An Adelaide suburban councillor has been asked to apologise for posting an image of a swastika on social media, amid an acrimonious debate about security cameras that has now resulted in the council's mayor penning a letter to Elon Musk.
Salisbury councillor Severina Burner posted a photo, on her Facebook page, showing a young person contorting their body into the shape of the Nazi symbol.
The image is accompanied by the words, "Me when I'm asked to kneel and apologize for being right", with the word "right" superimposed on the word "white".
The post comes amid a deeply divisive debate within Salisbury council about its so-called Smart Cities initiative, with Ms Burner and fellow councillor Grace Bawden expressing criticism of the idea.
Salisbury Mayor Gillian Aldridge said the council held a special meeting last night in direct response to Ms Burner's Facebook post featuring an image of the swastika.
"Council condemns a post like this, we disassociate ourselves from it, because we've got a community that is objecting to it but also a large multicultural community which we're completely proud of," she told ABC Radio Adelaide's Stacey Lee and Nikolai Beilharz.
Ms Aldridge called upon Ms Burner to apologise for the post.
"We have asked for an apology, we think it's the right thing to do … [but] we have not received an apology of any kind," she said.
Chair of the Adelaide Holocaust Museum, Greg Adams, described the post as "very disappointing" and praised the council for setting "a good example of showing the appropriate response to online hate".
"Councillor Burner's post — she might have thought she was being edgy or a free thinker, but there's nothing smart or commendable about posting this sort of online hate and I think as mayor Aldridge said the residents of Salisbury council deserve a lot better than that," he said.
"It's a fairly well-documented phenomenon that anti-Semitism is on the rise not just in Australia but across the world at the moment.
"There's no place for anti-Semitism in our society, let alone in public life, so to see a public figure like Councillor Burner posting this sort of online hate and bigotry – we condemn it in the strongest terms possible and we would hope that she would issue some sort of public apology or retraction.
"She didn't show up to the meeting last night, which is disappointing that she would sort of post a hit and run so to speak, but we would like to see some sort of response from her."
When contacted by ABC News and ABC Radio Adelaide, Ms Burner declined to comment.
But she has responded on Facebook, writing that, to those "accusing me of being a Nazi, J'accuse!" — a reference to the so-called Dreyfus affair and the famous open letter written by 19th century novelist Emile Zola in defence of Alfred Dreyfus, a French army officer of Jewish background who was falsely imprisoned and subjected to far-right, anti-Semitic smears.
"It is not I banning the public from civic participation," Ms Burner wrote.
"It is not I violating the right or residents to attend council meetings without breaching their privacy. It is not I restricting who can attend a council facility paid for by residents."
The rancour over the swastika post comes amid ongoing internal friction over the City of Salisbury's Smart Cities initiative.
Proponents say the plan, which involves security cameras, will boost public safety, while critics have expressed concern about facial recognition technology.
The council's mayor today said that, during the course of one debate on Smart Cities at a previous council meeting, claims had been made about brain chips, Elon Musk and machines with human brains, one of which was said to have "killed nine people".
"Of course it wasn't true that a robot had killed people with a chip in its brain," Ms Aldridge said.
But Ms Aldridge said the idea had taken such strong hold among some on council that she had written to Mr Musk asking him to address the council to dispel the idea.
"We've asked him whether he would like to do a Zoom meeting … [and] whether he's interested in talking to us," she said.
"He seems like a reasonable guy, I'm sure he wouldn't want anything about anything he's doing to be misconstrued."
In another statement on Facebook, Ms Burner vehemently rejected any suggestion she had made such claims, but accused the council of trying to insinuate that she had.
"No-one has ever made any such claims that Elon Musk 'has inserted or is in the process of inserting &/or attaching to residents' brains [brain chips] to control the community," she said.
