Members of the far-right German NPD (Getty) The alarming news concerning anti-Semitism in Europe continues to dominate the news cycles of major publications. Earlier this month, a 40-year-old Palestinian man was sentenced four months in jail following his assault of a Jewish man in February, and Holocaust survivor and activist Elie Weisel’s childhood home was vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti. Organizations dedicated to tracking trends in anti-Semitism over time have warned of increased anti-Semitic activity in both Europe and the United States. The recent report by the Kantor Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry pointed to the rise of far-right parties, “along with anti-Semitism spread by the Islamists, the radical Muslims, and anti-Semitism mired in acute anti-Zionism and anti-Israel expressions,” as causes of concern. In Switzerland, a Palestinian man assaulted a fellow Jewish passenger aboard a train, who was easily identifiable as Jewish due to his kippah. While both spectators and commentators, such as the head of CICAD (Coordination Intercommunautaire Contre L’Antisemitisme et la Diffamation) asserted that the victim had been “singled out…for attack because he was visibly Jewish,” the attackers conviction does not reference hate crime as being a motivating factor in the assault. This conviction continues a pattern of hate crimes being committed against Jews in Europe leading to miniscule or paltry punishments. Similar sentences have been handed down recently in cases involving anti-Semitic attacks in both France and Amsterdam. The case in Switzerland is particularly striking, as the Swiss penal system is notoriously lenient when prosecuting assault cases that do not contain hate bias. The rate of Swiss citizens who received custodial sentences following convictions of assault sat around nine percent in 2012. The rate of violent hate crimes motivated by anti-Semitism in Sweden has remained relatively stable, with only 3 violent crimes against Jewish individuals reported in 2016. This information, however, may stem from the weak hate crime laws that exist in Switzerland. Hate crime law in Switzerland stems from article 261 bis of the Swiss penal code. The interpretation of this section of the penal code in Swiss judicial proceedings has been so controversial as to illicit criticism from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The committee expressed concern at the “restrictive interpretation of [the article] by judicial authorities.” Poor interpretation of this statute by Swiss authorities may explain the failure to prosecute this particular case as a hate crime. The attacks on Jewish individuals are bolstered by repeated vandalism, graffiti, and harassment of Jewish communities within Europe. The recent targeting of Elie Weisel’s childhood home is simply the latest outrage. The home of Elie Weisel, a holocaust survivor and civil rights champion, located in Sighet, Romania, was converted into a Holocaust education center in 2014. It was vandalized on Sunday, August 5th with graffiti calling him a “Jewish Nazi,” and a “pedophile” who is “in hell with Hitler.” The police and local authorities quickly removed the graffiti, and last week arrested a suspect. The proliferation of far-right political parties has, without a doubt, bolstered anti-Semitism within European nations, but, as the Kantor Center notes, it is not the only cause. Recently, a deluge of anti-Semitic incidents has come to light in the United Kingdom, all revolving around the left-wing Labour Party. This Labour Party anti-Semitism has caused waves in British academic, political, and social circles. The Labour Party most recently encountered criticism following its decision to adopt a diluted definition of anti-Semitism. The definition of anti-Semitism adopted by the Labour Party was based upon the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition that has been adopted by multiple countries, including Britain itself. The Labour definition, however, differed from the IHRA definition in the omission of four key points that the IHRA considers essential to defining anti-Semitism. The four points include accusing Jews of being more loyal to Israel than their own countries, claiming that Israel’s existence is a racist endeavor, applying a double standard on Israel, and comparing contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis. All the language that was removed pertains to the insidious connection between anti-Israelism and anti-Semitism. The majority of the anti-Semitism emanating from the Labour Party is inextricably related to anti-Israelism. The nations of Europe must begin the difficult process of tackling anti-Semitism by properly prosecuting anti-Semitic attacks, addressing anti-Jewish vandalism, and condemning both right-wing and left-wing political parties who harbor anti-Semitic sentiments among their ranks.
Courtesy of WikiMedia Commons In an interview with the Associated Press on August 13th, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad claimed that “Anti-Semitic is a term that is invented to prevent people from criticizing the Jews for doing wrong things.” Prime Minister Mohamad, a proud anti-Semite, explained that “There is one race that cannot be criticized. If you are antisemitic, it seems almost as if you are a criminal. When somebody does wrong, I don’t care how big they are. They may be powerful countries but if they do something wrong, I exercise my right of free speech. They criticize me, why can’t I criticize them?” Prime Minister Mohammad has a long history of anti-Semitism. In 1970, he wrote “the Jews are not merely hook-nosed, but understand money instinctively.”In 2003, at the Organization of the Islamic Conference summit in Kuala Lumpur, he said, “1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews. There must be a way. And we can only find a way if we stop to think, to assess our weaknesses and our strength, to plan, to strategize and then to counterattack. We are actually very strong. 1.3 billion people cannot be simply wiped out. The Europeans killed six million Jews out of 12 million. Jews rule this world by proxy.” He is fully aware of his anti-Semitism, as he has also said, “I am glad to be labeled anti-Semitic … How can I be otherwise, when the Jews who so often talk of the horrors they suffered during the Holocaust show the same Nazi cruelty and hard-heartedness towards not just their enemies but even towards their allies should any try to stop the senseless killing of their Palestinian enemies.” While he may claim to be a champion of the Palestinian cause, his rhetoric goes far beyond what could be considered political speech or criticism of Israeli policy. Engaging in anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about Jewish world domination, spreading anti-Semitic stereotypes, equating Israelis with Nazis, and promoting the annihilation of the Jews all count as blatant anti-Semitism.
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons Advocacy group UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) has successfully forced Kuwait Airways to “pay substantial damages plus costs to an Israeli National who was refused a ticket on a Kuwait Airways flight from London to Bangkok on the grounds of her nationality.” Last November, Mandy Blumenthal, who holds Israeli and UK citizenship, attempted to buy a ticket at Heathrow Airport, but the Kuwait Airways ticket counter denied her request, saying, “Israeli passport holders are not permitted to travel on Kuwait Airways.” UKLFI helped Blumenthal sue the airline after the incident, which was caught on video. Kuwaiti law prohibits the airline from engaging in any commercial transactions with “entities or persons residing in Israel, or with Israeli citizenship.” The Lawfare Project has also brought attention to this discriminatory practice, bringing legal actions against the airline in multiple countries. In 2015, US Department of Transportation demanded that it stop barring Israelis from their flights. Instead of allowing Israeli citizens on their planes, the airline terminated their New York-London route. In 2016, the airline canceled their intra-European flights after the Lawfare Project took them to court in Switzerland. Their lawsuit in Germany was unfortunately not successful, as the court ruled that the airline had a right to bar Israelis from their flights, as it was “not reasonable” to demand that they violate Kuwaiti law. An appeal hearing is scheduled to take place in September. According to British law, it is unlawful to refuse a public service to an individual because of their nationality. Blumenthal found it unacceptable that she was denied service while on UK soil. Attorney David Berens said, “The law is clear: direct discrimination on grounds of nationality in the provision of a service to the public is illegal. Ms. Blumenthal has done a service in showing up Kuwait Airways’ illegal policy. Kuwait Airways is now legally obliged to end this policy or end its services from the UK altogether.” While Kuwait Airways has agreed to pay Blumenthal, they have not admitted liability. Blumenthal said, “It is horrible to be singled out, to be told you are not allowed to do something because of who you are. Having someone telling me that he is following instructions, that it is a rule, a policy gave me a sinking feeling inside. In my mind it is an antisemitic policy to single out the only Jewish State to boycott.”
Courtesy of Dagbladet On August 7th, a Norwegian newspaper, Dagbladet, published an extremely anti-Semitic cartoon, prompting Israel’s ambassador to Norway to demand the removal of the image and apologize. The cartoon depicts Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose body is in the shape of a swastika, punching a Druze Israeli off of a “whites only” bench. The cartoon was published in response to Israel’s recent passage of a new Jewish Nation-State law, which some have criticized for being discriminatory towards minority groups. While thousands of Druze Israelis protested the new law on August 4th in Tel Aviv, others, like head of the Druze Zionist Council Atta Farhat, have said that the new law does not affect their community. He said, “You should know that the nation-state law does not deprive us in the least; most importantly, it enshrines in law the indisputable fact that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people.” Regardless, the cartoon published in Dagbladet is not simply an expression of legitimate criticism of Israeli policy. Instead, the paper crossed a line, equating Israel with Nazism and white supremacy. Ambassador Raphael Schutz tweeted that the cartoon was “an example of the most repulsive imaginable #antisemitic imagery.” This is not the first time that Dagbladet has been accused of anti-Semitism, as they have previously published cartoons that equate Israel to Nazi Germany and North Korea. Additionally, they have published cartoons that demonize circumcision and equate it with pedophilia. Dagbladet has consistently refused to apologize for their blatant anti-Semitism. With the rise in anti-Semitic attacks in Europe, news outlets should not be adding fuel to the fire. Modern anti-Semitism frequently takes on the form of anti-Zionism, thereby masking Jew-hatred as acceptable political speech. However, this trend is extremely detrimental, as it allows for blatant anti-Semitic rhetoric, imagery, and actions to run rampant.
President Trump addressing the UN General Assembly (MPR News) On Friday, August 31st the State Department announced its plan to completely defund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, better known as UNRWA. The US decision is part of a larger protest against the agency, which has been blamed repeatedly for perpetuating the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Former Israeli Ambassador to the UN Ron Proser has described how UNRWA schools have become a “hotbed of incitement” against Israel, Jews and the West, and how UNRWA personnel have been caught coordinating with Hamas operatives to build terror tunnels that run beneath the agency’s buildings. These examples are just two among a litany of others that have frustrated the US and motivated lawmakers to finally withdraw dollars from the UN program. Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, UNRWA was created to carry out direct humanitarian aid and programs for Palestinian refugees. While the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) offers assistance to all refugees throughout the world, UNRWA is uniquely designated to help Palestinians. While both organizations help refugees, their characterizations of refugee are radically different. Unlike UNRWA, the UNHCR does not consider the subsequent generations of those who were originally displaced as “refugees.” UNRWA applies refugee status to those who actually left their homes in 1948 or 1967, as well to all of their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Such explains why the $1.2 billion agency supports a ballooning number of Palestinians who are defined as “persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15 May 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict.” Descendants of the first generation afflicted by the war also qualify to receive UNRWA services which include educational, health, and social programs across the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. While UNWRA was originally responding to the needs of roughly 750,000 Palestinians it is currently doing so for a population that exceeds 5 million people. The agency’s inflated statistics markedly taints the perception of Palestinian life today. While there have been myriad wars and outbursts of violence in the decades since Israel’s establishment, no event has created a new cohort of displaced Palestinians. This notion of a growing refugee demographic gives credence to the muddled understanding of the Palestinian condition. More than 50 percent of those initially displaced by the 1948 war have garnered citizenship in other recognized states, and would otherwise not be delineated refugee status according to any other standard besides that put forward by UNRWA. The United States is the largest single donor to UNWRA, contributing more than $350 million in 2017. In the midst of its plan to defund UNWRA, the US is looking for alternative organizations to provide medical assistance, education, and food to Palestinians in need. The recent policy directive is only the latest in a series of other punitive actions that have predicated the US’s larger review of its diplomatic and political relations with Palestinian leadership. In the last year, US policymakers have opposed the current status of UNWRA’s leadership and have blamed other UN member states for failing to provide equal monetary support for the agency. Among them is US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, who stated that UNRWA reforms, especially moving to “change the number of refugees to an accurate count,” are conditional for the organization to receive US dollars and support. Building on Haley’s sentiment, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert called the relief agency an “irredeemably flawed operation” that is built upon an “unsustainable” business model and fiscal practices. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed the US decision to withdraw from UNWRA. In a public statement he reproached the organization for being a “refugee-perpetuation agency” that should serve a population “much smaller than the number reported by UNRWA.” The commissioner general of UNRWA, Pierre Krähenbühl, responded to Netanyahu’s criticism with a sharp censure, blaming the international community for prolonging the refugee crisis by not creating a “just and fair and inclusive solution to the conflict.” Whether the relief agency should support an ever-expanding population of beneficiaries is not only the subject of controversial debate for international legalists and government officials but also for students on university campuses across North America. A core demand of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement is the right of all Palestinian refugees—including first generation refugees and their descendants since the end of the 1948 war—to return to their homes and property in what is now Israel proper and the disputed territories. UNRWA originally offered humanitarian support to some 750,000 Palestinians, the incipient number of people displaced when Israel was established. Under UNRWA’s definition of refugee that number has since expanded to more than 5 million Palestinians who now span the region. Israel rejects the demand, claiming that it represents a Palestinian effort “to destroy Israel by weight of numbers.” The influx of millions would compromise Israel’s current standing as a Jewish-majority state and concomitantly introduce a host of political ramifications and uncertainties to the Jewish State. The refugee debate has become an acrimonious point of contention on campus, which Jewish students have continued to deem “unsafe” since the proliferation of BDS over the last decade. Given that the US decision to defund UNRWA was announced at the beginning of the academic school year, it is too soon to tell what responses the policy will merit on campus and whether Jewish students and allies of Israel will deal with any repercussions.