The Ukrainian Parliament on Wednesday left a lot of people scratching their heads when they seemly equated the bombing of Ukrainian cities with the bombing of Nazi Germany during World War II.
In a twitter appeal for the West to impose a “no-fly zone” over Ukraine, the Ukrainian Parliament posted a picture comparing the devastation suffered by its cities to that suffered by Nazi Germany during Allied bombing raids.
The picture on Twitter seen by Investogist, shows a bombed out building in Hamburg Germany in 1943 alongside bombed out building in Kkarkiv Ukrain in 2022.
— Верховна Рада України (@verkhovna_rada) March 23, 2022
The text above the image reads “When the Sky is Open,” and a message in English demands that the West “#CloseTheSky over Ukraine.”
An Irony that seems lost on the Parliamentarians is that they are asking the same allies that bombed Hamburg in 1943 to fight on Ukraine’s behalf today.
Although the Parliament did not explain why it chose to compare Kharkov with Hamburg, the message it sends was not lost on those commenting online
“Man, they really don’t know what optics are,” wrote one commentator.
This is not the first time that the Government of Ukraine is making a direct comparison between the Russian war campaign with the Nazi campaign in World War II.
In an address on Monday to members of Israel’s Knesset and a large crowd of supporters in a central Tel Aviv square, equated the Russian invasion of Ukraine to the Nazi campaign to subjugate Europe and beseeched Israel to do more to prevent ongoing carnage in his country.
However, Zelensky’s speech to the Knesset on Sunday evening was received with mixed responses from Israeli lawmakers, with some calling it “outrageous” and others supporting the “distressed” president.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused the Ukrainian government of harboring sympathies to Nazi Germany, and in a speech announcing the start of Russia’s military offensive on Ukraine last month, he said that one of Russia’s goals was to “denazify” the country.
RT reports that aside from integrating the neo-Nazi ‘Azov’ batallion into its military, the Ukrainian government has launched efforts to portray its people as racially distinct from Russians, whom politicians in Kiev have openly referred to as “orcs.”
Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera is considered a hero to Ukrainian nationalists, and just last week a television host in Ukraine, Fahruddin Sharafmal, caused controversy when he approvingly quoted Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in calling for the murder of Russians and their children.
In 2015, the Ukrainian Parliament passed a bill stating that the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, an ultra-nationalist faction that sought to establish an independent Ukrainian state, would be eligible for official government commemoration, according to the Kiev Post.
While the group, an offshoot of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists led then by Stepan Bandera, engaged in warfare against both the Soviet Union and the Nazis, it also collaborated with Germany and took part in actions against local Jews.
Nnamdi Maduakor is a Writer, Investor and Entrepreneur
