The basic premise of two Indiana Jones movies was for the hero to track down important historical artifacts to make sure they don’t fall into the hands of the Nazis.
A Lebanese man plunked down €600,000 ($660,000) at an auction for the same reason — to ensure that Nazi memorabilia doesn’t fall into the hands of far-right groups that could use them as propaganda.
Abdallah Chatila, who is one of the 300 wealthiest people in Switzerland, purchased multiple items at the Hermann Historica, a Berlin auction house, including Hitler’s top hat, a silver-covered edition of his autobiography “Mein Kampf,” cigar box, and typewriter.
He then announced the items would be donated to the Keren Hayesod association, an Israeli fundraising group. Chatila originally hoped the items would be burned, but now hopes they will be placed in a museum.
“Far-right populism and anti-Semitism are spreading all over Europe and the world,” Chatila told the Swiss newspaper Le Matin Dimanche. “I did not want these objects to fall into the wrong hands and to be used by people with dishonest intentions.”
According to Newsweek, Chatila is estimated to have a net worth of around of over €136 million ($150 million).
RELATED: He photographed Nazi atrocities and buried the negatives. The unearthed images are unforgettable.
Rabbi Menachem Margolin, head of the European Jewish Association, said he was “bowled over” by the gesture. “In a cynical world… such a noble act of kindness, generosity and solidarity,” he said.
Rabbi Margolin had previously chastised the auction, claiming that Germany “leads Europe in the sheer volume of reported anti-Semitic incidents.”
After learning that some of the items would be donated, the European Jewish Association thanked Chatila for his generosity.
“Thank you Mr. Abdallah Chatila for doing the right and noble thing. Thank you all of you out there that took the time to write, speak and bring the issue to the public,” a spokesperson said. “Your thoughts and voices matters.”
RELATED: Austria is so sick of Nazis visiting Hitler’s birthplace they’re turning it into a police station
Last week, GOOD reported on a similar story out of Austria.
The Austrian government announced that the building where Hitler was born in 1889 and was seized in 2017, would be completely redesigned and turned into a police station. The building that formerly housed the Braunau am Inn had been a pilgrimage site for neo-Nazis for decades.
Austria has strict anti-Nazi laws, iso t’s highly unlikely that far-right extremists will return to the site for fear of being arrested.
Both stories are great examples of people taking the Nazi threat seriously, seven decades after the second World War. It serves as a reminder that we must be forever vigilant against the forces of evil to prevent them from ever rising again.
