Antisemitism on rise across Europe ‘in worst times since the Nazis’
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/08/08/antisemitism-on-rise-across-europe-in-worst-times-since-the-nazis/
Antisemitism on rise across Europe in worst times since the Nazis
By Jon Henley, The Guardian
Friday, August 8, 2014 14:09 EDT
In the space of just one week last month, according to Crif, the umbrella group for Frances Jewish organisations, eight synagogues were attacked. One, in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles, was firebombed by a 400-strong mob. A kosher supermarket and pharmacy were smashed and looted; the crowds chants and banners included Death to Jews and Slit Jews throats. That same weekend, in the Barbes neighbourhood of the capital, stone-throwing protesters burned Israeli flags: Israhell, read one banner.
In Germany last month, molotov cocktails were lobbed into the Bergische synagogue in Wuppertal previously destroyed on Kristallnacht and a Berlin imam, Abu Bilal Ismail, called on Allah to destroy the Zionist Jews
Count them and kill them, to the very last one. Bottles were thrown through the window of an antisemitism campaigner in Frankfurt; an elderly Jewish man was beaten up at a pro-Israel rally in Hamburg; an Orthodox Jewish teenager punched in the face in Berlin. In several cities, chants at pro-Palestinian protests compared Israels actions to the Holocaust; other notable slogans included: Jew, coward pig, come out and fight alone, and Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas.
Across Europe, the conflict in Gaza is breathing new life into some very old, and very ugly, demons. This is not unusual; police and Jewish civil rights organisations have long observed a noticeable spike in antisemitic incidents each time the Israeli-Palestinian conflict flares. During the three weeks of Israels Operation Cast Lead in late 2008 and early 2009, France recorded 66 antisemitic incidents, including attacks on Jewish-owned restaurants and synagogues and a sharp increase in anti-Jewish graffiti.But according to academics and Jewish leaders, this time it is different. More than simply a reaction to the conflict, they say, the threats, hate speech and violent attacks feel like the expression of a much deeper and more widespread antisemitism, fuelled by a wide range of factors, that has been growing now for more than a decade.
These are the worst times since the Nazi era, Dieter Graumann, president of Germanys Central Council of Jews, told the Guardian. On the streets, you hear things like the Jews should be gassed, the Jews should be burned we havent had that in Germany for decades. Anyone saying those slogans isnt criticising Israeli politics, its just pure hatred against Jews: nothing else. And its not just a German phenomenon. Its an outbreak of hatred against Jews so intense that its very clear indeed.