The board of the Jewish community in Trondheim, Norway, reacts strongly against the behavior of a police student during a visit in the synagogue and the Jewish museum in Trondheim.
Mrs. Rita Abrahamsen, chairman of the Jewish community, has written a letter to the head of the Police Directorate in Norway, Mrs. Ingelin Killengreen.
“We are working on the case. If the statements are correct it is a form of behavior that is totally unacceptable in our department”, says senior advisor Asbjoern Gran of the Police Directorate.
In the letter, it says that the police student refused to wear a kippa when entering the synagogue, referring that he was a Muslim.
According to the letter, the head of the Jewish Museum, dr. Henriette Kahn, gave this response; ”this is not about which religion or culture the visitor belongs to, but respect for the house of prayer and comparable to taking off your shoes when entering a mosque.”
The police student then responded; “I don’t give a damn shit. You are only Jews . . .” after which he entered and slammed the door. Kahn perceived him that aggressive that she dared not follow up on the case.
Some time after the disturbance the Jewish community received a phone call from a fellow student from the Police Academy. This fellow student could tell that the Muslim police student had bragged about that he finally “had put the Jews to their place”.
The complaint is now being taken up for discussion at the Police Directorate and at the Police Academy in Oslo.
“This man is no longer a student, he has passed his exams. We are, however, trying to map the situation, with his and others version of what happened”, says headmaster Hans Sverre Sjoevold at the Police Academy.
Date: Dec. 15, 2007
