if it's not them personally but their parents and relatives then it's indirectly. and no, they have no right to whine either they didn't experience it just because their grandparents did. it is something that happened THAT long ago when you compare it to the average length of a human life. the generation that were old enough to remember anything about it is almost completely gone now. is it really fair to blame the crimes of dead people on their children? of course not. it's stupid to do that. by hating their children who did nothing wrong then your mentality isn't really far away from the nazis. this isn't really a little bit of whining either it's systematic accusations and slurs thrown after them year after year showing no sign of stopping. you say "our people" like you were there. you weren't. you didn't suffer and it's not your place to collect the apologies over and over again. and to Hey Swede from USA, Denmark performed massacres in Stockholm a few hundred years ago, it's not like i go around hating danish people for something that happened before i, and todays danes, were even born. and who says i'm critical of jews? i can't recall me saying that. i attacked the german-bashers here because i saw so many of them, if you're jewish or not isn't really important. I think i know more about the crimes of the holocaust than you actually. in Europe, it's mandatory to have the holocaust history in school and most schools invite holocaust survivors to come and tell the children about his or hers experience. and i'm not talking about having holocaust subject an hour or so in every class, i'm talking many classes each semester and watching documentaries and movies about the holocaust is a must in almost every school. now, i'm not saying you shouldn't feel hurt that such atrocities were made against jews, i'm saying that you weren't even there so it's merely an historical fact for you. just as it's wrong when fanatical christians yell that the jews killed jesus, it's wrong when someone blames todays germany for another generations crimes.

Rumours say, that one of the officials who was insulted as a Nazi was a former employee of ELAL, a JEW! ...

It's BECAUSE Germans regret their history that laws and attitudes like this exist in Germany. The idea that this is somehow a veiled form of anti-semitism makes no sense at all. In fact, it appears that Germans are more sensitized to the dangers of Naziism and anti-semitism than some Jews -- at least the two who were arrested, and anyone who belittles the Holocaust by throwing this word around whenever they are inconvenienced or don't get their way.

You can't change what happened 65 years ago, but why call someone a Nazi just because that person is German. Germany is one of the European countries that has Holocaust denial laws which is considered a crime. although I certainly do not agree that questioning any event should constitute a crime. At least Germany recognized the crimes that were carried out by their country which is a lot more than I can say about Israel and its crimes carried out against the Palestinians with total indifference, whose security forces behave like the SS. What is so despised should at least not be emulated.

its not like they need outsiders there..

According to a recent opinion poll conducted in Germany, 51% of "non-migrant" Germans believe that Israelis behave in a very similar fashion to Nazis and 68% of Germans believe that Israel is waging a "war of extermination" against Palestinians. In the late 1990s Germany had not paid one red cent to Jewish victims of Nazi persecution in Central and Eastern Europe and yet at the same time was paying extremely generous pensions to member of the SS living in Western countries (the higher the rank, the higher the pension). That Germany had no problem in paying out large sums to those involved in the most terrible crimes against humanity and yet did not given anything to their victims is yet one more blot on post-war Germany's honour. It's obvious that little if anything has changed in Germany since the 1930s, at least in terms of German attitudes towards Jews. It seems that despite attempts at re-education Germans simply cannot escape the most terrible aspect of their culture.

The Israeli woman should have kept shtum,( especially to an authority )!However to whom can we turn to when reffered to as JEW? We will never get over the holocaust.

Calling someone Nazi over a pack of cigarettes - why am I not surprised? Jews throw this term around along with anti-Semetic, and oh yes, my favorite, Jew-Hater, or even better: self-Hater (if the culprit is Jewish himself). Get over all the name calling. You do it so as to belittle your opponent and make them seem as the agressor and you the victim, it's getting old and annoying.

you might end up in a detention camp. It should be illegal (and it is) in Germany to practice or profess Nazism - but if a non-Nazi calls someone else a Nazi, why is that action deserving of Gestapo-like tactics? I understand why the guards might be offended - after all, if my grandparents were anti-semetic murderers, I wouldn't want to be assumed to have learned anything from them or have taken any value system whatsoever from my parents or grandparents. But Nazi is as Nazi does and putting someone in detention for uttering swear words is one step away from wearing an armband.

Being right is not a prophylactic for bad habits and negative character traits. Sometimes our opinions are best kept to ourselves. When we travel abroad we represent our nation. A basic sense of decorum and diplomacy is incumbent on all of us. It is far from being a native Israeli trait (quite the opposite), but being Israeli doesn't release us of the obligation to improve ourselves - or to behave like Mentschen.

I have lived in the US. I love the country but to hear the americains lecturing the europeans about racism is beyond my understanding! Ask the african-americans what they think of this high moral ground! visit Georgia, kansas ou louisiana and learn decency. We all have problems : in 1936, the french prime minister was jewish. In the US, there were quotas against the jews in the universities.

For some time now, I've read your comments on various sites and I must tell you that not only are you stunningly ignorant of the situation in Israel, but you constantly exhibit a sickening racism. Your comparison of Israeli security forces to the SS is beneath contempt, and you might do well to examine your real motives in drawing such comparisons. And if you're so pro-Palestinian, you ought to stop infantilizing them and start holding them responsible for their own murderous behavior and for willingly subjugating themselves to some of the most vicious and corrupt leaders in the history of the Middle East. The Palestinians may be victims, but not of the Israelis. They're the victims of their own inability to stop blaming the rest of the world for their problems.

I am proud to say that I have worked with more than 50 nationalities. It’s ironic to witness the level of racism and arrogance Israelis have when dealing with others. Israelis have an awesome nation with great potential; unfortunately, it’s plagued with racisms and intolerance to others. Sad but true. I hated my stay in Israel and I will never return to that country again.

When someone is visiting another country, breaking the law and then insulting the official is just plain stupid. These Israelis had no business traveling to Germany if this is how they felt towards Germans. I wonder what they would have called American custom officials who discovered their smuggling attempts? What is more important, and a subject that was untouched by other responders, is the situation in other parts of Europe, especially the antisemitic left. The mayor of London, the out-of-control Ken Livingstone, routinely refers to people as nazis and compares Israel to nazi Germany. Other Europeans, including the usual collection of antisemites, leftist extremists (including nonJewish Jews), and even left-wing newspapers delight in comparing Israeli behavior such as security at checkpoints to the real nazis who gassed and burned people. Even in Israel, accusations of being nazis are made regularly against opponents. This is an abomination. To refer to someone who you dislike as a nazi without understanding or appreciating the murderous evil of the real nazis is a mark of ignorance and evil in itself. Read this, Mr. Livingstone.

Oh deary me, Let's not spoil our strong economic and political understandings with Germany over the wild use of the term Nazi. It is a fact that they are sensitive to any reference to that period in History and they have made concerted efforts to move on and crack down on any such references. I have no sympathy for those Israeli's who made mention of naziism irrationally!

And i'm sure if a similar opinion poll were to be carried out in the UK the numbers would be MUCH higher. Those who believe israel behave the same way as the nazis and that they're waging a war of extermination against "palestinians" are wrong. But it's not really difficult to understand why they believe that. If you don't know the facts and the background of the conflict then you only know what you see on tv, and on tv you see images carefully picked out by the propaganda ministry in the PA to portray a picture of palestinians as victims and israelis as evil occupiers. In the late 1990s Germany was still undergoing internal problems and reforms from the reunification, paying back gold stolen decades ago can't be expected to be their first priority. big deal that they gave pensions to former members of the army. all countries do that. the americans pay out money to the soldiers that were in vietnam too. i don't really see why germany shouldn't. a soldier is just a soldier, he does what he's told to serve his country. you're one of the worst hypocrits in the world when you whine at Germany, your country has a horrific record of racism, colonialism, genocides, wars, antisemitism etc. and as far as i know you still haven't paid back anything of what you stole (you'd probably go bankrupt if you had to do that). deal with your own problems before you lash out at someone else!

Kate, you a racist. You cannot use statistics to condemn a people. Real anti-semites use bad things done by Jews to condemn all Jews. The opinions of 68% or 51% of Germans in an opinion poll is not the opinion of all Germans. Another statistic, if you will, at the beginning of the Palestinian Uprising in 2000, an opinion poll in Israel showed that 60% of Israeli's favoured expelling the Palestinians across to the East Bank of the Jordan. That figure is not representative of the Israeli national opinion. It all depends on how you frame the question. Criticism of Israel is not anti-semitism. I think that the continued occupation of the West Bank of the Jordan is a travesty and I hope that Israel removes it self from there soon. As Yitzak Rabin said before he was murdered, Isreal was not founded in an empty land. The minority of Israeli's, who still reject the idea of Palestinian rights, have to grow up and accept the reality. The people of Palestine have a right to exist too. The actions of the Israeli army in Palestine damage the good name of Israel in the eyes of the world. Criticising the ongoing situation in the Israeli occupied West Bank is not anti-semitism. Zionism was a struggle to create a Jewish homeland. That homeland was born in 1947. The West Bank and Gaza are not Israel. They are Palestine, the homeland of the Palestinian people. Israel must accept this.

where exactly did you stay?Did you travel through every city It's not every city in Israel that are racists.

How do you call people that impose duty on stamps? Fellows? On a package from Israel I'd to pay customs on the gross amount (value of the goods 65 US$ plus 14 US$ postage).

They have no manners, a big mouth, they think the whole world belongs to them....these people deserved what they got....you don't call someone a Nazi, specially not an authorithy person, even not in Germany....ofcourse there are Israelis that know how to behave, but most are a bunch of wild Indians when they are abroad....yes I'm also Israeli and European..and I always make sure that I go somewhere for a vacation where there are no Israelis...

time we understand that the way things are run in other countries is different than the way we do things here. according to what happened as told in the article there was absolutely no justification in either case to call these germans "nazis". but we israelis have a big mouth, we all know it.

I live in the Netherlands which like Israëli culture is crude. We call it honest...others call it uncivilized. The girls at the airport were 'kasach', going even further.

because of it. Let's just forget that episode though.

...is still a Nazi! Don't believe that the German mentality has changed. If they were repentant for their attempted genocide, they would not have fascist practices like this. The german laws imply that Nazi ideas of racial superiority are so dangerous that they must be outlawed. If they were truly sorry for what they've done, they would be able to deal with swastikas and Nazi propaganda in a rational matter like we do in the USA or Britain. Instead they give Hitler and the Nazi's a mythical stature by having fascist laws prohibiting any mention of Germany's terrible past crimes. To any Jews here who think Germany has cleaned up its act, you're plain and simply delusional. If you haven't heard, Neo-Nazi Germans march by the tens of thousands through the streets with the protection of the German police.

Leave germany for the arabs.Theyre doing well.Encourage and wait.Peace

are you talking about secular israelis or religious

peter you are a total ignorant, besides your response is irrelevant to the subject you should learn that customs are calculated on the total of the cost and freight as an international norm, in your case the $14 stamps represent the freight. my advise for you is to shut up and stop being a blinded racist.

Kate, pls, provide me with the sources of this "recent" opinion poll. Your second paragraph is totally bulls**t. My grandparents (jewish) had recieved reparation exactly in late 90es. By the way, most of still living ex-ss members get dito pension rather from Légion étrangère than from Germany.

...whether we're talking about the pot-smoking ones in Thailand or the Chassidim on El Al who refuse to sit down during takeoff because they have to daven minchah.