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The EU elite simply refuses to crack down on Muslim Jew-hatred in Europe that stems from canonical Islam, because they are scared to death of them…

 

Just look what happened in the US recently, with the Democrats refusing to single out Ilhan Omar for her Jew-hatred, instead, they crafted a tepid condemnation of “all forms of hatred”, with Omar herself including the bogus term of “Islamophobia”. People who called out Omar were labeled “Islampfauxbes” for their efforts.

 

With the increase of Islam in Europe, coupled with the European reluctance to take active steps against Jew-hatred in these communities, the situation will not improve, in fact, it’ll only get worse. Islamic Jew-hatred will only serve to supercharge European Jew-hatred. I’ve said for a long time now that there is no moral imperative in importing millions of Islamic Jew-haters into Europe, especially so if you’re truly serious about being against antisemitism and saving Western culture and its civilization.

 

 

Dr.Gerstenfeld’s article was originally published by the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, (BESA), and republished here with the author’s consent.

 

THE EU CANNOT FIGHT ANTISEMITISM EFFECTIVELY

Manfred Gerstenfeld

There has been an explosive growth in antisemitism since the beginning of this century in many European Union countries. Occasionally European leaders mention that it is a huge problem and it has to be fought. A few examples of this: In December 2017, EU Commission First Vice President, Frans Timmermans, said that antisemitism is “disturbingly normalized in Europe and those who want to defend Christian values should stay well away from antisemitism.”1 Yet when the EU appointed a coordinator for combatting antisemitism in 2015 the resources given to her were minute.

 

European Commission President, Jean Claude Juncker, said in January 2019 on International Holocaust Remembrance day: “We will not tolerate any form of antisemitism from everyday hate speech, offline and online, to physical attacks. The European Commission is working hand-in-hand with all member states to combat this menace and guarantee the security of Jewish communities in Europe. Our Union was built on the ashes of the Holocaust. Remembering it and fighting antisemitism is our duty toward the Jewish community and indispensable to protect our common European values.”2 Around the same time EU Foreign Policy Chief Federica Mogherini, said “The European Union has always been and stays engaged against any form of antisemitism, including attempts to condone, justify or trivialize the Holocaust.”3

 

In January 2019, EU Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, Vera Yourova said: “The fact that 9 out of 10 Jews in Europe today again perceive a rise in antisemitism, as recently stated in a Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) survey, is Europe’s shame.” She listed four areas of future activities to fight antisemitism of the EU Commission: security of Jewish communities and premises, education and Holocaust remembrance, increasing the awareness of antisemitism as a problem by making use of the IHRA definition and better data collection of antisemitic incidents, also beyond hate crime and finally supporting the development of national strategies.4

 

This may sound promising to the uninformed. It is however far too little and far too late. Yourova noted that a precondition for fighting antisemitism is the establishment of an accepted definition. The sole candidate is that of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).5 Yourova said that she had accepted this definition in 2017 as a basis for the work on countering antisemitism. This may sound good at first. It raises a major question: Why has only this EU Commissioner accepted the IHRA definition rather than the entire Commission?

 

The IHRA definition has been accepted for internal use by seven EU countries, the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Lithuania, Slovakia, Romania and Bulgaria. When the definition was accepted by the IHRA in May 2016 this required the approval of all its members. These include the great majority of EU members.

 

Much more important than the EU’s fight against antisemitism in the past decades is the massive immigration of antisemites from Muslim countries where the percentage of antisemitic citizens is among the highest in the world. Among these millions of immigrants the percentage of antisemites is also far higher than that of native Europeans.

 

The EU Commission cannot claim innocence in this matter. Frits Bolkestein was the Dutch EU Commissioner from 1999 to 2004. He told me more ten years ago and agreed that I could publish it: “In the European Commission, I twice tried to raise the problem of the multicultural society and the risks of unlimited Muslim immigration. My colleagues … did not want to discuss it. I said to one Commissioner that they almost considered me a racist. He replied: ‘Drop the word almost.”6

 

In January 2019, the European Commission published its Eurobarometer 484 study titled Perceptions of Antisemitism. This study contains data on perceptions of antisemitism among the citizens of all member states. The researchers found that fifty percent of the respondents think that antisemitism is a problem in their country. These include fifteen percent who consider it a very important problem.7 There is however a huge gap between awareness of antisemitism and effectively fighting it.

 

One further important operational reason why the EU cannot fight antisemitism is that it has no common standards for incidents. Reliable statistics about incidents, according to common criteria, are needed. There are even countries which do not provide statistics at all. From From Yourova’s words one can understand that after more than eighteen years of greatly increased antisemitism the collection of uniform data on incidents in the EU is only somewhere on the horizon.

 

Beyond operational reasons there are two structural causes which prevent the European Union from effectively fighting antisemitism. Almost nobody in Europe who is not Jewish has dared to state the truth: Antisemitism is an integral part of European culture. The history of many European Union member countries is characterized far more by the antisemitism interwoven with it than by democracy.

 

Antisemitism is many centuries old. While it has had ups and downs it has never gone away in these European countries. Antisemitism is much older than the values in addition to democracy the European Union considers to be fundamental: respect for human dignity, human rights, freedom, democracy, equality and the rule of law.

To fight antisemitism effectively the EU has to admit this upfront. That means also that it has to order from genuine scholars – and specifically not from antisemitism whitewashers – in depth studies on the meaning of the ingrained aspects of antisemitism in European culture and how they are promoted. It includes investigating the level of citizens’ agreement with the stereotypes of Jews and the antisemitic accusations against them.8 Research has also to be done into the spreading of the word “Jew’ as a curse word in various countries, the way Jews are presented in schoolbooks and so on.

 

There is a second major structural reason why the EU cannot effectively fight antisemitism. One cannot simultaneously incite against Israel, the only state with a Jewish majority, and fight antisemitism. As this is the reality it becomes clear why the EU does not want to accept the IHRA definition which inter alia states that singling out Israel is antisemitic.

 

Yet the EU does this antisemitic singling out from time to time. One example is when the EU decided to label goods from the disputed West Bank and not from any territories occupied by a variety of states. As jurists Avi Bell and Eugene Kontorovich have pointed out: “The EU does not have a general set of rules for dealing with occupied territories, settlements or territorial administrations whose legality is not recognized by the EU. Rather, the EU has special restrictions aimed at Israel.”9 Furthermore Israel’s Ministry of Strategy has published data on the transfer of funds by the EU to Israel boycott organizations.10

 

The UN General Assembly performs antisemitic acts by singling Israel out annually for condemnation in many resolutions. If one collects data on the voting records of many EU states on these resolutions their major participation in this antisemitic process becomes evident.

 

For the EU to effectively fight antisemitism it has first to admit that antisemitism is ingrained in its culture and also change its biased attitude toward Israel. From there the way to effectively fight antisemitism is still arduous and long. As there is no indication that the EU is willing to openly admit to the reality, the discrepancy between the words of its leaders’ intentions and the need to come clean and act will remain huge.

 

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