Dutch judge orders teens to visit Anne Frank House

DutchAmsterdam.nl — A judge in The Hague, Netherlands, has ordered four teenagers to visit the Anne Frank House museum after finding them guilty of discrimination for insulting Jews at a rally.

After the supervised visit the four teenagers, aged 14 to 17, must turn in written reports to the Prosecutor and the Council for the Protection of Children.

During a demonstration last January 18 in The Hague against Israel’s actions in Gaza two of the boys held a banner depicting a Swastika superimposed over a Star of David.

The two other boys chanted “Hamas, Hamas, all Jews to the gas.”

The Anne Frank House museum tells the history of eight Jewish people who during the Second World War hid in a canal-side house at Prinsengracht 265 in Amsterdam.

The group was eventually betrayed and subsequently deported to concentration camps. Anne Frank’s father, the only survivor of the group, returned to Amsterdam after the war to find that his daughter’s diary had been saved. It was first published in 1947. Translated into many languages, The Diary of Anne Frank has become one of the world’s most widely read books.

To save the building on the Prinsengracht from demolition, the Anne Frank House was founded on May 3, 1957. Three years later, the museum opened its doors. Besides managing the museum, the Anne Frank House develops educational products and activities to promote tolerance and mutual respect in society.