J. C. Martin. NeuvOrden is linked to NJ, as well as to Movimiento Social Español (a coalition member of the AUN).

In an interesting ideological turn, a group of Spanish neo-Nazis has been attempting to convince their most radical followers that the Basque extreme left (abertzale), which supports the terrorist group ETA, is the only valid movement to "break with the system and the monarchy." Composer and well-known ultra-right wing leader Fernando Márquez, Rafael Palencia of BBAA, and Ramón Bau of the now defunct CEDADE, are among the sponsors of this idea, which is expressed in bulletins and magazines such as Resistencia, Tribune of Europe, Punto de Vista Operativo and El corazón del bosque. While the neo-Nazis lauded ETA, the latter, in their daily organ Egin, heaped praises on Márquez, who in an interview to the skinzine Mundo Bruto, had defended the Herri Batasuna (the political wing of ETA) as the vanguard of this Third Position force.

On June 27 the first issue of the weekly Spanish-language Amanecer del nuevo siglo (Dawn of the New Century), published by Collado-Villalba in Madrid, appeared in several kiosks in Madrid. The contents of this newspaper are virulently anti-Israel and anti-Jewish. One of the members of its editorial board is the radical Argentinean rightist Norberto Ceresole (see ASW 1996/7).

ATTITUDES TOWARD THE HOLOCAUST AND THE NAZI ERA

Otto Remer, former SS general and one of the foremost leaders of the neo-Nazi movement after World War II, died in Marbella at the age of 84. A German court had sentenced him in October 1992 to 22 months imprisonment for "promoting hate, violence and racism," and for having denied the existence of the gas chambers. He fled to Spain and, in February 1996, the Spanish national parliament refused Germany's extradition request.

The Nazi gold affair is being followed with great interest by the Spanish media. In February, American Senator Alfonse D´Amato asked Spain to report on the whereabouts of Nazi gold that had apparently been transferred there from Switzerland during World War II. This was revealed in a document from 1946, disclosed by the State Department and made public by D´Amato. In July, the Spanish government approved the setting up of a commission to investigate possible gold transactions between the Third Reich and Spain. This governmental commission, which is under the foreign ministry, is headed by the socialist leader Enrique Múgica Herzog and has eight members. According to a preliminary 200-page report prepared by this commission, which was to be delivered to the prime minister, Spain was not culpable for the purchase of Nazi gold during World War II. Pablo Martín Aceña, one of the historians who led the Spanish research group, declared that "Spain only bore responsibility for being a neutral country that traded with Germany." This thesis is contradicted by American historians who maintain that three-quarters of the gold bought by Franco from Switzerland had been confiscated by the Nazis.

In June, a delegation from the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles asked Prime Minister Aznar to extradite Nazi war criminals living in Spain, including Remer (who died in the meantime) and Gerd Honsik (see previous reports).

RESPONSES TO RACISM AND ANTI-SEMITISM

In April, the Catalan police delivered to an investigating judge new documentation on the Europa bookstore, which revealed evidence of Holocaust denial and copyright infringement. Judicial sources reveal that the material seized at the premises included lists of more than 317 Jewish organizations and citizens, both Spanish and foreign. The lists were gathered between 1983 and 1989, CEDADE's heyday. The Jewish community is participating in the suit against Pedro Varela, the former CEDADE leader and owner of the Europa bookstore.

A judge dismissed the charges of SOS Racism against Professor Guillermo Quintana, a lecturer in educational psychology at Madrid's Complutense University. Quintana wrote a controversial book, La psicología de la personalidad y sus trastornos (The Psychology of the Personality and Its Disorders), which, inter alia, claimed blacks were inferior to whites and women were weak and unstable.

Public and Political Activities

"The City of Difference" exhibition against racism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism, organized by the Baruch Spinoza foundation (see ASW 1996/7), was displayed very successfully in the Madrid City Museum from March to June.

On March 13 the Spanish Committee for the European Year Against Racism 1997, under the presidency of the queen of Spain, was established in Toledo. The B'nai B'rith Association of Spain (ADL Commission) is a member of this committee, as well as of the Regional Committee against Racism and Intolerance of the Autonomous Community of Madrid. The counselor to the presidency of the Madrid Community, Jesús Pedroche, announced that the regional committee would have permanent status.

From November 24 to 26, the University of Alcalá of Henares (Madrid) hosted the second Inter-religious Encounter of Alcalá (the first was in 1994), with the participation of leading representatives of the three monotheistic religions. They agreed on the importance of dialogue and mutual recognition for advancing the Middle East peace process.

The presidents of the Autonomous Community of Madrid and the Jewish community of Madrid signed an agreement on collaboration which set forth various common objectives on social policy, education and culture. Similar agreements with Catholics and Protestants already exist.