“In August 2004, several incidents of anti-Semitism occurred during the time of the presidential referendum. The pro-government daily newspaper VEA published an article containing accusations that Jewish leaders in the country had participated in the 2002 coup against the Government. During a political rally, graffiti labeling Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon an assassin and condemning the Zionist movement was painted on a Caracas synagogue. A few days after his electoral victory, President Chavez gave a speech in which he compared the opposition to wandering Jews.’”
Michael Kaminer, writing for the Forward in 2014, reported on a government-run bookstore in Caracas that sold “Los Protocolos de los Sabios de Sion” — a Spanish translation of the “Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion” — next to the cash register. Another store sold “Mi Lucha” — Spanish for “Mein Kampf.”
Kaminer reported that when the clerk behind the counter found out he was Jewish, he “started ranting about how Jews control the media and Hollywood, how the six-million-dead Holocaust figure was an exaggeration, and how he was actually opposed to Zionism, not Jews. He continued railing about ‘finding the truth through dialogue’ as we inched out the door.”