Spanish group dressed in Nazi Uniforms cancels Holocaust-themed parade after backlash

Spanish carnival troupe whose Holocaust-themed parade outraged Jewish human rights groups and Israel’s embassy in Madrid has cancelled its remaining shows.

The troupe has also apologised to the Jewish community in Spain over the parade in the small town of Campo de Criptana about 110km (68 miles) southeast of Madrid.

In the parade, some dancers wore Nazi uniforms and had machine guns, others wore striped death camp costumes, and girls in white paraded with Israeli flags.

“Appalled by the carnival parade in Campo de Criptana,” Foreign Minister Arancha Laya tweeted, calling the show “a banalisation of the Holocaust”.

“After contacts with organisers, they apologised to the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain,” she wrote.

A spokesman for the Chaparral Cultural Association, which organised the parade, said the group had also called the Israeli embassy to explain that it had not intended to cause insult and that the aim had been to honour victims “with maximum respect”.

The embassy in Madrid had condemned the “vile and appalling show” in a tweet, saying it “mocks the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis”.