The Royal Family are under the microscope even more than usual, as footage has surfaced showing the Queen giving a Nazi salute. This all sounds horrendous until you realise that she was six at the time, was playing around in the garden, and it happened a good six years before World War II started.

It’s not clear who leaked the video, taken from private family archives, but unsurprisingly the Palace is out for blood.

The Palace is likely to be looking at whether the process leading to its publication could have involved criminal activity.

It is also thought to be looking at whether copyright was breached.

A Palace spokesman said this to Sky News:

 It is disappointing that film, shot eight decades ago and apparently from Her Majesty’s personal family archive, has been obtained and exploited in this manner.”

It does seem pretty bizarre that someone with access to the ‘inner sanctum’ would give it to ‘The Sun’ newspaper, a.k.a. the trashiest rag in the UK. Sounds like someone has some serious beef with those Royals.

The Sun – which ran the story under the headline “Their Royal Heilnesses” – acknowledged in its editorial column that the images “do not reflect badly on our Queen, her late sister or mother in any way”.

In any case, the Palace is making it crystal clear that the Queen is not a closet Nazi:

The Queen is around six years of age at the time and entirely innocent of attaching any meaning to these gestures.

The Queen and her family’s service and dedication to the welfare of this nation during the war, and the 63 years the Queen has spent building relations between nations and peoples speaks for itself.”

Regardless, I’m sure there will be plenty of Royal-bashers who will jump on this and milk it for all it’s worth.

[source: Sky News]