editorial team to leave the paper two years later. In 1949 only Arno Rudert and Karl Gerold were left from the founding team. Gerold left SPD in the same year, to demonstrate his political independence. Research by the Rundschau in the 1960s revealed, among other things, initiated the Auschwitz trials in Germany. At the end of the 1960s, the Frankfurter Rundschau uncovered the so-called HS-30 scandal. The German government only procured the HS-30 armored personnel carrier for the Bundeswehr because bribes had been paid to several responsible persons and illegal payments had been made to the CDU. On 30 May 2007 the Rundschau changed its format to the award-winning smaller tabloid size. The paper was awarded the European Newspaper of the Year in the category of judges' special recognition by the European Newspaper Congress in 2011. In the 2013 elections the magazine was among the supporters of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). The 1993 circulation of the paper was 189,000 copies. In the first quarter of 2015, the newspaper boasted a circulation of around 70,000 copies. In 2019, the newspaper published an editorial titled "The Eternal Netanyahu" about Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu. The name evoked a Nazi Germany film titled The Eternal Jew. Ulf Poschardt, editor-in-chief of German newspaper Die Welt, tweeted a condemnation of the Frankfurter Rundschau, as did a top journalist for German newspaper Bild. The Frankfurter Rundschau claimed that the association was accidental. Restructuring In 2003, the paper had financial difficulties and was supported by a guarantee from the federal state of Hesse. In May 2004 the (DDVG), owned by the SPD, acquired 90 percent of the shares of the Druck- und Verlagshaus Frankfurt am Main (DuV), the publisher of the FR until then. The social democrats emphasized that they wanted to assure the future of one of the few left-liberal daily newspapers in Germany and asserted they would not exert influence on the articles. The social democrats also announced that they wanted to reduce their share to under 50 percent until 2006. In order to save the paper from insolvency, the DDVG soon drastically cut back expenditures. By means of dismissals and outsourcing, the number of employees shrank within the last three years from 1700 to 750. Amid speculation on DDVG's complaints about too friendly articles on the new left party Die Linke and its plan to sell the majority of its shares (see