There is currently a stir in Switzerland over a discriminatory notice at a mountain station: Jewish guests are no longer allowed to rent equipment there.
Davos — In the Swiss ski resort of Pischa near Davos, the anti-Jewish rules of a mountain station are shocking. A notice there, written in Hebrew, currently informs people that sports equipment will no longer be loaned to Jews.
It literally says: “Due to various sad incidents, including the theft of a sled, we no longer rent sports equipment to our Jewish brothers. This applies to all equipment such as sledges, airboards, ski jacks and snowshoes. Thank you for your understanding.”
Discriminatory notice: 21-year-old Jewish guest turned away from mountain station
Like the Swiss media portal 20 minutes reported that a 21-year-old Jewish guest was turned away by an employee at the mountain station counter. “I pretended I couldn’t read Hebrew and asked if we could rent the airboards. After the woman asked the manager, she denied the request,” the man said in the interview. He is deeply saddened by the company's decision. He and his family were actively discriminated against because of their religion.
The general secretary of the Swiss Association of Israelite Communities was shocked by the incident: “The fact that such a letter is publicly hung on a Swiss mountain is shocking. The content is highly discriminatory and anti-Semitic.” Bad experiences with individual customers are not a reason for generalizations. The notice also caused horror on platform X (Twitter). Zurich local councilor Jehuda Spielman shared a picture of the notice on the platform. According to Spielman, there are probably other anti-Jewish notices at the mountain station.
The anti-Semitism commissioner for North Rhine-Westphalia, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, speaks in an interview about how she assesses hatred of Jews and extremism in her district.
Hill station defends anti-Jewish notice: “We don’t want the daily hassle anymore”
The Pischa mountain restaurant defended the decision even after the criticism and rejected allegations of discrimination. “We no longer want the daily hassle and are therefore exercising our right to decide who can and cannot rent our property,” the restaurant said in a statement 20 minutes. Apparently Jewish guests increasingly left sledges and other equipment on the slopes and did not bring them back. “The fact that we no longer want to rent anything to them has nothing to do with faith, skin color or personal preferences, but only with the fact that we are no longer interested in these daily discussions and frictions,” it continued.
The managing director of the Destination Davos Klosters, Reto Branschi, said that it was an unfortunate formulation. “The notice can hurt the feelings of the Jewish guest group as a whole and that shouldn’t be the case. It does not represent the attitude of the destination and the tourism providers in our place. Davos Klosters and its services are open to all guests.”
Anti-Semitic incidents have also been increasing in Germany since the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel: recently, a Jewish student was beaten up by a fellow student. The act was presumably anti-Semitic and sparked a debate in Germany. The anti-Semitism commissioner is now calling for the universities to intervene. (jus)
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