TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – Recently leaked video shows suspected members of a white supremacist group training near the shores of Lake Talquin. The Anti-Defamation League tells WCTV it believes this is an authentic video of the group known as the “Patriot Front”.

Although the video was recorded in the fall of 2021, its release comes at a time when anti-Semitic acts and questions about Holocaust education are no longer in the headlines.

WCTV spoke Thursday with people with close ties to the Holocaust.

Barbara Goldstein, who heads the Holocaust Education Resource Council in Tallahassee, says she’s had a troubling few days. Between the video’s release in Tallahassee and a neo-Nazi group being staged near an Orlando-area mall over the weekend, Goldstein says it’s horrifying.

An investigation into the assault related to this protest in central Florida is ongoing.

Goldstein says it’s a wake-up call and a chance to reflect.

“What would you do if this happened right in front of you? Do you want to stop it or not stop it? said Goldstein.

The rally in Orlando also shocked Tallahassee resident Mark Friedemann, who shared his father’s incredible Holocaust survival story with WCTV in 2019.

“The swastika on a flag on a city street in Florida is a bit too much. It’s shocking and extremely unfortunate,” says Friedemann.

Closer to home, a video would show members of the Patriot Front Training near Lake Talquin. The ADL tells WCTV that the group is paranoid about confronting far-left groups.

The group split from a neo-Nazi group in 2017, but retained much of its ideology, according to the ADL.

The ADL says those workouts last fall, while disturbing, did not break the law.

It comes as a school district in Tennessee has made national headlines for banning “Maus,” an acclaimed graphic novel by a Holocaust survivor used for decades to teach about the Holocaust.

The district says the book was banned for its nudity and language. Goldstein says that’s a bad excuse.

“Reflect the truth, the facts, that happened throughout history,” she says. “Unfortunately, the truth is not comfortable in many ways.”

But Friedemann says the ban has a silver lining.

“The banning of this book actually created a wave of enthusiasm for this book,” says Friedemann.

Booksellers like Amazon are seeing an increase in sales of “Maus”.

If you want to learn about the Holocaust yourself, Midtown Reader is host a virtual curation at 7 p.m. Thursday with an author and grandson of a survivor.

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