Berlin — German airline Lufthansa has apologized for denying some of its Orthodox Jewish passengers boarding flights after they refused to wear masks.
In a statement late Tuesday, Lufthansa said it “deplores the circumstances surrounding the decision to remove the affected passenger from the flight,” and Lufthansa sincerely apologizes.
The airline said it was reviewing what happened during the May 4 incident, including a passenger from New York transiting in Frankfurt for a flight to Budapest.
The German daily Frankfurt Allgemeiner Zeitung reported that some passengers refused to comply with the rules requiring face masks to be worn, prompting Lufthansa staff to be visibly Jewish. All visible passengers were denied boarding on connecting flights.
Local German media reported that staff excluded passengers who could be identified as Jews because they wore skull caps or had side locks.
The airline said it “regrets that a large group has been denied boarding, rather than limiting it to guests who are not abiding by the rules.”
“We have zero tolerance for racism, anti-Semitism and discrimination of any kind,” he added.
The anti-Semitism commissioner for the state of Hesse in Frankfurt vehemently condemned the incident.
Uwe Becker said that for something that apparently only affected individual travelers, whole groups of people were apparently held accountable for their recognizable beliefs.
“This is not a discriminatory and trivial matter. That is why company management must feel personally responsible for apologizing for this incident and taking a clear and definite position,” said Becker Germany. He told news agency dpa.
Becker said he would be happy to discuss the matter with Lufthansa.
“Things like this shouldn’t happen again,” he added.
Rabbi Jehuda Teichtal, a Berlin rabbi and head of the local Chabad community, said German businesses should be aware of possible anti-Semitism in light of the country’s Nazi past. rice field.
Teichtal welcomed the fact that Lufthansa Chief Executive Carsten Spohr called him to apologize for the incident.
