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Jews snub Sólyom over hate speech bill The Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities (MAZSIHISZ) last Monday rejected an invitation for a year-end lunch with President László Sólyom in protest against Sólyom’s refusal to sign a hate-speech bill into law. Parliament passed the law, which allows people to take legal action against those who denigrate their race, minority identity or sexuality, in late October. Sólyom, however, sent the law to the Constitutional Courtfor consideration as he was concerned it was disproportionate and could curtail freedom of speech.This has angered Mazsihisz’s leaders, who attacked Sólyom as they refused the invite to join other religious leaders in an end-of-year lunch. In an open letter, Mazsishisz bemoaned the fact that it had waited years for a law that would stop the increasingly loud voices “of hatred and crude vocal attacks on Jews and other minorities”. The group also accused the President of being more interested in protecting the assets of those slinging around insults than the dignity of those insulted. Constitutional question Sólyom’s office said that he regretted Mazsihisz could not attend and pointed out that sending the law to the court did not mean Sólyom opposed moves to stop hate speech, but that he simply believed it did not comply with the Constitution. The President’s major beef with the law revolves around the fact that anybody within a community can bring a lawsuit even if the comments were not personally directed at them. Sólyom’s office also said that the President had already indicated in public that he was concerned about attacks on Jews and other minorities. Guarding against the Gárda The hate speech bill was introduced after a perceived rise in right-wing activity in Hungary over the last year, of which the most high-profile case was the formation of the Magyar Gárda (Hungarian Guard) by extreme-right party Jobbik. The Gárda has chosen as its coat of arms a variation on the red-and-white Árpád Stripes, a medieval flag that became associated with Hungary’s Nazi-aligned Arrow Cross party in power for a brief period during the Second World War. Mazsihisz has condemned the group for wearing uniforms similar to those worn by the fascists in the 1940s.
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