Swiss hotel asks ‘our Jewish guests’ to shower before using the pool U.S. decries Islamic State ‘genocide’ of Christians, other minorities

Paris — Outrage erupted Tuesday after a small Swiss hotel posted a sign asking “Jewish guests” to shower before using the swimming pool.

After a hotel guest posted a picture of the sign online, the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human-rights organization, quickly demanded the closure of the Paradies Arosa, an Alpine establishment in the eastern Swiss city of Arosa, outside Davos.

Israeli government officials also condemned the hotel, describing the sign as “an anti-Semitic act of the worst and ugliest kind,” in the words of Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s deputy foreign minister. Israel’s ambassador to Switzerland, Jacob Keidar, reportedly contacted the Paradies later on Tuesday and was told the signs had been taken down.

The backlash spread across social media.

The text of the sign shown in the photo was written in broken English and read: “To our Jewish guests, men, women and children, Please take a shower before you go swimming and although after swimming. If you break the rules, I’m forced to close the swimming pool for you.”

A second sign was posted in the kitchen of the apartment-style hotel, telling “Jewish guests” they could use the freezer only between 10 and 11 a.m. and again between 4:30 and 5:30 p.m. As the second sign concluded: “I hope you understand that our team does not like being disturbed all the time.”

For Shimon Samuels, the Wiesenthal Center’s head of international relations, the language on the sign relied on age-old anti-Semitic caricatures, as well as Holocaust insults. As he told Agence France-Presse, “the reference to ‘showers’ can be construed as a patently vicious reference to the fake shower in the gas chambers.”

During the Holocaust, Jewish and other prisoners of Nazi concentration camps were often told that they needed to be disinfected at the “showers” after arriving by cattle car from elsewhere in Europe. The showers actually released poison gas — the Nazis’ infamous instruments of mass murder.

Ruth Thomann, the hotel manager who signed both declarations, told Swiss media on Tuesday that she was not anti-Semitic. Speaking to Switzerland’s Blick newspaper, Thomann said that the Paradies was accommodating a large number of Jewish guests, some of whom — according to other guests — had not showered before using the pool. Other guests asked her to do something, Thomann said. Hence the sign.

In the past, the Paradies has been popular with orthodox Jewish guests, AFP reported, as its apartment-style setup has been accommodating to their needs, including the use of a freezer to store particular kosher foods.

Regarding the second sign, Thomann told Blick, she was trying to ensure the comfort of hotel staff, given that the freezer in question was located in the staff room. She wanted to make sure hotel employees could eat “lunch and dinner in peace.”

But as she said Tuesday: “I wrote something stupid naive on that poster,” acknowledging to Blick that perhaps it would have been better to address all hotel guests with the notice, and not just “Jewish guests.”

Washington — The Trump administration denounced the Islamic State group on Tuesday for carrying out “genocide” against Christians and other religious minorities in areas under its control.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the group is “clearly responsible for genocide” against Christians and Yazidis in Iraq and Shiite Muslims in Syria and elsewhere. His comments were made as the State Department released its annual report on international religious freedom.

Tillerson said he was making the pronouncement to “remove any ambiguity” about previous genocide assertions made by his predecessor, John Kerry, who in March 2016, determined that genocide was occurring in Islamic Stateheld areas but was criticized by lawmakers and religious groups for not declaring genocide was taking place earlier. Neither administration’s genocide determination carries with it any legal obligation for the U.S. or others.

“ISIS has and continues to target members of multiple religions and ethnicities for rape, kidnapping, enslavement and death,” Tillerson told reporters in presenting the report.

“ISIS is clearly responsible for genocide against Yazidis, Christians and Shia Muslims in areas it controlled. ISIS is also responsible for crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing directed at these same groups, and in some cases against Sunni Muslims, Kurds and other minorities,” Tillerson said. “The protection of these groups — and others who are targets of violent extremism — remains a human-rights priority for the Trump administration.”

The religious freedom report, which is mandated by Congress, covers 2016 and does not address the Trump administration’s decision to temporarily halt the admission of all refugees, many of whom are fleeing religious persecution. The administration has appealed challenges to the suspension of those admissions to the Supreme Court.

An appendix to the report covering refugees said admissions are “a vital tool” in addressing religious persecution and other human rights abuses.