Stern magazine's Trump 'Seig Heil' cover draws sharp criticism

"We have grown increasingly alarmed by the use of the Swastika and other Nazi symbols in depicting the elected President of the United States," said the Wiesenthal Center.

By HAGAY HACOHEN
Updated: AUGUST 24, 2017 21:47
Stern cover of US President Donald Trump (photo credit: FACEBOOK)
Stern cover of US President Donald Trump
(photo credit: FACEBOOK)
US President Donald Trump was depicted draped in the American flag and performing a Nazi salute on the cover of the German magazine Stern's Thursday issue.
The title, translated from German, is: "His Struggle (Sein Kampf) - Neo-nazis, Ku Klux Klan, Racism: As Donald Trump stirs hate in America."
"His Struggle" is a reference to the infamous book penned by Adolf Hitler, "My Struggle" (Mein Kampf), further making the association between Trump and the leader of Nazi Germany.   

The Simon Wiesenthal Center quickly denounced the German publication's decision to run the cover.

Dean and founder of the Wiesenthal center Rabbi Marvin Hier and Associate Dean Abraham Cooper stated that while Trump had been mistaken to compare Neo-Nazis and white supremacists with those who oppose them from the left, it is still wrong to compare the leader of the free world to Adolf Hitler. 
"President Trump is fair game for serious criticism by the public and media at home and abroad," they stated, "but depicting him as a latter-day Hitler in a major German publication is untrue and beyond the pale."
Other magazines had taken creative license in depicting the unprecedented event of a US president saying there are "fine people"  among KKK supporters and Neo-Nazis. The New Yorker showed Trump blowing into a sail shaped like a Klan man's hood.

The Economist displayed him talking to a megaphone resembling the same Klan hood.