South African Equality Court Upholds Anti-Semitism Complaint

In the first case of its kind to come before an Equality Court in South Africa, Gerhard Barkhuizen was found guilty of anti-Semitic hate speech for painting a swastika and the phrase Habrizo Mamzer ("spiteful Hebrew bastard") on a wall facing the home of his neighbor, Yaron Fishman. Today's South Africa Sunday Independent reports on the case. The anti-Semitic incident was the culmination of a dispute between the two neighbors over a dog kennel that Barkhuizen was building on his property. Fishman, the son of a Holocaust survivor, took the incident to the country's Human Rights Commission last August. Barkhuizen, who is also facing criminal charges, has refused to apologize, claiming that the painting formed part of a mural depicting the Second World War and that South Africa's constitution affords him the right to freedom of expression. The magistrate hearing the case ruled that Barkhuizen knew that Fishman was Jewish and had deliberately chosen to paint the swastika facing his home.