Spicer sorry for ‘insensitive blunder’ over Holocaust

White House press secretary Sean Spicer has apologised for making an “insensitive” reference to the Holocaust in comments about Syrian President Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons.

Mr Spicer said in an interview with CNN that he mistakenly used “an inappropriate, insensitive reference to the Holocaust”.

He said there was no comparison and “it was a mistake to do that”, adding: “It was my blunder.”

Mr Spicer, below, said during a White House briefing yesterday that Adolf Hitler “didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons”.

His comments drew looks of astonishment from journalists and drew instant rebuke from Jewish groups and critics who noted it ignored Hitler’s use of gas chambers to exterminate Jews during the Holocaust.

Mr Spicer was attempting to discuss the horror of the chemical weapons attack last week in Syria.

He was asked to clarify his remarks during the news conference and garbled his words during the response.

“I think when you come to sarin gas, there was no, he (Hitler) was not using the gas on his own people the same way that Assad is doing.”

He added: “There was not, in the, he brought them in to the Holocaust centres, I understand that, what I’m saying, in the way that Assad used them, where he went into towns dropped them down to innocent, into the middle of towns, it was brought to, so the use of it, and I appreciate the clarification, that was not the intent.”