Antisemitism in France - Antisemitism in The 21st Century

Antisemitism in The 21st Century

Antisemitism has increased significantly in Europe since 2000, with significant increases in verbal attacks against Jews and vandalism such as graffiti, fire bombings of Jewish schools, desecration of synagogues and cemeteries not only in France and Germany, where antisemitic incidents are highest in Europe but also in counties like Belgium, Austria and the United Kingdom, physical assaults against Jews including beatings, stabbings and other violence increased markedly, in a number of cases resulting in serious injury and even death.

The Netherlands and Sweden have also had consistently high rates of antisemitic attacks since 2000.

This rise in antisemitic attacks is associated one the one hand with the Muslim anti-Semitism towards Jews as a result of the Israeli- Arab and Israeli- Palestinian conflicts and on the other hand with the rise of far right parties as a result of the economic crisis of 2008.

The failure of assimilation of Muslim immigrants communities in Europe together with economic and social problems and the spread of fundamentalist ideas among the Muslim youth in Europe has led to radicalization inside the Muslim communities and especially among the youth.

This, together with the escalation of the Israeli- Palestinian conflict and the failure of the Oslo peace process, the Jews in Europe were more and more perceived as promoters and favors of pro-Israeli ideas. Thus, the thick line that existed before between antisemitism and anti-Zionism has become even thicker. A number of studies conducted among the Muslim youth in various western European countries have showed that Muslim children have far more anti-Semitic ideas than Christian children- in 2011 Mark Elchardus, a Belgian sociologist, published a report on Dutch-language elementary schools in Brussels. He found that about 50 percent of Muslim students in second and third grade could be considered anti-Semites, versus 10% of others. In the same year Unther Jikeli published his findings from the 117 interviews he conducted with Muslim male youngsters (average age 19) in Berlin, Paris and London.. The majority of the interviewees voiced some, or strong anti-Semitic feelings. They expressed them openly and often aggressively.

A large number of violent antisemitic attacks in Europe were done by Muslims- the murder of 4 Jews in Toulouse in 2012 by Mohammed Merah, the 1982 attack on the Jewish Goldenberg restaurant in Paris that was carried out by Arab terrorists, the kidnapping and murder of the French citizen Ilan Halimi in 2006 by a Muslim gang and the antisemitic riots in Norway in 2009 are a few examples to this phenomenon.

The second cause of the rise in the scope of antisemitism in Europe is the economic crisis that started in 2008 and resulted in the rise of far right parties, anti-immigration and antisemitic ideas.

The number of anti-Semitic political parties in European parliaments rose from 1 to 3 during 2012 and a survey in 10 European countries revealed high levels of anti-Semitic attitudes. In June, Greece's neo-Nazi party, Golden Dawn, won 21 seats in parliament. In November, the radical Svoboda (Freedom) party of Ukraine captured more than 10% of the popular vote, giving electoral support to a party well known for its anti-Semitic rhetoric. They joined the ranks of Jobbik, an openly anti-Semitic party, in the Hungarian parliament.

This rise in the support for far right ideas in western and eastern Europe has resulted in the increase of antisemitic acts, mostly attacks on Jewish memorials, synagogues and cemeteries but also a number of physical attacks against Jews.

According to a poll conducted by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in 2012, anti-Semitic attitudes in ten European countries remain at "disturbingly high levels", peaking in Eastern Europe and Spain, with large swaths of the population subscribing to classical anti-Semitic notions such as Jews having too much power in business, being more loyal to Israel than their own country, or "talking too much" about what happened during the Holocaust. In comparison with a similar ADL poll conducted in 2009, several of the countries showed high levels in the overall level of anti-Semitism, while other countries experienced more modest increases:

• Austria: Experienced a slight decrease to 28 percent from 30 percent in 2009.
• France: The overall level of antisemitism increased to 24 percent of the population, up from to 20 percent in 2009.
• Germany: antisemitism increased by one percentage point, to 21 percent of the population.
• Hungary: The level rose to 63 percent of the population, compared with 47 percent in 2009.
• Poland: The number remained unchanged, with 48 percent of the population showing deep-seated antisemitic attitudes.
• Spain: Fifty-three percent (53%) percent of the population, compared to 48 percent in 2009.
• United Kingdom: antisemitic attitudes jumped to 17 percent of the population, compared to 10 percent in 2009.

In Eastern Europe anti-Semitism in the 21th century continued in a similar scale of the 90's. The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the instability of the new states has brought the rise of nationalist movements and the accusation against Jews for the economic crisis, taking over the local economy and bribing the government alongside with traditional and religious motives for amtisemitism (blood libels for example).

Most of the antisemitic incidents are against Jewish cemeteries and building (community centers and synagogues). Nevertheless there were several violent attacks against Jews in Moscow in 2006 when a neo-Nazi stabbed 9 people at the Bolshaya Bronnaya Synagogue , the failed bomb attack on the same synagogue in 1999 .the threats against Jewish pilgrims in Uman, Ukraine and the attack against a menorah by extremist Christian organization in Moldova in 2009.

Since the outbreak of the economic crisis of 2008 there had been a rise in the scope of antisemitic incidents with the rise in power of nationalist parties such as "Svoboda" in Ukraine although the number of physical attacks against Jews remains low. Eastern Europe was less affected by the rise of Islamic antisemitism because of much smaller numbers of Muslims living in the aria . Nevertheless, in arias and countries populated by Muslims, such as the Caucuses there had been an increase in antisemitism as a result of the Israeli- Arab conflict such as the attempt to assassinate a Jewish teacher in Baku in 2012 although it is important to note that the terrorists were trained by Iran and that the local population has always been tolerant towards Jews.