GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE have issued an apology after a picture of two men dressed in Nazi SS uniforms was posted on its Twitter page.
The GMP traffic account tweeted a picture on Sunday evening of two men fully dressed in SS uniforms next to a German military Kubelwagen vehicle.
A caption went along with the picture, reading:
M62 J22 On the west Yorkshire border. These two likely lads trying to invade.
One Twitter user Shulem Stern – a member of the Hackney Orthodox Jewish community – responded to the image, saying that it was “not right”.
GMP responded by removing the image, saying that it was “unacceptable”.
The BBC reports that the men were returning from a World War II reenactment event when the picture was taken.
Speaking to the BBC, Stern said that “education was key” and that he did not think whoever posted the picture did it intentionally to cause offence.
Stern said:
“The Nazis rounded up millions of innocent people, including my great-grandfather, great-grandmother and their two young boys aged just two and six..they were taken to Auschwitz where they were murdered, simply because they were Jewish.”
To wear the SS uniform at a show about World War Two is one thing, but to dress like that in public, is likely to cause offence to any person who lost close relatives… as well as veterans and their relatives.
In a statement following the incident, a GMP spokesperson said that the matter had been referred “to GMP’s professional standards branch”.
“This post was deleted as soon as were made aware of it and we apologise for its content, as it was unacceptable,” the spokesperson said.
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