Goldberg has apologised for saying that the Nazi genocide of six million Jews "was not about race." Photo / Getty
Goldberg has apologised for saying that the Nazi genocide of six million Jews "was not about race." Photo / Getty
An English comedian has delivered a perfect take-down of Whoopi Goldberg's controversial Holocaust claims.
Goldberg has been suspended from her position on the American ABC's The View after she claimed that the Holocaust was "not about race," claiming Nazis and Jews were both white.
Around six million people were killed by Hitler's regime in Nazi Germany during World War II and his hatred of Jewish people stemmed from Nazis believing themselves to be an Aryan "master race".
Whoopi, 66, said on the US talk show: "Let's be truthful about it because Holocaust isn't about race. It's not about race. It's not about race. It's about man's inhumanity to man.
"These are two white groups of people! The minute you turn it into race it goes down this alley. Let's talk about it for what it is. It's how people treat each other. It doesn't matter if you're Black or white, Jews, it's each other."
Comedian David Baddiel, who released the book Jews Don't Count in 2021, told Good Morning Britain said he was a big fan of Goldberg's but that there was a lot wrong with her comments.
Whoopi Goldberg has been suspended by The View following her controversial comments about the Holocaust when she said 'it was not about race'@Baddiel tells @susannareid100 and @adilray that Goldberg's comments reveal 'a lot about the confusions people have around anti-semitism' pic.twitter.com/63VR5SV9BD
"It does reveal an awful lot about the confusions people have around anti-Semitism," he said. "One of the principal things that's going on here is the resistance to the idea that anti-Semitism is racism."
He said Goldberg appeared to think anti-Semitism is merel religious intolerance — but the issue goes much deeper.
"The problem with that is I'm and atheist and the Gestapo would have shot me tomorrow," said Baddiel — who is from a Jewish family.
"My great uncle who died in the Warsaw ghetto was not an observant Jew, And it's not just the Holocaust, now Neo Nazis marching with torches saying 'Jews will not replace us' in Charlottesville would not ask a Jew whether he kept Kosher before they set alight to his house.
"They are not interested in faith and the Nazis weren't interested in faith, they were interested in racial purity."
Goldberg has apologised for saying that the Nazi genocide of six million Jews "was not about race." Photo / Getty
He said the "whiteness of Jews" is a very complex issue.
"Jews are seen as white or non white, depending on the politics of the observer, right, so far right groups and for years and years, centuries have seen Jews as not part of the white race," he said.
"But on the far left, the association of Jews, which is a racist thing with power and privilege makes them kind of super white.
"And what that ends up with, it's similar to because in the Black Lives Matter thing with All Lives Matter, because it takes away from the specifics of the racism to something very bland in general, like man's inhumanity to man.
"Okay, but what's going on here is actually a very particular type of genocide. She talked on Stephen Colbert show, about two sides fighting this is not two sides fighting. This was an ethnic group being marked out to be destroyed by the military industrial machine."
Whoopi later conceded her remarks were wrong, and apologised for the "hurt I have caused".
Despite calls for the 66-year-old showbiz veteran to be fired, ABC has released a statement saying Goldberg is being taken off-air for two weeks.
