Austria’s Foreign Ministry has recalled an employee of its embassy in Israel after an Austrian weekly said he posted a picture of himself on social media wearing a T-shirt bearing the name of a Nazi tank division.
The Falter weekly published a screenshot of the attache’s Facebook page which shows him in a green shirt with the words “stand your ground” and “Frundsberg.” Frundsberg was a German Waffen SS armored division during World War Two.
The attache, Juergen-Michael Kleppich, is a member of the far-right Freedom Party, which is a junior partner in Austria’s coalition government. He was sent to Tel Aviv in December to help out at the embassy for a few months, Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl told radio station ORF on Wednesday.
The incident is the latest in a series of embarrassments for the anti-immigrant FPO, which in December joined Austria’s national government for the first time in more than a decade, and has been trying for years to shed any Nazi associations.
by Reuters and Algemeiner Staff
{Matzav.com}