Azerbaijani Jews - Antisemitism in Azerbaijan

Antisemitism in Azerbaijan

According to the Report on Global Anti-Semitism released by the USA Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor on January 5, 2005, "Cases of prejudice and discrimination against Jews in the country were very limited, and in the few instances of anti-Semitic activity the Government has been quick to respond. The Government does not condone or tolerate persecution of Jews by any party". Jews do not suffer from discrimination, and the country is remarkably free from anti-Semitism.

Despite antisemitism has not historically been a problem in Azerbaijan, in the 1990s there was rise of anti-Armenian and anti-Russian nationalism (in Azerbaijan Jews are also seen as ethnically Russian). Jewish emigration from Azerbaijan increased during the Nagorno-Karabakh War: Jews feared both becoming casualties of war and becoming the targets of hostility that had previously been directed at Armenians.

The former Interior Minister of Azerbaijan (1992−93) and later a political prisoner Isgandar Hamidov, now chairman of the unregistered National Democratic Party (Boz Gurd), made antisemitic and anti-Israel statements. According to The Stephen Roth Institute, Tel Aviv University report, Hamidov accused the Jews "of owning all the land in northern Azerbaijan, of trying to get hold of other assets and of acting as if they owned the world".

The Islamic Party of Azerbaijan, whose official status as a party was revoked in 1995, routinely disseminates antisemitic messages through their newspapers and radio channels, with statements such as "Throw the Jews out!" and "Jews should go where they belong or be destroyed."

According to the Radio Liberty report, in October, 2001 fifty gravestones in a Jewish cemetery were desecrated in Baku. The leader of the Religious Community of Mountain Jews of Azerbaijan, Semyon Ikhilov, was quoted by Radio Liberty as saying that this is not the first time such an attack has taken place. In 2002 the government of Azerbaijan has warned of the threat of rising Islamic extremism to Jewish and minority Christian groups and has closed some mosques connected with radical Islamism.