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The Westin in Leipzig (symbol picture): Advertisement for defamation
Photo: Manfred Segerer / imago images / Manfred Segerer
The Leipzig police are investigating after a criminal complaint for defamation against the singer Gil Ofarim.
The singer had accused the employee of a Leipzig hotel of anti-Semitism.
The employee described the incident "significantly different from the statements made by the musician," said Leipzig police spokesman Olaf Hoppe to SPIEGEL.
Ofarim had previously reported in an Instagram video that an employee at the Westin Hotel had asked him to wrap his chain with a Star of David.
Then he can check in.
The video caused a sensation nationwide.
To what extent the employee presents the matter differently, Hoppe did not say.
He referred to the ongoing investigation.
The employee also filed a second complaint about threats against unknown persons.
He was attacked in the social networks.
In addition, the police had received an online complaint from an uninvolved third party for sedition.
It is directed against hotel employees.
Ofarim himself has not yet received a complaint, according to Hoppe.
The Westin Hotel has now responded and put two employees on leave for the duration of the criminal investigation, said a spokeswoman for the Marriott group to which the house belongs.
In response to a request from SPIEGEL, she said that the hotel's team was holding talks with everyone who was present at the time in question.
The hotel is in close contact with Ofarim's management.
After the allegations became known, hundreds of people gathered in front of the Westin on Tuesday evening.
They wanted to express solidarity with the musician and Jewish people in Germany.
Ofarim is a German rock musician and son of the Israeli singer Abi Ofarim, who died in 2018, and his wife Sandra.
Gil Ofarim also works as an actor and has appeared in series such as "Gute Zeiten, Bad Zeiten" or TV formats such as "Let's Dance".
jpz / dpa