UK: Antisemitic, racist and other discriminatory abuse rise in football for sixth straight year

Via Telegraph:

Reports of antisemitic, racist and other discriminatory abuse within English football have risen for the sixth year in a row, according to the latest figures from Kick It Out.

Football's equality and inclusion organisation has revealed there were a total of 520 reports of abuse last season, up 11 per cent from 469 in 2016/17, with racist abuse accounting for more than half of the cases.

One in 10 reports of abuse concerned antisemitism, while reports of disability discrimination more than doubled from 14 to 29.

The statistics are compiled from all levels of the game and include reports of abuse on social media.

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Germany: Israeli reporter attacked in Berlin ‘for speaking Hebrew’

Via Times of Israel:

An Israeli journalist was recently attacked in Berlin while trying to film a report, with video capturing a group of men harassing her and then apparently attacking her with a firecracker.

Antonia Yamin claimed the attack occurred because she spoke Hebrew, with several men throwing a firecracker at her and at her cameraman, while trying to film a report.

A video of the incident was published Sunday on Twitter by Yamin, Europe correspondent for Israel’s public broadcaster Kan.

(...)

German daily Bild reported that the assailants were immigrants.

Yamin later tweeted that she had been asked by police to give a statement but shied from labeling the attack as anti-Semitic.

Speaking to Bild, Yamin suggested she was targeted because she was speaking Hebrew and had Hebrew writing on her microphone, although she said she did not know definitively if that was the reason for the attack.

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UK: Racist who gave Nazi salutes and shouted 'child killers' during anti-Semitism rally is jailed for six months

Via Daily Mail:

A racist who gave Nazi salutes during an anti-Semitism rally then tried to claim it was 'freedom of speech' has been jailed.

Catering assistant Joseph Brogan, 27, shouted 'child killers' and 'you people should live in Israel' as hundreds of people, including MPs and rabbis, took part in a march.

As marshals at the rally in Manchester intervened, Brogan continued to hurl profanities and then raised his arm to mimic the Nazi salute before he was arrested.

One of the abused security staff later revealed members of his family had perished in the Holocaust.

Brogan, from Openshaw in Manchester admitted racially aggravated threatening behaviour but later tried to claim he was giving his opinion on 'Zionism'.

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Netherlands: 43% of Jews say they hide their ethnic identity

Via Times of Israel:

Nearly half of 557 respondents in a survey of Dutch Jews said they were afraid of identifying as such.

Of the respondents, 43 percent said they take active steps to hide their Jewish identity, such as wear a hat over their kippah or hide Star of David pendants.

Many respondents cited their perception of a rise in the prevalence of anti-Semitic sentiment, with 48% saying they avoid situations where they suspect they may be exposed to anti-Semitic reactions.

The results of the survey were published Monday.

Other key findings were that 52% of respondents said anti-Semitism on the street has become more common, 59% said it extends also to media and 82% see it rising online.

When it came to experiencing anti-Semitism, 34% said they had experienced racially offensive remarks directed against them, and of those, 89% said that those remarks were connected to Israel. 11% of respondents said they had experienced anti-Semitic violence directed against them.

Nearly three-quarters of respondents said they heard anti-Semitic jokes, featuring stereotypes about Jews. Other jokes involved the Holocaust. One respondent said a neighbor once told him that the only reason the respondent is living in the Netherlands is “because they forgot to gas” his family.

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Germany: 'The word Jew was not a common insult when I went to school...it is now.'

Via CNN:

Rachel always thought it was best to hide her religion from her high school students. The trouble started a few years ago when she let slip to a student that she was Jewish.

"I found swastikas scribbled in their textbooks, they drew penises around my name on the blackboard, and they'd yell like 'Hey, Jew' at me during class," said Rachel, a teacher in Berlin. "It became harder... to do my job."

Rachel, whose name has been changed because of safety concerns, went to her headmaster, and then to the police, but she said neither took her complaint seriously and would not intervene.

She said things got worse. The students saw Israel as a menace, an oppressor of the Palestinian people and viewed her as a stand-in for the Jewish state, she said. They took out their frustration by screaming anti-Semitic slurs at her.

Last year, she decided to switch schools for her own safety. She has not told her new students she's Jewish.

In a country still haunted by the Holocaust, anti-Semitic incidents in the classroom offer clear evidence that deep wounds haven't healed. Some Jewish teachers and students say they are caught between a surge of traditional right-wing anti-Semitism and threats from Muslim immigrants angry at Israel.

Unsure of how to deal with anti-Semitism in the classroom, Jewish teachers very often keep incidents to themselves to avoid tipping off their own religious identity, according to Marina Chernivsky, the head of the Berlin-based organization Kompetenz Zentrum für Pravention und Empowerment (or Competence Center for Prevention and Empowerment), which provides counseling to individual and institutions after anti-Semitic and discriminatory incidents.

She recently held a workshop to help Jewish teachers deal with anti-Semitism in their classrooms. Around 20 Jewish teachers attended the session; Chernivsky said it was the first time many of them opened up about the problem.

"It's not normal to be Jewish in Germany so anti-Semitism is not normal to talk about," Chernivsky said. "It's very taboo."

It took history and politics teacher Michal Schwartze years to reveal her religion to her students.

The Frankfurt based 42-year-old said she didn't feel comfortable teaching about the Holocaust, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or anti-Semitism in Europe without being transparent with her students.

"I don't say hey I am Jewish, but I make it clear that I am personally affected," said Schwartze.

A few years ago, Schwartze penned an article in her school's newspaper encouraging students to stop using the word "Jew" as a slur. She said she took a risk writing the piece, but it raised awareness around anti-Semitism at her school.

"Fortunately, I have colleagues who are sensitive and a headmaster who has an interest in preventing anti-Semitism," says Schwartze. She cautioned that Jewish teachers who don't have similar support need to "hide their identity."

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UK: Company apologises to Jewish residents for telling them to take down their mezuzot

Via Jewish Chronicle:

A management company has apologised to its Jewish residents for threatening to take their mezuzot down if they did not remove it themselves.

Warwick Estates said on Monday it was sorry for the "overzealous" letter to residents of Cedarwood Court, near Stamford Hill, which said hanging mezuzot on front doors breached the terms of the residents' leases and they could be billed if they did not take them down.

The letter was sent last week, saying hanging objects outside their homes was against the terms of their leases. It specifically singled out the mezuzah, the rolled-up scroll of parchment Jewish families customarily hang on their front doors.

One residentsaid she had never seen anyone complain about the mezuzot in 10 years living in the area and the mayor of Hackney said he would intervene.

On Monday, the company backtracked, a day after the JC reported the letter and the anger it had caused locally. 

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UK: Labour AM 'deeply sorry' over comments on Cardiff's Jewish community

Via Wales Online:

Cardiff Central Labour AM Jenny Rathbone is facing a call for her to resign or be expelled in the wake of controversial reported comments about Jews and anti-Semitism.

She will meet with a local rabbi to apologise and will refer herself for “equalities training”.

The Jewish Chronicle released a recording in which she appears to link anti-Semitism to Israeli actions in the Palestinian territories and argue that Jews in this country have a responsibility to promote peace.

In the recording, she is told that a synagogue in the Cyncoed area of Cardiff has had to “install bulletproof glass” but she suggests that “siege mentalities are also a part of this”

The AM compares the Welsh synagogue to a “fortress” and says it is hard for her to judge “how much of it is for real and how much of it is in their own heads”.

Her comments, made in 2017, have triggered alarm among Jewish groups and a call for her to quit.

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Jewish leaders call for new editions of the Bible and the Koran to carry trigger warnings highlighting anti-Semitic passages

Via Daily Mail:

Jewish leaders are calling for new editions of the Bible and Koran to carry warning messages which highlight anti-Semitic passages in the holy texts.

The recommendations have been made in a new document called ‘An End to Antisemitism! A Catalogue of Policies to Combat Antisemitism’.

It was produced following an international conference organised by the European Jewish Congress, at which academics gathered to discuss how prejudice and discrimination can be tackled.

Among the policies mentioned in the document was the idea of warning messages in holy texts, a topic discussed in a chapter entitled 'recommendations regarding Religious Groups and Institutions'.

The document reads: 'Translations of the New Testament, the Qur’an and other Christian or Muslim literatures need marginal glosses, and introductions that emphasize continuity with Jewish heritage of both Christianity and Islam and warn readers about antisemitic passages in them.

'While some efforts have been made in this direction in the case of Christianity, these efforts need to be extended and made consistent in both religions.'

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Germany: Neo-Nazis use Whatsapp to share anti-Semitic 'stickers'

Via Israel National News:

A group monitoring anti-Semitism in Germany is calling on the operators of a popular cell phone application to take action, after it discovered neo-Nazis have begun using a new feature in the application to spread pro-Nazi images.

Recently, the popular Whatsapp messenger service – which is owned by the social media giant Facebook – added a new feature, allowing users to upload custom digital images or “stickers”, and share them with fellow users.

Shortly after the new feature debuted, however, far-right nationalists and neo-Nazi groups in Germany began using the Whatsapp sticker system to create and spread pro-Nazi images.

The Jewish Forum for Democracy and Against Anti-Semitism (JFDA) said neo-Nazis and white supremacists were using the sticker function to flood group chats with hateful symbols.

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Belgium: Vandals damage Holocaust memorial in Ghent

Via JNS:

Vandals damage a Holocaust memorial in the Belgian city of Ghent on the eve of a Kristallnacht commemoration. 

Vandals damaged a Holocaust memorial in the Belgian city of Ghent, some 50 kilometers west of Brussels, on the eve of a Kristallnacht (“Night of the Broken Glass”) commemoration.

The so-called Michaël Lustig monument, in the shape of a dreidel, is located at the confluence of a major canal. It was ripped off its foundation and left on its side.

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France: Jewish mayor’s home covered with anti-Semitic graffiti

Via JTA:

The home of a Jewish mayor in France was covered with anti-Semitic graffiti including swastikas and “Dirty Jew, get out.”

The graffiti were spray-painted Friday on the home of Etienne Wolf, mayor of Brumath, near Strasbourg in France’s east, France3 reported. Police have no suspects in the incident, which occurred on the 80th anniversary of the Kristallnacht pogroms by the Nazis against German and Austrian Jews.

“Mayor Marx = Jude,” a reference to the communist ideologue Karl Marx, followed by the German-language word for “Jew,” also was painted on the house along with several swastikas and the words “Dirty Jew, get out.” Another tag read “Jews want to destroy Whites.”

Wolf discovered the tags early in the morning when he came out to get his newspaper.

“It stunned me. I wondered what I had done to deserve this,” Wolf, whose town has approximately 10,000 residents, told France3.

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Sweden: Hospital official quits over alleged anti-Semitic bullying by surgeon

Via Times of Israel:

A department head at a Swedish hospital resigned following media reports about a physician in the department continually bullying Jewish staff.

The former manager left Karolinska University Hospital, near Stockholm, due to “a combination of personal reasons, but also because he has not handled the situation [efficiently] enough,” Annika Tibell, the hospital’s director, told Sveriges Television, the broadcaster reported Tuesday. The department head was not named in the report.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center made accusations against a surgeon from the hospital in a letter sent in October, the Aftonbladet daily reported.

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Management at Karolinska knew about the “obvious and open anti-Semitism” expressed by the physician to at least one Jewish employee since February, but the complaints were “ignored,” the center’s dean, Rabbi Abraham Cooper, wrote in the letter, which was obtained by JTA.

At least two other Jewish employees quit until only the one mentioned by the Simon Wiesenthal Center remained, Cooper said.

Tibell told Aftonbladet that the institution has a “zero tolerance for all types of harassment and offensive treatment.” She also said that “relevant investigative measures” are being taken when “misunderstandings arise.”

According to Aftonbladet, Karolinska has launched an internal investigation and asked outside counsel to review the complaints.

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UK: Muslims harass pro-Israel group in Hyde Park

Here you'll see a smorgasbord of antisemitism: Muslim fundamentalism, Holocaust-denial, accusations of Christ-killers

All because Jews dared stand with an Israeli flag in Hyde Park.

Germany: NGO rescinds award to U.S. Women's March due to antisemitism

Via Jerusalem Post:

The think tank for the German social democratic party withdrew its Human Rights Award to the Women’s March USA in Washington, DC, on Thursday because doctoral students associated with the foundation accused the organizers of the march of hardcore antisemitism and support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign targeting the Jewish state.

“We believe that the Women’s March USA does not meet the criteria of this award, as its organizers have repeatedly attracted attention through antisemitic statements, the trivialization of antisemitism and the exclusion of Zionists and Jews since Women’s March USA’s establishment in 2017. Women’s March USA does not constitute an inclusive alliance,” wrote members of the scholarship working group, called Critique of Anti-Semitism and Jewish Studies, from the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in a public letter.

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France: Anti-Semitic acts surge, government promises action

Via Reuters:

Violence against Jews and other acts of anti-Semitism have surged in France in the past nine months, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Friday, promising stepped-up action against perpetrators.

Citing new government statistics, Philippe said acts of anti-Semitism had risen 69 percent in the year to September, compared with the same period in 2017, an increase he said should worry everyone in France. In the two previous years there had been a downward trend in the figures.

“Not remaining indifferent means taking better care of victims, acknowledging their complaints and more efficiently punishing those who carry out attacks,” Philippe said in a post on his Facebook account. 

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Moldova: Jewish cemetery vandalized

Via Artuz 7:

A Jewish cemetery in Moldova was vandalized by unidentified individuals who painted a swastika on one of the headstones.

The Nazi symbol was discovered Monday at the cemetery in Chisinau, the capital of the East European country sandwiched between Romania and Ukraine, the news website Point reported Wednesday.

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