Beck slammed for dead teen Hitler comparision

Leading US right-wing broadcaster Glenn Beck has been slammed by the Norwegian government for on-air comments he made comparing the teenage victims of the weekend’s massacre to the Hitler Youth.

In a radio show broadcast in the US overnight, former Fox News presenter and Tea Party poster-boy Glenn Beck said, "There was a shooting at a political camp, which sounds a little like, you know, the Hitler Youth or whatever. I mean, who does a camp for kids that's all about politics? Disturbing."

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A former press secretary to Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg slammed Beck's statements as a "new low", saying they were "ignorant" and "extremely hurtful".

Torbjorn Eriksen told the Telegraph that “young political activists have gathered at Utoya for over 60 years to learn about and be part of democracy, the very opposite of what the Hitler Youth was about.”

The Hitler Youth – or Hitler Jugend – was set up by Adolf Hitler in the 1920s to indoctrinate young Germans in Nazism.

The Labour Party youth camp on Utoya island was attended by 600 people.

Sixty-eight people died after self-confessed Norwegian "crusader" Anders Behring Breivik opened fire at the camp run by the youth wing if the ruling Labour party.

The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, a Washington-based campaign group, told the Telegraph the remark by Beck was "absolutely disgusting".

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