Budapest chosen to host four-yearly WJC gathering to highlight rise of anti-Semitism and far-right groups in Europe.

Leaders of a far-right Hungarian party have accused Israelis of plotting to buy up the country amid protests by several hundred nationalists on the eve of a meeting of the World Jewish Congress, or WJC, in Budapest.

Senior figures from the opposition Jobbik party, the third biggest with 43 seats in the 386-member parliament, levelled charges on Sunday that Israeli President Shimon Peres had praised Jews for buying property in Hungary.

They said the WJC had decided to hold its four-yearly gathering in Budapest to shame the Hungarian people.

The WJC, which normally holds its worldwide assembly in Jerusalem, chose Hungary this time to highlight the rise of far-right groups and anti-Semitism in Europe. More than half a million Hungarian Jews were killed in the Holocaust.

"The Israeli conquerors, these investors, should look for another country in the world for themselves because Hungary is not for sale," Gabor Vona, Jobbik chairman, told the rally near the neo-Gothic parliament along the Danube River.

Marton Gyongyosi, a Jobbik member of parliament, told the crowd: "Our country has become subjugated to Zionism, it has become a target of colonisation while we, the indigenous people, can play only the role of extras."



The rally ended after almost two hours and the protesters dispersed without incident.



Michael Thaidigsmann, WJC spokesman, said: "We find it a worrying sign that these people express their anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli ideology in such a public way."

Viktor Orban, Hungary's conservative prime minister, who addressed the WJC assembly's opening session on Sunday evening, had ordered the rally to be banned, but a court on Friday ruled police had overstepped their authority in trying to block it.