Game Offering Users Chance to ‘Live Like a Real Jew’ in Auschwitz Generates Outrage

The app, which had been uploaded to Google Play, was removed by its developers on Monday, a school for vocational training based in Zaragoza, Spain. The developers claimed the game was “just a parody.”

A new app-based game which invited users to “live like a real Jew in the Auschwitz Concentration Camp” has generated outrage in the Jewish world and was subsequently removed by Google Play.

Colette Avital, the head of the Center of Holocaust Survivor Organizations in Israel and a member of the Executive of the World Jewish Congress-Israel, expressed indignation and outrage over the program.

“We cannot understand how the top management of Google approved such a cynical game, turning the martyrdom of six million Jews into an object for amusement and enjoyment,” Avital said in a statement.

The app was removed by its developers on Monday, a school for vocational training based in Zaragoza, Spain. The developers claimed the game was “just a parody.”

At least 1.1 million victims died at Auschwitz during the Holocaust.

The gates of Auschwitz. (Lucky Team Studio/Shutterstock)

The Italian newspaper La Repubblica first reported about the app, which was downloaded thousands of times before being removed. It described the app as “a macabre game that replicates the Holocaust in a digital version. ”

Many users left anti-Semitic messages in the comment fields on the app’s download page.

One user expressed his enjoyment at playing the game and said the only problem was “that every 20 minutes I find the full oven and I have come to remove ash.”

Another user described the app as an addictive game, “like a drug.”

In recent weeks, Google was repeatedly criticized for its sluggish reaction to content posted on its sites in which the Holocaust is glorified or belittled. The World Jewish Congress called on the internet giant to remove repulsive neo-Nazi songs from its video platform YouTube.

Google Play is the official app store for the Android operating system, the most widely used smartphone operating system worldwide.

By: United with Israel Staff

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