Why Jew passengers were denied boarding? Lufthansa apologises amid outrage

German airline Lufthansa has issued an apology after it was accused of refusing a large group of Orthodox Jewish passengers to board a flight. Some of them had allegedly refused to wear masks, it was said. Issuing a statement late Tuesday night, Lufthansa said that it “regrets the circumstances surrounding the decision to exclude the affected passengers from the flight, for which Lufthansa sincerely apologizes.” The airline - accused of antisemitism - further mentioned that it was reviewing what had happened during the incident.

"We regret that the large group was denied boarding rather than limiting it to the non-compliant guests. We have zero tolerance for racism, antisemitism, and discrimination of any type," the airline added in its statement.

The airline further mentioned that they will be "engaging with the affected passengers to better understand their concerns and openly discuss how we may improve our customer service."

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Reportedly, the airline had refused a large number of Jewish passengers to board a connecting flight from New York transiting in Frankfurt for a flight to Budapest on May 4 after some passengers had allegedly refused to comply with rules requiring them to wear face masks. Upon this, the airline staff had blocked all the passengers who were “visibly” identified as Jews.

According to local media, the staff had denied entry to those passengers who were “recognizable as Jews because they were wearing skull caps or had sidelocks.”

In a video of the incident posted by foreign media, passengers can be seen accusing the airline and German police of “anti-Semitism”. In a heated exchange, a passenger can also be heard calling a police officer a “Nazi”.

The antisemitism commissioner of the state of Hesse also condemned the incident. Calling it a “discriminatory” and “not a trivial matter”, the commissioner of the state said that the airline's top management should “feel personally responsible for apologizing”.

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Angry tweets flooded Twitter after the incident. “A Four Step Plan for @lufthansa. Step 1. A real apology from the CEO for targeting Orthodox Jews. Step 2. Terminate the employees who participated in the discrimination. Step 3. Compensate all of the victims. Step 4. Announce the measures to ensure that it never happens again. (sic)” - this was one of the many posts on the social media website.