Italy: Israeli Embassy attack in Rome foiled by Italian authorities

Ynet News reports:

Two of the people who planned to carry out
an attack on the Israeli Embassy in Rome

Arrest warrants were issued for six people affiliated with ISIS on Thursday evening, four of which planned to attack the Israeli Embassy in Rome and the Vatican.

Milan prosecutor Maurizio Romanelli told reporters that investigators intercepted communications from within ISIS held territory ordering attacks in Italy, "with particular attention to the city of Rome" and focusing on the Holy Year pilgrimage now underway.

He said the messages promoting lone-wolf attacks were "very strong, very serious and very efficient," indicating that ISIS's current policy is to push for attacks in locations where foreign fighters are residing "as the best way of creating terror within Western countries."

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Germany: Left-wing politician called a Mossad agent for speaking out against antisemitism

On Saturday, thousands of people marched in Hannover against a proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) deal.

BZ Berlin reports that Diether Dehm, MP for the Left Party, posted about the demo on his Facebook, adding "We'll see what the press gives us, and whether the Mossad-Dickwurz would call it a 'Nazi demo' again."

Dickwurz (mangold) is a reference to the environmentalist politician Jutta Ditfurth. 

It is a play on words for "dick" (fat) and "wurz" (wutz = pig).  Dehm is calling Ditfurth a fat pig who collaborate with the Mossad (ie, the Jews)

The meaning is clear, though Dehm can claim that he said no such thing.

Ditfurth is an activist against antisemitism on the left-wing. She recently spoke out against antisemitic slogans on the May 1st parade, and for her efforts was met with a barrage of criticism from left-wing activists.

Sweden: Green Party politician invites antisemitic Saudi cleric, says "everyone loves him"

Via The Local:

A Green Party politician in Malmö has taken a break from politics after it emerged that he had invited a notorious Islamist to speak in Malmö.

The junior coalition partners recent woes continued when newspaper Sydsvenskan revealed that Kamal al-Rifai had asked a well-known Saudi Salafist, Salman al-Ouda, to give a speech in Sweden’s third largest city.

Al-Rifai, an active party member in Burlöv and a Syrian Association board member, previously told Sydsvenskan he admired the 60-year-old al-Ouda, who has renounced his earlier support for violent jihadism. "Everyone loves him," said al-Rifai, who has invited al-Ouda to speak in Malmö's central Folkets Park this Saturday.

But al-Ouda remains faithful to views that are deeply patriarchal and conservative, and has expressed an array of anti-Semitic view, the newspaper reports. 

The ADL has more on some of al-Ouda's recent antisemitic views:

Holocaust denial, the blood libel and other vicious anti-Semitism marked last week’s episode of the weekly show Milad airing on multiple Arab satellite channels.

During the program, a weekly discussion with Dr. Salman al-Ouda, a prominent Saudi scholar and the Assistant Secretary General of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, al-Ouda promoted the Arabic language translation of the Babylonian Talmud to support his anti-Semitic diatribe.

In one segment of the episode, al-Ouda said: “The Jews believe that they have the right to kill anyone who doesn’t believe in their religion — it’s stated in the Talmud.” He then told a story about a doctor who was asked by Jews to provide them with human blood to make pies. That story was followed by another description of Jews abducting children in Damascus in order to use their blood during Easter.

Al-Ouda then showed a copy of the newly released Arabic translation of the Talmud published by the Middle East Studies Center (MESC), a Jordan-based think tank. “The people who translated this book must be thanked,” he said. “…they gave us a weapon to confront our enemies, to expose the mentality of the Jews, to learn how they think and expose their scandals. The Jews were very upset with this translation and fought against it.”

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UK: Former London Mayor claims Hitler was a Zionist, says accusation of antisemitism are result of 'Israel Lobby' smear campaign

Via Sky News:

Ken Livingstone has been suspended by Labour for "bringing the party into disrepute" after saying Hitler supported Zionism.

Mr Livingstone made his comments when he defended suspended Labour MP Naz Shah over social media comments she posted suggesting Israel should be relocated to the US and claiming everything Hitler did was legal.

He said Ms Shah's Facebook posts were not "anti-Semitic" and he claimed there was a "well-orchestrated campaign by the Israel lobby to smear anybody who criticised Israeli policy as anti-Semitic".

(...)

In his interview with the BBC on Thursday morning, Mr Livingstone said: "Let's remember when Hitler won his election in 1932 his policy then was that Jews should be moved to Israel. He was supporting Zionism.

"This is before he went mad and ended up killing 6m Jews."

He said that in all his time as a Labour member he had never heard anyone say anything anti-Semitic and suggested the "Israel lobby" had orchestrated a campaign to smear people.

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Sweden: Nazi flag appears outside town hall on Hitler's birthday

Via RT (h/t IdoDaniel):

Residents of Vetlanda, a small Swedish town of 13,050 people, woke up to see a Nazi flag flying outside the town hall on Wednesday morning. The swastika banner is thought to have been a silent homage to Adolf Hitler, born on that day in 1889.

The flag was spotted by a town hall employee and was quickly taken down by an on-call caretaker, with the incident classed as "incitement to racial hatred," Swedish SVT television reported.

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France: Antisemitic graffiti targets Paris Rabbi

Via NRG (h/t CFCA):

Rabbi Moshe Sabag, the rabbi of the Great Synagogue of Paris found antisemitic graffiti on his elevator.  According to Rabbi Sabag the phrase was used by the Nazis and means "Jewish trash".


Rabbi Sabag posted the pictures on Facebook so the community would be aware, but does not think this is a serious incident that deserves any more attention. 

Rabbi Sabag assumes it's a teenage 'prank' and says that today the Muslims use Nazi slogans against Jews.

Germany: Holocaust memorial stolen from school

 
Via Jüdische Allgemeine, CFCA:

Two memorial plaques were stolen fron the Hildegard-Wegscheider school in Berlin.

The plaques commemorate the Jewish students who were expelled from the school under the Nazi regime.

UK: Posters at Scottish universities claim Jews invented the Holocaust for financial gain

Via Campaign Against Antisemitism:

Posters have been found at Edinburgh and Glasgow universities claiming that the Holocaust was a “robbery” and a “fraud” used by Jews to create a “Holocaust industry”. According to this line of thinking, the Holocaust was greatly exaggerated or entirely fabricated by Jews so that they could make financial gains, for example from war reparations. 

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Austria: Disappointed Mattersburg fans blast their 'Jew' club

Via Kurier (h/t Honestly Concerned):

Several Mattersburg fans shouted antisemitic slogans during a game in which their team lost 0-9 to Austria Wien.

Shouts included "Jew, Jew, Jew" and "Crappy Jew club".

Ireland: British Labour suspend member for saying Holocaust is ‘a useful political tool’

Meanwhile, McAuliffe doubles down on his claims and purports that the 'respectable media' did not touch his story.  "These stories remain confined to media outlets affiliated with or based in Israel", by which he means 'Jewish News', the British Jewish site that broke the story.


McAuliffe is convinced that he cannot be an antisemite, because he has nothing against Jews.  He just hates the evil Zionist ones.  Local Jews who complain about him are obviously Israeli stooges.

Source: Facebook

Via Jewish News:

Labour has suspended a party member who described the Holocaust as “a useful political tool” of Israel to “establish a financial racket”.

John McAuliffe is the latest in a string of party members to have faced similar action in recent weeks.

Dublin-based McAuliffe, who is understood to have been an international member of the UK party, wrote ton Facebook: “The Holocaust has been the most useful political tool of the Zionist government in Israel to establish a financial racket in the West, whereby Israel receives an unlimited sum for the duration of its existence.

“The large level of poverty in Israel among Holocaust survivors shows they don’t care about the emotional impact they are trying to generate. It is about money and military technology. This further paints a clearer picture of the divide between Zionism and Judaism, and their incompatibility.”

His Facebook profile describes him as a “foreign affairs heavyweight” and columnist at Digital Journal and the Cambridge Globalist.

A Labour spokesperson said: “John McAuliffe has been suspended from the Labour Party pending an investigation.” 

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French chief rabbi: Paris ‘ignored Jewish ties to Jerusalem’ in UNESCO vote

Via Times of Israel:

In an unusual commentary on his country’s foreign policy, the chief rabbi of France spoke out against its vote at the United Nations on a resolution that he said ignored Jewish ties to Jerusalem.

In a statement Thursday, Rabbi Haim Korsia expressed his “strong disapproval” of the April 16 resolution by UNESCO, the Paris-based UN organization dealing with education, culture and heritage, which refers to the Temple Mount area solely as Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al Sharif, except for two references to the Western Wall plaza that were put in parentheses.

The broad-ranging resolution, which France’s mission to UNESCO supported in a vote, condemns Israeli actions in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, but focuses in large part on Israeli actions with regard to the Temple Mount and Western Wall plaza.

UNESCO has passed similar resolutions in the past, also with French support but the April 16 resolutions provoked particularly strong-worded condemnations from French Jewish groups, with Roger Cukierman, president of the CRIF umbrella group of French Jewish communities, calling the French vote in favor of it “scandalous.”

Korsia wrote that French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault told him France did not mean to downplay Judaism’s ties to Jerusalem with the vote.
France, Russia and China were among the 33 countries the voted in favor, along with Sweden and Spain. Seventeen countries abstained while six voted against, including the United States, Estonia, Germany, Lithuania, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

Judaism, Christianity and Islam all consider the Temple Mount to be a holy site. The text approved also referred to the plaza area by the Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest prayer site, as al-Buraq Plaza — language that the Simon Wiesenthal Center alleges was lifted from Hamas literature.

“On the eve of Passover, a holiday when Jewish pilgrims would ascend to the Temple in Jerusalem, the chief rabbi of France reaffirms the indestructible ties that unite the Jewish people and Jerusalem and urges UNESCO executive council to reconsider their position as soon as possible,” Korsia’s office wrote in the statement.

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France: ‘Israel boycott halted security deal that could have foiled Paris attacks’

The allegations, if verified, seem to indicate that French officials could be operating a BDS policy, though in public the P.M. Manuel Valls has come out very strongly against the boycott of Israel.

The Times of Israel reports:

An alleged boycott of Israeli technology may have prevented an airport security deal offered to France after the deadly Charlie Hebdo and Hyper Cacher attacks last January, and which could possibly have thwarted the subsequent Islamic State terror attacks in Paris in November and Belgium several months later.

According to an Israeli security source who spoke to Fox News on Monday, an Israeli security company offered terrorist-tracking software to the Directorate-General for Internal Security, France’s main intelligence agency — software that could have helped flag the deadly IS terror cell that perpetrated the attacks in Paris late last year and those in Belgium last month — but was rebuffed allegedly after an official made clear that Israeli technology could not be purchased.  

The agency did not officially state a reason for the rejection.

The software, according to the Fox News report, could find and match up intelligence reports from a number of different databases, both national and international. The tool could have helped counter-terror agents track suspects in real time.

“French authorities liked it, but the official came back and said there was a higher-level instruction not to buy Israeli technology,” the Israeli counter-terror specialist told FoxNews.com. “The discussion just stopped.”  

The source did not name the company behind the software or go into further detail about the technology but indicated it was made available to the US and other countries with which Israel enjoys good relations.

“Government agencies struggling to foil terror attacks need access to technologies that allow them to connect their data fragments, making it possible to handle daily data challenges,” the source added. “With this system, all data can then be easily navigated, processed and represented by employing a set of powerful analytic tools and unique algorithms.”

The source said he believes the software could have given French and European authorities an advantage in flagging and tracking the Islamic State suspects and could have possibly thwarted the attacks that killed 130 in Paris and over 30 in Belgium. Both assaults have been linked to the same Islamic State terror squad.

The last surviving member of the Paris branch of the terror cell, Salah Abdeslam, who was arrested in Brussels last month after a four-month manhunt — setting off the airport and subway attacks in the Belgian capital — is set to be extradited to France after a court appearance. [...]

Following the November Paris attacks, demand for Israeli security technology surged, according to a report in Haaretz in November.

A manager for Israeli company BriefCam — whose technology lets users view security footage quickly to detect suspicious activity — told Haaretz he received urgent orders from Belgium, Italy and Germany, after the attacks.

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Netherlands: Feyenoord fans celebrate victory with "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas" chant

Via CFCA:

Feyenoord won the Dutch cup in a victory over Utrecht.

A small group of fans celebrated by making the Nazi salute and chanting "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas" (clip here)

German Pastor declares himself an anti-Semite

Benjamin Weinthal writes @ Jerusalem Post: 

A pastor for the Lutheran Church in Bremen, Germany who boasted that he is an anti-Semite has prompted the Simon Wiesenthal Center to call for his dismissal.

The pastor, Volker Keller, who is a member of the Bremen city government council responsible for the integration of Muslims for the northern German city, sent an email to this Jerusalem Post correspondent, announcing his embrace of anti-Semitism.

He wrote: “Yesterday evening the anti-Semite Arn Strohmeyer delivered a lecture to me…Best wishes to Israel, Yours truly, Volker Keller, Antisemite.”

The trigger for Keller’s email appears to be a series of Jerusalem Post exposes on Strohmeyer’s alleged modern anti-Semitic views and the city of Bremen’s public funding for, according to critics, hate-mongering events in the Citizens’ House Weserterrassen targeting the Jewish state.

Volker Keller refused to answer multiple Post queries. Renke Brahms, a spokesman for the Bremen Protestant Church, wrote to the Post by email that the church ”distances itself from every form of anti-Semitism and clearly supports the existence of Israel… Pastor Keller sent a ‘sarcastic email’ and wanted to express that he is not an anti-Semite and feels wrongly defamed. The choice of this form was an extraordinary misunderstanding and is from our perspective, as well as Mr. Keller’s, a completely inappropriate reaction. We have made this clear to Mr. Keller that in his function he is not allowed to write such emails.”

It is unclear why Keller feels defamed. Keller,who used his business church email to send his embrace of Jew-hatred note, co-founded an NGO called “Nord-Bremer Citizens against War.”   [...]

Because of Keller’s role in the city administration, the anti-Semitism row has also raised eyebrows. Bremen is a main hub for anti-Israel hatred in Germany and a leader in boycott actions against Jewish products. Andre Städler, a spokesman for Bremen’s Mayor Carsten Sieling, did not immediately respond to a Post query.

Last year, Schneider and the German Protestant establishment grappled with the classic religious "anti-Semitism of the church’ founder Martin Luther."  The 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation will take place in 2017.

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UK: Labour MP steps down as private secretary after Facebook posts about Israel and Jews

According to Labour MP Naz Shah, Jews the cause for all problems in the Middle East and have more rights to the lands colonized by Europeans in the Americas than they do to their own homeland in the Land of Israel.

Photo: Ynet

Via Jewish Chronicle:

Labour MP Naz Shah has stepped down as private secretary to Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell after a series of social media posts she made about Jews and Israel were revealed.

The Bradford West MP, who defeated George Galloway in last year’s general election, backed the spending of “transportation costs” to move Israelis out of the Middle East.

In a statement Ms Shah said: "I deeply regret the hurt I have caused by comments made on social media before I was elected as an MP.

"I made these posts at the height of the Gaza conflict in 2014, when emotions were running high around the Middle East conflict. But that is no excuse for the offence I have given, for which I unreservedly apologise.

"In recognition of that offence, I have stepped down from my role as PPS to the shadow chancellor John McDonnell.

"I will be seeking to expand my existing engagement and dialogue with Jewish community organisations and will be stepping up my efforts to combat all forms of racism, including antisemitism."

The Guido Fawkes website revealed Ms Shah had shared a highly offensive graphic arguing in favour of the inflammatory “transportation” policy two years ago, during the summer before her election.

The JC also revealed that in August 2014, Ms Shah also posted a tweet with a link to a blog which claimed Zionism had been used to "groom" Jews to "exert political influence at the highest levels of public office".

In July 2014, at the height of the Gaza conflict, Ms Shah posted a link on Facebook to a newspaper poll asking whether Israel had committed war crimes.

She wrote: "The Jews are rallying to the poll." She then called on people to vote "yes".

In a post in September that year she appeared to liken Israel’s policies to those of Hitler.

Ms Shah claimed her views on Israel have moderated over the last two years.

In a statement issued by Labour, she said: "This post from two years ago was made before I was an MP, does not reflect my views and I apologise for any offence it has caused."

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Germany: Jewish cemetery desecrated

Via CFCA:

Lübeck - Several tombstones of the local Jewish cemetery have been knocked over. Also a window of the local synagogue was found broken.

France: Marine Le Pen has a plan to court Jewish voters

Politico reports:

Marine Le Pen has set her sights on a novel potential group of backers as she tries to build support for a presidential bid next year: France’s Jewish voters.

Her anti-EU National Front party has given arms-length blessing to the launch of a nonprofit group that aims to drum up support among France’s 500,000-strong Jewish minority and counter criticism from mainstream religious groups.

Le Pen locked horns last year with the head of France’s main Jewish umbrella group, the CRIF. Its president, Roger Cukierman, had warned that French Jews would leave the country en masse if the National Front ever came to power, the same response if Islamic religious laws were ever imposed on the population.

That’s the sort of criticism that the nonprofit group, whose name is to be announced within coming days, aims to counter, the group’s founder told POLITICO.

“In France’s Jewish community there are lots of people who disagree with the views of the CRIF and don’t want to follow them like sheep,” said Michel Thooris, a police union member who advised Le Pen on security matters during France’s 2012 presidential election and remains a party member. “We want to give them an alternative voice.”

The National Front, which has taken to targeting specific voter groups despite its public opposition to defining ethnic or religious minorities, won’t be funding the group directly. It will be officially launched and named within coming days and will “not exert pressure” on Le Pen, added Thooris, who Le Monde reported was linked to Israeli far-right groups.

However, two senior National Front officials said they supported the initiative. Vice President Louis Aliot told Europe 1 Le Lab this week that it was important to offer an alternative narrative about his party to French Jews. 

“The idea is to fight the dictatorship and constant defamation of the CRIF against the National Front,” Aliot said. “This collective will not make pronouncements on foreign policy or religious issues like the CRIF does. It’s there to fight against people who try to smear the Front.”

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Note: Louis Alliot's maternal grand-father was Jewish.  Since 2009, Marine Le Pen has been in a relationship with Louis Aliot,

UK: Formula One chief praises Hitler

Via Times of Israel:

In a single interview this week, Formula One chief executive Bernie Ecclestone managed to praise Adolf Hitler, offend women, and claim that Vladimir Putin should be in charge of Europe.

Speaking at a conference in London on Tuesday with F1’s non-executive director Martin Sorrell, Ecclestone declared that comments he had made in praise of Adolf Hitler’s leadership methods in a 2009 interview were taken out of context, but reiterated that the Nazi leader “got the job done.”

In the 2009 interview he had said: “In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done.”

At the time, a spokesman for British Jewry’s Board of Deputies said: “Mr Ecclestone’s comments regarding Hitler, female, black and Jewish racing drivers are quite bizarre. He says, ‘Politics are not for me’ and we are inclined to agree.”

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Sweden: "This is not bullying, this is a hate crime that has been trivialized so many times"

Via Algemeiner:

Hernroth-Rothstein’s remarks came on the heels of a Facebook post she uploaded this week, bemoaning the antisemtism suffered by one her two young boys. It reads:

    So I’m feeling tired. Really tired and sad. When my son came home today to tell me that a classmate had said “someone should throw that f—–g Jew in an oven and burn him”, he wasn’t angry, bur rather resigned. It’s not the first time, right? Nor will it be the last.

    I work really hard every day to give my children a strong Jewish identity here, in the Galut [Diaspora]. I am not here because I want to but because right now, I have to, and those who know me know that I have made many difficult decisions and personal sacrifices in order to assure that my family’s Jewish lineage lives on and that we stay observant despite the hostile surroundings.

    I am a single mother raising Jewish boys and I am so very tired. I am tired because every time this happens, every time someone calls my child a “dirty Jew” or makes them feel like less than human because of who they are and what they are it takes something from them and from the strength and values I am working so hard to instill in them.

    How do I do this? How do I live in a remote place and provide my children with Jewish education, Jewish pride and faith and most importantly – how do I counteract this society that keeps telling them to be less (and ultimately nothing) of what they are. Less Jewish, less annoying, less in the way of the “ordinary” world.

    My son is resigned and he is sad and that makes me sad and tired, too. As a parent, we sacrifice so that our children may reap the rewards. We do so they won’t have to, we hurt so they may heal. But tonight as I hang up the phone with the principal, the parents, the teachers and the counselor I wonder if I may be losing the fight and getting lost on my way from mitzrayim [Egypt].

    Tomorrow there will be meetings, a lot of nodding and assurances that “bullying” is unacceptable in a Swedish school. However, this is not bullying, this is a hate crime that has been trivialized so many times that it starts to sound like boyish banter. Nothing will come of these meetings, and I know this because I have been to so many of them before. They will say the right words and commit the wrong acts and then it is up to us to stay standing.

    I pray we get angry soon. But for now, I’m just really really tired.

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Why is Ireland so hostile to Israel? Why do the Irish support BDS? What Is It about Israel that upsets them?

Alex Grobman, Ph.D., writes @ The Jewish Voice and Opinion

During her formative years, Israel received significant support in Ireland. Having experienced religious persecution themselves, the Irish identified with Jews. Unfortunately, this is no longer the case, according to Professor James Bowen of the National University of Ireland at Cork.

Bowen, who serves as national chairman of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC), says the initial sympathy expressed towards Israel disappeared when the Irish learned how the Arabs were “dispossessed” of their land in 1948 and then experienced the “horrors of the post-1967 occupation.”  Founded on November 29, 2001, the IPSC has no policy regarding the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Rather, according to Bowen, it believes the decision to turn the area into two states, a federated state, or a single state should be made by the Palestinians and Israelis, who, the group says, have a legitimate interest in the outcome.

Promoting BDS

However, IPSC does not see itself as merely an interested party trying to support both sides. The group and its national chairman have taken a prominent role in promoting the Boycott-Divestment-and-Sanction (BDS) movement in Ireland against Israel. In fact, Irish academics have been particularly adamant in their efforts to have Israeli academic institutions boycotted.

In a letter to the Irish Times dated September 16, 2006, 61 Irish professors signed a petition urging academic institutions throughout the world to adopt a policy of boycotting Israeli institutions of higher education.

The date was no coincidence. The Irish professors, calling themselves Academics for Justice, published their letter on the anniversary of the 1982 massacre in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Beirut, Lebanon. In that incident, thousands of Arab civilians, mostly Lebanese Shiites and Palestinians, were killed by a militia controlled by the Philange, a predominantly Christian-Lebanese party. The Philange claimed the attack on Sabra and Shatila was retaliation for the assassination of then-newly elected Lebanese-Christian president Bachir Gemayel. Although Israeli soldiers did not participate in the massacre, the IDF, which was already in the area, did nothing to stop it.

Academics for Justice have proclaimed September 16 as Ireland’s “Boycott Israel” day. [...]

More Irish Demonizing of Israel
But teachers are not the only segment of society promoting BDS against Israel in Ireland, where a de facto cultural boycott of the Jewish state has been in effect for years. A classified Israeli Foreign Ministry report revealed in December 2011 that, for more than a decade, no Israel dance or theatrical company, musician, or filmmaker had been invited to Ireland. Thirty-four Irish artists—one-fifth of all Irish performers receiving public funds—signed a petition calling for a cultural boycott against Israel. Irish artists and performers interested in maintaining relations with Israel are subjected to verbal and written attacks.

The Irish press regularly demonizes Israel and tirades against the Jewish state’s leaders are published in the name of “human rights.”

Trócaire, the overseas development agency of the Catholic Church of Ireland, which is funded by the Irish government through Irish Aid, is also anti-Israel. Although Irish Aid’s mandate is to “promote coherence across the full range of Irish government policies on issues such as agriculture, trade, the environment, and fiscal matters,” Trócaire has assumed a major role in fostering the demonization of Israel. In January 2013, for example, Trócaire produced a series of biased “educational resource guides” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that drew strong criticism from Israelis and some Irish commentators.

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Moldova: Jewish cemetery desecrated

Via CFCA:

A dozen tombstones and memorials were vandalized in the Jewish cemetery in Soroca.

Germany: Calls to ban overtly ‘anti-Semitic’ left-wing May Day protests

Breitbart reports (H/T Elder of Ziyon)

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) wants to see a ban on a left wing protest in Berlin they say is overtly anti-Semitic.

May 1st is one of the biggest days of the year for those on the left side of the political spectrum. Known as International Worker’s Day, the event usually revolves around leftists getting together to march in cities all over Europe and North America.

Berlin is no different, and plans are already under way for a protest to be organized.

The anti-mass migration party AfD has said that the protesters  message has changed in recent years. They say that the tone of the protests has become increasingly anti-Semitic and that those types of attitudes should not be permitted on the streets of the German capital. The party has called for a ban to the protest entirely, reports Junge Freiheit.

Berlin AfD Deputy Chairman Hans-Joachim Berg said that if the openly anti-Semitic slogans and attitudes of radical left organizations are allowed to march in the May 1st demonstration then, “the Senate proves that its commitments to Israel are worthless.”

Even those on the left are engaging in a new debate about the role of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic members of their movements. German politician and former national chairman of the Green party Jutta Ditfurth has become the centre of resistance to anti-semitism on the Berlin left.

The politician who campaigns for ecological issues said, “we have never experienced in a left wing alliance such anti-Semitic incitement and discussion.”

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France: A locksmith was beaten because assailants thought he was Jewish

Le Parisien has the story (in French).

Three anti-Semitic 15-year-olds assumed that a locksmith was Jewish because he had advertised his company on the Jewish community radio station Radio J. They set a trap and beat the "Jew" up.

The assailants have now been placed under judicial control by the prosecutor of Meaux (Seine-et-Marne).

In late November, the three teenagers heard on the Jewish radio the advertisement  for a locksmith located at the eleventh arrondissement of Paris whose name sounded Jewish. They contacted the firm and made an appointment for the fitting of a security door at a bogus address in Bussy-Saint-Georges (Seine-et-Marne). Their faces hidden and armed with a knife and pepper spray, they kicked and punched an employee sent by the firm.  They made death threats and verbally abused him:  "Give us your money, you dirty Jew". They stole his smartphone, a valuable watch and some papers.

Arrested on Tuesday in their family homes, the three youngsters denied the facts.   The police investigators come across antisemitic messages such as "I hate the Jews" on the phone of one of the youngsters.  The victim was able to identify him as he had seen his face during the attack.

One wonders why three young anti-Semites listen to a Jewish radio.

Germany: Printers at Universities Mysteriously Churn Out Anti-Semitic Fliers

Via New York Times:

Printers at several universities across Germany produced anti-Semitic leaflets on or before Hitler’s birthday this week, after hackers appeared to break into their computer systems, according to university officials.

Universities in Hamburg, Lüneburg and Tübingen confirmed that printers connected to their computer networks had suddenly started churning out the leaflets, most of them on Wednesday, the anniversary of Hitler’s birth in Braunau, Austria, in 1889.

At least six other universities in Germany reported similar episodes, according to the German news agency DPA.

The leaflet produced at the University of Hamburg carried the slogan “Europe, awake!” and alluded to the mass migration that brought more than one million people, many from the Middle East, to the Continent last year. “Europe is being flooded by enemy strangers,” it read, in part.

Without naming Hitler, the leaflet referred to “the words of a former European führer” who blamed the Jews for bringing non-Europeans to the Rhineland.

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Denmark: US Army captain helped foil Danish Jewish school bombing

 Arutz Sheva reports:

A US Army captain in Iraq helped crack a plot to bomb a Danish school after gleaning crucial details from documents recovered from extremists, the Pentagon said Wednesday.

Army Captain Bradley Grimm, who is based at Al-Asad airbase in Iraq's Anbar province, had "helped develop a system to speed the flow of intelligence from here on the ground to various national capitals," Baghdad-based spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said.

Grimm gleaned "actionable intelligence" from "captured documents" belonging to foreign fighters with ties to Denmark, Warren said.

"Brad's work likely saved the lives of Danish citizens," Warren said, without providing additional details of the plot itself. However, the announcement is likely in connection with the planned bombing of two schools - one of them a Jewish school.

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UK: Anti-Zionist student leader elected as the new president of NUS

Via Jewish Chronicle:

Malia Bouattia has been elected as the new president of National Union of Students.

The election took place in Brighton at NUS national conference on Wednesday.

Ms Bouattia has faced criticism from Jewish students over her controversial remarks about Zionists.

Ms Bouattia won the election on the first round of voting with 372 votes, beating outgoing president Megan Dunn who had 328 votes. Candidate Adil Waraich won nine votes and Re-open Nominations (RON) won 22.

The Union of Jewish Students said: "Antisemitism has been something of a buzzword at NUS Conference 2016 and in the student movement this year. This looks set to continue, especially in light of the questions posed by 57 J-Soc Presidents to Malia Bouattia ahead of the presidential election. Jewish students have not yet received adequate answers from Malia on these concerns and UJS will continue to support their demands for answers over the next year.

"There is now a choice to be made. Jewish students need to decide whether NUS has gone too far for them to want to be involved, or whether now is the time to step up the fight from within. UJS will be consulting Jewish students in the near future and will continue to ensure that their interests are best represented."

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Writing in the Guardian, Bouattia denies she's antisemitic:

I am deeply concerned at accusations of antisemitism. In an open letter last week in response to concerns raised about my candidacy by Jewish students, I sought to allay their fears, and answered all points put to me honestly.

I want to be clear, again, that for me to take issue with Zionist politics is in no way me taking issue with being Jewish. In fact, Zionist politics are held by people from a variety of different backgrounds and faiths. For me it has been, and will always be, a political argument, not one of faith or ethnic identity. Zionism, religion and ethnicity must not be seen as one and the same. If the language I have used in the past has been interpreted any other way then let me make this clear – it was never my intention, although my political ideologies and beliefs remain unchanged.

There is no place for antisemitism in the student movement, or in society. If any of my previous discourse has been interpreted otherwise, such as comments I once made about Zionism within the media, I will revise it to ensure there is no room for confusion. I was being critical of media outlets that unquestioningly support Israel’s actions and maltreatment of Palestinians, I was not talking about the media as a whole, or repeating despicable antisemitic prejudice. The first thing I did on being elected was to hold a meeting with the Union of Jewish Students, and these meetings are set to continue.

Here are some of the statements which were 'misinterpreted', according to  Bouattia:

"Mainstream Zionist-led media outlets - because once again we're dealing with the population of the global south - resistance is presented as an act of terrorism, but instead of us remembering that this has always been the case thoughout struggles against white supremacy, it's become an accepted discourse amongst too many."

Bouattia thinks Jews are colonialists and white supremacists.  She believes the dichotomy of Jews as the rich, powerful White vs. Palestinians as the poor, powerless Black.  She believes Jews control the media.  She supports violent resistance against Jews.


Bouattia's basic attitude is antisemitic.

But it's much easier to claim she's been 'misunderstood' than deal with the problem.

Belgian schools are being turned into “Jew-free” zones - another antisemitic incident

The JTA reports:

The mother of a Jewish boy who said she took her son out of a Brussels public school because of anti-Semitic bullying filed a police complaint against the school’s management for alleged incitement to discrimination.

The complaint, first reported Tuesday by the RTBF broadcaster, concerns the school’s alleged inaction on reported abuse that, according to the pupil, went on earlier this year at a high school in Uccle, an affluent neighborhood. The mother said the bullying at the Athénée Royal Uccle 2 school forced her to enroll her son at a Jewish school last month.  The boy was identified only as Samuel (not his real name) and his mother as Helene.

According to the report, the abuse began after Samuel had a falling out with his former best friend, who was the only person at the school whom Samuel had told that he was Jewish. The friend told the rest of the class Samuel was Jewish and on Feb. 5, a classmate allegedly told Samuel “get lost, dirty Jew.” A fistfight ensued,  ending without serious injury, according to Helene, who said the school treated the incident as a common brawl rather than racist harassment.

Over the following weeks, other pupils threatened Samuel and made anti-Semitic statements at him “two, three times each week,” said Helene, who added she specifically enrolled her son at a public school so that he would not have a parochial worldview that she feared would develop at a Jewish school.  In one incident, a pupil reportedly told Samuel: “If you’re in favor of Israel we’ll break your skull.”

 When Helene came to pick up Samuel from school on March 22 following terrorist attacks that killed 32 people that day in Brussels, she heard a pupil declare inside the school that the attacks were Israel’s fault, adding “Allah hu akbar,” an Arab-language religious expression which means “Allah is the greatest.” [1] [...]


Joel Rubinfeld, the president of the Belgian League Against Anti-Semitism, or LBCA, who studied the case, said the school’s actions meant that “the victim had to go away, the perpetrators – they got to stay.” He also noted the affluence of the Uccle neighborhood and that its schools have a better reputation than heavily Muslim schools in central Brussels, where few Jews would now enroll their children. 

“There is no sanctuary for Jews in the public education system,” Rubinfeld said.

Samuel’s case is one of several recent incidents, including the online shaming last year by classmates of a pro-Israel high school student who also left the public education system for a Jewish school. These cases, Rubinfeld said last year, are turning Belgian schools into “Jew-free” zones.

[1]  The RTBF reports this differently.  The mother saw groups of youngsters and heard them reacting to the terrorist attacks: "It's the Jews' fault.  It's Israel's fault.  They should all be killed. Allah hu akbar". ("C’est la faute aux Juifs, à Israël, faut tous les buter! Allahou Akbar!')

Hungary: One third of Hungarians are anti-Semitic

Via Hungarian Free Press:

A poll commissioned by Hungary’s Action and Defense Foundation (Tett és Védelem Alapítvány – TEV), discovered that a third of all Hungarians and a staggering 41% of all Fidesz supporters hold anti-Semitic views. 

The poll was conducted by Medián, one of Hungary’s most prominent polling and research firms. The organization’s director, Endre Hann, presented the findings: 23% of adult Hungarians hold “strongly anti-Semitic” views, while an additional 12% are “moderately anti-Semitic.”

When explored from the perspective of party supporters, 59% of Jobbik voters or sympathizers gravitate to antisemitism, while 41% of those who identify with Fidesz are anti-Semitic.

The proportion of anti-Semites among Hungarians who vote for left-centre opposition parties is lower, but still at a level that gives cause for concern: among sympathizers of the Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP), 24% were found to hold antisemitic views. This proportion is somewhat lower among those who gravitate to the Democratic Coalition (DK) and the Politics Can Be Different green party (LMP). In both case, the proportion stands at 18%.

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Slovakia: Far-right party urges remembrance of hanged Nazi-era president

Via Euronews:

A Slovak far-right party demanded a minute’s silence in parliament on Monday to mark what it called the murder of the head of the Slovak wartime Nazi puppet state who was hanged for treason in 1947; the chamber’s head refused the move.

The People’s Party-Our Slovakia party shocked many in a March election when it won three times as many votes as expected to enter parliament for the first time, mirroring a rise in far-right support around Europe and becoming an unwanted partner for other Slovak lawmakers.

On Monday, the party led by Marian Kotleba called for a commemoration of the 1939-45 State president and Catholic priest Jozef Tiso in an open letter to the parliament’s chairman.

Tiso allowed tens of thousands of Slovak Jews to be deported to Nazi death camps and was tried for treason after the war.

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UK: Video of dog responding to antisemitic commands goes viral

Via Metro:

Jewish leaders have condemned a man following the emergence of a video in which he teaches his girlfriend’s dog commands using anti-Semitic phrases.
Labour MP suspended over anti-semitism row

The clip, in which pug Buddha responds to instructions from former security guard Marks Meechan such as ‘gas the Jews’, has been watched more than 750,000 times and found itself on the front page of Reddit.

Mr Meechan has the dog raise a paw when he says ‘Sieg Heil’. The 28-year-old, from Coatbridge, North Lanarkshire, says at the end of the video that the purpose of the video is to ‘p*** off’ his girlfriend, Sue.

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Russia: Protesters demand ban on Chabad movement

As previously reported, the opponents of Chabad in Perm claim it's a radical, anti-Christian group and accuse it of helping fund the war in Ukraine.



Via Times of Israel:

Demonstrators protesting the allocation of land to the Jewish community in the Russian city of Perm demanded the outlawing of the Chabad movement.

More than 100 people attended the rally near the area that municipal authorities in Perm, which is located 870 miles east of Moscow, designated for transfer without charge to the local Jewish community that is headed by a Chabad rabbi. They sang a song titled “Holy War,” a patriotic tune widely identified with Russia’s fight against Nazi Germany.

Unrest around the Jewish community of Perm has been brewing for years amid accusations made in 2013 that the local Jewish community made unauthorized use of a local theater. Unidentified individuals that year tried to set fire to the local synagogue.

On Saturday, the protesters showed up with signs reading “Chabad out” and “liberate us Russians from Chabad.” One protester held a placard that read “Chabad settlement is over the line: 1547,” an apparent reference to the decision that year by Ivan the Terrible, a grand prince of Moscow, to ban Jews from entering or living in his kingdom because they “bring about great evil.”

But participants insisted they were protesting against Chabad specifically and not against Jews in general, the Russian news site Ura reported.

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Belgium funding illegal construction by Palestinians to provide a pretext for anti-Israel propagandizing

Belgian media has indeed been "propagandizing" this, without providing the context...  In France, Belgian journalist, Danièle Kriegel, wrote a viciously anti-Israel article @ Le Point on the subject.  Sadly, not much is done to help alleviate the appalling living conditions of the Roma population in Europe!  Nothing is done in Europe to address Palestinian authorities' corruption. 

CAMERA reports:

Independent Catholic News, a publication that serves Catholics in Ireland, recently published an article about Israel demolishing a playground in the West Bank.

The main thrust of the article, which was published on April 14, 2016, is that Israel is behaving badly by demolishing the playground. Israel is acting well within the rights accorded to it under the Oslo Accords, which give Israel authority over the area where the playground was built — illegally and without permits — by Palestinians who do not own the land on which it was built.

Moreover, it appears that the Belgian government, which paid for the playground’s construction, is aiding an abetting illegal construction by local Palestinians, not to improve the living standards, but to provide a pretext for anti-Israel propagandizing, which sadly enough, the Independent Catholic News fell for.

Here’s the background: According to the story, the playground, which was built last year with funds provided by the Belgian government, was demolished on Tuesday April 12, 2016. The playground was located in a village south of Nablus.


The playground’s demolition has prompted outrage from the Belgian government.

The Belgian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Development Cooperation Alexander De Croo and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Didier Reynders condemned the destruction of the children's playground. They have asked for an explanation from the Israeli government through the Ambassador in Brussels and via the Belgian Embassy in Tel Aviv.

The article, which is based on a report from Ma'an New Agency, a Palestinian outlet that has published antisemitic diatribes in the past, states “Israeli authorities gave no prior notice before demolishing the park.”

CAMERA contacted COGAT, the Israeli agency responsible for administrating the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and received the following response:

Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories: On April 12th, enforcement measures were taken against an illegal structure in Za'atra, after handing all the relevant orders and giving opportunity to prove ownership on the lands.

COGAT’s response reveals couple of problems with the story as it appeared in the Independent Catholic News.

First, the article failed to mention that the Palestinians who used the Belgian money to build the playground did not have title to the land on which it was built. In other words, it was built illegally. [...]


This brings us to another problem with the story. It omits the fact that a number of European institutions have been funding the construction of illegal structures in the West Bank in an effort to generate spectacles that can be used to demonize Israel. The so-called humanitarian structures are built not for humanitarian purposes, but propaganda purposes. 

In February 2015, The Daily Mail (London) reported the following:

The EU is acting illegally by funding unauthorised Palestinian building in areas placed under Israeli control by international law, say an NGO, international lawyers and MEPs. More than 400 EU-funded Palestinian homes have been erected in Area C of the West Bank, which was placed under Israeli jurisdiction during the Oslo Accords – a part of international law to which the EU is a signatory.

The Palestinian buildings, which have no permits, come at a cost of tens of millions of Euros in public money, a proportion of which comes from the British taxpayer. This has raised concerns that the EU is using valuable resources to take sides in a foreign territorial dispute.

An article published the following month by the same publication reveals that the European Union has claimed diplomatic immunity to protect itself from lawsuits in Israel arising from its illegal actions.

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Italy: Soccer team punished for anti-Semitic chants of fans

Via JTA:

Italian sports officials punished its top soccer team, Juventus, for its fans shouting an anti-Semitic chant, but suspended the penalty.

The order to close a section of the club’s stadium in Turin for its next game will only be enforced if there is a repeat of the behavior, ESPN reported Monday. The Curva Sud section represents about a quarter of the stadium. The anti-Semitic chants were heard coming from there on Sunday during the team’s 4-0 win over Palermo in the Serie A championship match.

According to the chant’s chorus, for which Juventus has been punished in the past, people from Florence, where the team’s chief rival is based, are “not Italian” but “a bunch of Jews.”

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Sweden: Green Party founder claims Israel targeted minister because of Sweden's recognition of Palestine

Via Helahälsingland.se (h/t BrncicIvo):

Earlier this week, a Green Party minister, Mehmet Kaplan, quit after allegations that he participated in events of nationalist Turkish organizations.

It had also been reported, just before Kaplan resigned, that he had compared Israel to Nazis.

Even though this had nothing to do with his resignation, Per Gahrton, the party's founder and former spokesperson, claimed Kaplan's resignation was part of a Zionist conspiracy.  Gharton, an anti-Israel activist, also headed the Palestine Solidarity Association in the years 2004-2011.

Gahrton spoke on TV4 Nyhetsmorgon and said that the prime minister was influenced by a campaign, in which Israel was very much involved.  Israeli representatives were quoted on the front pages of Swedish papers saying that Kaplan is an antisemite, and that it wasn't right of the Prime Minister not to support Kaplan against this campaign.

Gahrton also said that Kaplan was targeted after Sweden recognized Palestine.  First Foreign Minister Margot Wallström was accused of being an antisemite, now Kaplan, and there will be more such accusations in the future.

Gahrton said that it's very strange that the fact that the Israeli ambassador was quoted on Svenska Dagbladet's front page, accusing Kaplan of being an antisemite, was overlooked, because it was clearly influential.

This is not the first time that Gahrton makes such accusations.  In the 1980's he said that the accusations of antisemitism against Radio Islam were a way of turning attention away from Israeli atrocities and that the investigation into those claims were an 'ominous sign of appeasement to a resourceful lobby'.

Germany: Jewish student denied seat on S-Bahn due to magen-david necklace

Via CFCA, RIAS:

A Jewish student was denied a seat on the S-Bahn in Berlin due to her magen-david necklace.

Two women saw her, noticed her necklace, then put their bags on the empty seats next to them, to prevent her from seating.  They also expressed their hate towards her. 




The other passengers studiously ignored what was going on and looked at the floor or window.

The victim says she experiences such negative experiences when her magen-david is visible.  She usually hides it with a scarf but forgot to do so that day.

France: Mohamed Merah's brother fell in love with a Jewish woman and was stabbed by family

Still all sorts of experts maintain that young Muslims are radicalised on the Internet and not within their own families.

Jewish victims of Mehra

La Libre Belgique carries an article about Abdelghani Merah, Mohamed Merah's brother.  He broke with his family ethos when he "betrayed" his brother by informing the police of his crimes.

Abdelghani Merah says that their parents laid the "fertile ground" on which his brothers and sister Souad became radicalised and unbounded anti-Semites.  

"My mother always said that Arabs were born to hate Jews. My father believed that the Palestinians were right to explode themselves and the Israelis got their just deserts."

Abdelghani Merah fell in love with a woman of Jewish descent and this led his brother Abdelkader to take revenge by stabbing him seriously.

read more (in French)

Read more:
Mohamed Mehra's brother vows to liberate France and Jerusalem from Jewish filth
Brother of French anti-Semitic terrorist speaks out against his upbringing

UK: Students applaud claim that Holocaust Memorial Day suggests Jewish lives are worth more than others

 
Via Jewish News:

The Jewish community was “in shock” this week after the National Union of Students applauded arguments why NOT to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day and voted a woman who rails against “Zionist-led media” to be its next president.

(...)

John Mann, who chairs the All Party Party Group Against Antisemitism reacted by saying: “Today’s comments and their reception were inappropriate, offensive and point to a disturbing wider ignorance about anti-Semitism in NUS.”

He said the student body “is not doing enough to combat anti-Jewish hatred”, and is therefore failing in its responsibilities.

“The fact that delegates applauded these comments, and failed to recognise the attacks on Holocaust Memorial Day for what they were, underlines just how important an improved and far-reaching Holocaust educational effort in the NUS is.”

Meanwhile “armed struggle” advocate Malia Bouattia, who called Birmingham University a “Zionist outpost,” won the election to be the next NUS president in the first round of voting, beating outgoing president Megan Dunn by 371 votes to 328.

See clip on Huffington Post:

Darta Kaleja, from Chester University, argued against the amendment on the grounds that it singled out the Holocaust and ignored other atrocities.

She told the conference: “I am against the NUS ignoring and forgetting other mass genocides and prioritising others.

“It suggests some lives are more important than others.

Greece: Vice-President of the EU Parliament meets with Palestinian terrorist Leila Khaled, praises her "historical role in the Palestinian Resistance"

Her 'historical role' consisted of being the first woman to hijack an airplane.

Via Against Antisemitism:

Palestinian terrorist Leila Khaled met with Dimitris Papadimoulis, Syriza MEP and Vice-President of the European Parliament, in its headquarters in Brussels on February 10, 2016. Leila Khaled was accompanied by a PFLP delegation. Syriza, a left-wing party that despite its past support for the Palestinians has sought to strengthen ties with the Jewish state, has called Khaled in a statement issued after the meeting an “activist with a historical role in the Palestinian Resistance.”

Khaled is member the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist and nationalist organization founded in 1967. PFLP is considered as a terrorist organization by the Council of the European Union, since its members have carried out numerous hijackings, assassinations, bombings and paramilitary operations against civilian and military targets in Israel. Khaled herself has been involved twice in airline hijackings and is an active supporter of the BDS movement.

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Sweden: Despite media reports, minister did not resign over Israel-Nazi comparison

Since last week, Minister of Housing Mehmet Kaplan has been in the center of a political storm after it was revealed that he has met with Turkish extremists.

On Sunday, the Svenska Dagbladet newspaper revealed that he has also compared Israel to Nazis in 2009.

The next day, Kaplan tendered his resignation to Prime Minister Stefan Löfven.

Various news-sites reported that Kaplan resigned for 'criticizing Israel'.

For example, Reuter's headline: "Sweden’s housing minister resigns over Israel comments"

AFP's headline: "Swedish minister quits after comparing Israel to Nazi Germany"

Dutch site De Teleraaf headlined its article: "Criticism of Israel costs Swedish minister his position"

Similar headlines can be found on Jewish and Israeli sites as well.



Let's start with the fact that comparing Jews or Israel to Nazis is not 'criticizing Israel'.  It's a type of Holocaust denial.

It would be nice if antisemitic statements were cause for resignation in Sweden, but that wasn't the case here and it's extremely doubtful Kaplan would have had to resign if that was the only issue at hand.

In Monday's press conference, Löfven explained that Kaplan's actions in regards to "foreign religious and political organizations" made it untenable for him to continue in his position.

Löfven was obviously not referring to Kaplan's ties to extremist anti-Zionist organizations, as those were public knowledge long before he joined the cabinet.  He was referring to Kaplan's links to Turkish extremist organizations.

In fact, according to Swedish site Expressen, by the time Svenska Dagbladet published it's expose, Löfven had already spoken to Kaplan about the need for his resignation.

Kaplan's comments about Israel had nothing to do with his resignation.

Poland: University warns foreign students as antisemitic nationalists march, threaten to hang Zionists

pics via CFCA

Via Radio Poland (also here):

Members of the so-called National Radical Camp (ONR) gathered in Białystok to mark the 82nd anniversary of the group's foundation.

The university's international relations office sent a message in English to all foreign students, noting that “a march of a nationalist group will take place in Białystok.

(...)

The National Radical Camp was founded in 1934, but it was considered so extreme by the then Polish authorities that it was banned outright just three months after it was launched, following a wave of anti-semitic activity.

The ONR was revived in 1993 and officially registered as an association in 2012.

It is among the groups that organises an annual march in Warsaw on Polish Independence Day (11 March). The last Independence Day March was held under the slogan 'Poland for the Poles, Poles for Poland'.

(...)

Meanwhile, the Polish Episcopate published an apology on Tuesday after photographs emerged of ONR members brandishing the organisation's flags in the city's cathedral.

ONR members attended a mass in the cathedral on Saturday, led by Father Jacek Międlar, a priest known for taking part in anti-refugee protests.

The Curia in Białystok claimed in a letter that “the incident resulted from administrative negligence at the parish."

Prior to the mass, ONR members reportedly chanted: "Zionists will hang from the trees instead of leaves."

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Germany: Tel Aviv marked on package as "Palestinian territory"

Via Stand With Us: 

Fabian Maamari, a Lebanese/Swedish activist living in Israel writes:
"So I decided to go online and order a case for my phone from a company called "D Brand" (located in [Toronto]), found out that they deliver to Israel so I was happy about that. 2 weeks later when I got it delivered I noticed something special on the address part.

'TEL AVIV - PALESTINIAN TERRITORY'????"

The company responded that the error was in fact due to DHL routed through Germany, though many pointed out that DHL prints what they're given from the senders.

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UK: Confusion over suspension of ‘antisemitic’ Conservative Councillor

Via Campaign Against Antisemitism:

Abdul Zaman, the deputy chairman of the Bradford Conservative Association, has been suspended after making ‘antisemitic’ comments in support of local Conservative council candidate Sajid Akhtar.

Bradford politics has been heavily affected by the Biradri clan-based system of politics under which the selection and election of candidates and politicians can be influenced by their belonging or promises to a particular clan. The Biradri has been implicated in George Galloway’s election as MP for Bradford West for the Respect Party, leading the Labour Party to remove the local party’s ability to select its own candidates.

Zaman delivered a speech in the Mirpuri dialect which defended the Biradri system, ending in a statement about Jews and Christians. The speech ends with a call for the whole community to talk to their neighbours and friends and tell them to vote for Akhtar “so that the Jews and Christians know that we are one Biradri.”

This has been interpreted as either a message of unity, or as one of division, telling the local community to show Jews and Christians that they will adhere to the Biradri system and not be divided. Interpretation is made more difficult by the fact that Mirpuri is a purely oral dialect, and various phrases used in the speech can have different literal translations.

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