An auction of Nazi memorabilia, including Adolf Hitler's top hat, has raked in hundreds of thousands of euros in Munich, despite condemnation of the auction by a number of groups.
The hammer fell on the Nazi leader's top hat at €50,000, according to the Hermann Historica auction house website, while items of clothing belonging to his partner Eva Braun each sold for thousands.
One buyer paid €130,000 for a silver-plated copy of Hitler's antisemitic political manifesto Mein Kampf that once belonged to senior Nazi Hermann Goering, emblazoned with an eagle and the party's swastika emblem.
Other lots of clothing and personal belongings from notorious World War II Nazi leaders like Heinrich Himmler and Rudolf Hess also packed the catalogue pages.
Before the auction the chairman of the European Jewish Association, Rabbi Menachem Margolin, said: "We believe the sale of such memorabilia has little intrinsic historical value but instead will be bought by those who glorify and seek to justify the actions of the greatest evil to affect Europe.
Gideon Falter, Executive Chairman of UK-based organisation Campaign Against Antisemitism, said it is "absolutely wrong" that people are trading in Nazi items "as though they are items of memorabilia".
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Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland he said the decision to sell the items represents "greed by the people who own these items".
"It shows a complete lack of understanding and compassion for the victims of the Holocaust," Mr Falter said.
"The bidders who will be attracted by something like this are people who glorify and worship and idolise people like Adolf Hitler.
"These are not people who are engaged in trying to protect the memory of the victims of the Nazis or trying ot raise awareness about the horrors of what they committed," he added.
Many of the items belonging to top Nazi leaders were seized by US soldiers in the final days of World War II.
The dresses belonging to Braun, Hitler's long-term companion who was briefly his wife before their death, were found among 40 trunks seized by the US military in May 1945 in Salzburg in Austria.
