Study finds rise in European anti-semitism, anti-semitic attitudes varies across Europe

Europe: Anti-Semitism up, Islamophobia down

Overall, the level of anti-Semitic attitudes varies quite a lot across Europe with comparably lower levels of anti-Semitic attitudes in Britain and the Netherlands and significantly higher levels in Portugal, and especially Poland and Hungary.

Europe: Anti-Semitism up, Islamophobia down [Ynetnews.com December 6, 2009]

Study on 'group-focused enmity' conducted by researchers from University of Bielefeld in Germany finds hatred of Muslims decreased over past year, while hatred of Jews and homosexuals growing. Poland defined as most racist country

For the last eight years, the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence at the University of Bielefeld has been running an annual study called "German Conditions" to learn about "group focused enmity“ such as xenophobia, sexism, racism, anti-Semitism, and prejudices against unemployed, disabled, homeless or homosexual people in Germany.

Due to the financial crisis and the fears of the future, poverty and unemployment that are being stoked by that, the researchers expected a rise this year.

But compared to last year's results (as well as those of 2002), the level of resentment against most minorities declined – sexism and racism even considerably, Islamophobia slightly. There were only two exceptions: Homophobia and anti-Semitism.

Hatred of both groups is on the rise as they are considered to be found also among people of a high status.

Beate Küpper, one of the study's main researchers, believes that the financial crisis may in fact be a possible explanation for that. Küpper said that although in comparison to other European countries Germany was on average, it was staggering that in the light of German history, 48% still agreed with anti-Semitic statements.

For the first time, the study also compared xenophobia among European countries like Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Portugal, Poland, and Hungary. According to their findings, the level of prejudices against minorities in Europe is alarming.

About 50.4% of the population agreed that “there are too many immigrants” in their country, 54.4% believe that “the Islam is a religion of intolerance.” Interestingly enough, the percentage of people who believe “that there are too many Muslims” in their country is especially high in those countries that actually have a low percentage of Muslims living in them.

Nearly one-third (31.3%) of the Europeans somewhat or strongly agree that “there is a natural hierarchy between black and white people”. A majority of 60.2% stick to traditional gender roles, demanding that “women should take their role as wives and mothers more seriously.” Some 42.6% deny equal value of gay men and lesbian women and judge homosexuality as "immoral".


Hiding behind criticism of Israel

Anti-Semitism is also still widely spread in Europe. The team of scientists from the universities of Amsterdam, Bielefeld, Budapest, Grenoble, Lisbon, Marburg, Oxford, Padua, Paris, and Warsaw found that 41.2% of Europeans believe that “Jews try to take advantage of having been victims during the Nazi era”. The highest degree of affirmation was in Poland - 72%, and the lowest in the Netherlands – 5.6%.

One-quarter of Europeans (24.5%) believe that “Jews have too much influence“, and nearly one-third (31%) agree that “Jews in general do not care about anything or anyone but their own kind."

On the other hand, 61.9% say that Jews “enrich our culture”, especially in the Netherlands, Britain and Germany.

They study also measured the degree of anti-Semitism hidden behind a specific criticism of Israel’s policy towards the Palestinians that uses anti-Semitic terms such as “war of persecution” and a generalization to “all Jews”.

Some 45.7% of the Europeans (apart for France, where this facet of anti-Semitism was not measured) somewhat or strongly agree that “Israel is conducting a war of extermination against the Palestinians.” About 37.4% agree with the following statement: “Considering Israel’s policy, I can understand why people do not like Jews.”

Overall, the level of anti-Semitic attitudes varies quite a lot across Europe with comparably lower levels of anti-Semitic attitudes in Britain and the Netherlands and significantly higher levels in Portugal, and especially Poland and Hungary.

Federation's Leadership Forum trip to Israel pictured in the DM Register

A nice memento of the Leadership Forum's June 2009 Mission to Israel.  This picture was taken when the group visited the grottoes of Rosh Hanikra, in the Western Galilee, our Israel-Partnership region.  The Western Galilee is in the northernmost part of Israel along the Mediterranean. Rosh Hanikra is the promontory on the sea and borders Lebanon. 

The Des Moines Register graciously printed this picture in its 12/4/09 edition as part of its continuing series showing Des Moiners displaying copies of the Register in places all over the world.

The Mythical Peace That is Just Out of Reach
By Ami Isseroff   11/29/09    Abridged.

The conventional wisdom in much of the world holds that there is an Israeli-Arab peace settlement that is just out of reach - so near yet so far, frustrated only by tactical accidents. We all know what the peace settlement must look like, says the myth. If only Israel wasn't so stubborn about building in Jerusalem or (under Ehud Olmert) not negotiating at all about Jerusalem, there could be peace in a week. But somehow peace...remains beyond reach.... [because the Palestinian leadership -- as demonstrated by the existing documents of their statements to date --  insist on terms that are designed to destroy Israel as a Jewish state.]

 

[It is a myth] that the Palestinian leaders have really agreed or are secretly ready to agree to all the [supposedly 'everyone knows what peace will look like'] proposals and/or that polls show that the Palestinian people back these [everyone-knows-to-be reasonable] concessions.

 

There cannot be peace until...the Palestinian position changes from demands that amount to destruction of Israel to requirements that can be considered a legitimate and serious bargaining position. 

[The article documents Palestinian opinion on the so-termed "Right of Return"]

Ahmandinejad: Israel can’t stop Iranian nukes

December 2, 2009

JERUSALEM (JTA) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Israel cannot do a "damn thing" to stop his country's nuclear program.

Ahmadinejad made the statement Wednesday in a televised speech, Reuters reported.

He called the International Atomic Energy Agency's resolution approved last week censuring the country's nuclear activity "illegal" and said it came "under pressure of a few superficially powerful countries."
The IAEA resolution called on Iran to halt construction of a recently disclosed underground nuclear enrichment facility. In response, Iran's parliament on Sunday approved the construction of 10 new uranium enrichment sites.

Israel's U.N. Quagmire

An important article by Uriel Heilman. An Uphill struggle: Israel's U.N. Quagmire. Bloc voting cobbles together the 56 votes of the Arab and Muslim states. Members of the Non-Aligned Movement usually vote with the Arab/Muslim states -- as does the E.U. Israel - 1 vote.

Excerpt from Israel's U.N. Quagmire

 "A lot of what goes on at the U.N. is about evening the score between the developing world and the developed world, and that puts Israel in a very difficult spot." -- Jeff Helmreich, an expert on international law and a former staffer at Israel's U.N. mission

The United Nations does not reflect the reality of what's going on in the world today because there is no political will to call attention to that reality. Sudan, Myanmar, and North Korea usually escape condemnation simply because not enough members are interested in confronting powerful blocs over massacres, conflicts, and human-rights violations.

92ST Y Debate over American policy in the Middle East



Moderated by Eliot Spitzer, Dershowitz and Jeremy Ben-Ami debated over American policy in the Middle East on Sat, Nov 21, 2009.

Should military solutions or diplomatic ones be favored? What is the role of pro-Israel advocacy at a time of changing relationships between the U.S. and Israel? Has J Street helped or hurt the prospects for peace? Does the traditional lobby speak for all, or even most, American Jews? highlights in the video of Alan Dershowitz, who has been called Israels top defender in the court of public opinion, and Jeremy Ben-Ami, the founder and director of J Street, wrestling with these and other issues.

Tom Friedman: Hasan just another jihadist

America vs. The Narrative
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN New York Times Op Ed, November 29, 2009

What should we make of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who apparently killed 13 innocent people at Fort Hood?

Here’s my take: Major Hasan may have been mentally unbalanced — I assume anyone who shoots up innocent people is. But the more you read about his support for Muslim suicide bombers, about how he showed up at a public-health seminar with a PowerPoint presentation titled “Why the War on Terror Is a War on Islam,” and about his contacts with Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric famous for using the Web to support jihadist violence against America — the more it seems that Major Hasan was just another angry jihadist spurred to action by “The Narrative.”

What is scary is that even though he was born, raised and educated in America, The Narrative still got to him.

The Narrative is the cocktail of half-truths, propaganda and outright lies about America that have taken hold in the Arab-Muslim world since 9/11. Propagated by jihadist Web sites, mosque preachers, Arab intellectuals, satellite news stations and books — and tacitly endorsed by some Arab regimes — this narrative posits that America has declared war on Islam, as part of a grand “American-Crusader-Zionist conspiracy” to keep Muslims down.

Yes, after two decades in which U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny — in Bosnia, Darfur, Kuwait, Somalia, Lebanon, Kurdistan, post-earthquake Pakistan, post-tsunami Indonesia, Iraq and Afghanistan — a narrative that says America is dedicated to keeping Muslims down is thriving.

Although most of the Muslims being killed today are being killed by jihadist suicide bombers in Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan and Indonesia, you’d never know it from listening to their world. The dominant narrative there is that 9/11 was a kind of fraud: America’s unprovoked onslaught on Islam is the real story, and the Muslims are the real victims — of U.S. perfidy.

Have no doubt: we punched a fist into the Arab/Muslim world after 9/11, partly to send a message of deterrence, but primarily to destroy two tyrannical regimes — the Taliban and the Baathists — and to work with Afghans and Iraqis to build a different kind of politics. In the process, we did some stupid and bad things. But for every Abu Ghraib, our soldiers and diplomats perpetrated a million acts of kindness aimed at giving Arabs and Muslims a better chance to succeed with modernity and to elect their own leaders.

The Narrative was concocted by jihadists to obscure that.

It’s working. As a Jordanian-born counterterrorism expert, who asked to remain anonymous, said to me: “This narrative is now omnipresent in Arab and Muslim communities in the region and in migrant communities around the world. These communities are bombarded with this narrative in huge doses and on a daily basis. [It says] the West, and right now mostly the U.S. and Israel, is single-handedly and completely responsible for all the grievances of the Arab and the Muslim worlds. Ironically, the vast majority of the media outlets targeting these communities are Arab-government owned — mostly from the Gulf.”

This narrative suits Arab governments. It allows them to deflect onto America all of their people’s grievances over why their countries are falling behind. And it suits Al Qaeda, which doesn’t need much organization anymore — just push out The Narrative over the Web and satellite TV, let it heat up humiliated, frustrated or socially alienated Muslim males, and one or two will open fire on their own. See: Major Hasan.

“Liberal Arabs like me are as angry as a terrorist and as determined to change the status quo,” said my Jordanian friend. The only difference “is that while we choose education, knowledge and success to bring about change, a terrorist, having bought into the narrative, has a sense of powerlessness and helplessness, which are inculcated in us from childhood, that lead him to believe that there is only one way, and that is violence.”

What to do? Many Arab Muslims know that what ails their societies is more than the West, and that The Narrative is just an escape from looking honestly at themselves. But none of their leaders dare or care to open that discussion. In his Cairo speech last June, President Obama effectively built a connection with the Muslim mainstream. Maybe he could spark the debate by asking that same audience this question:

“Whenever something like Fort Hood happens you say, ‘This is not Islam.’ I believe that. But you keep telling us what Islam isn’t. You need to tell us what it is and show us how its positive interpretations are being promoted in your schools and mosques. If this is not Islam, then why is it that a million Muslims will pour into the streets to protest Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, but not one will take to the streets to protest Muslim suicide bombers who blow up other Muslims, real people, created in the image of God? You need to explain that to us — and to yourselves.”