Muslim
Anti-Semitism Increases the Threat Facing Europe's Jews
by Abigail R. Esman
Special to IPT News
May 7, 2019
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 In Amsterdam, where
a Syrian refugee twice last year shattered the windows of a kosher
restaurant, men leaving synagogue remind each other to remove their
yarmulkes before going out into the street. It is too dangerous to be seen
wearing one.
In France, where a teenager inspired by ISIS attempted to decapitate a Jewish teacher in 2016,
Muslim youth have killed 10 people during the past six years simply
for being Jews.
And in Germany, where the history of anti-Semitism runs deep, a new report from the Federal Office for the Protection of
the Constitution (BfV), cites more than 100 anti-Semitic incidents in 2017
for which Muslims were responsible. Much of these, the report says, can be attributed to the arrival of more than 1 million
Muslim refugees and immigrants since 2014. Others, however, point to a rise
in anti-Semitism among radical right and radical left groups, resulting in 1,646 anti-Semitic incidents in 2018,
including 62 physical attacks.
Remarkably, clear statistics for Germany are difficult to fully
ascertain. While 41 percent of German Jews questioned for an EU-wide report published by the European Union Agency
for Fundamental Rights (FRA) stated they'd been subjected to anti-Semitic
speech or attacks by fundamentalist Muslims, German police report that 94 percent of all attacks were perpetrated
by right-wing extremists, and only 5 percent by Muslims. One possible
reason for the discrepancy is the reluctance of many Jews to report attacks
to the police, while they may be willing to include mention of them in a
survey.
Either way, it is clear to German authorities that Islamism is taking a
toll on the country's Jews, only deepening the dangers posed by right- and
left-wing extremists. Yet, the BfV report says Islamist anti-Semitism
differs from radical right Jew hatred in that "it is not racist."
They do not explain what that means, exactly. Rather, they say, it is based
on deeply-held religious and cultural beliefs Muslim immigrants bring with
them. As Deutsche Welle reports, former Justice Minister
Heiko Mass also noted that those who have come as refugees "have
hardly had any reason to deal with German history. On the contrary, they
often come from countries in which the powerful stir up hate for Jews and
Israel, and anti-Semitism has almost become a cultural matter of
fact."
In response, according to the BBC, the country's main Jewish
organization is calling for classes on anti-Semitism specifically for
Muslim immigrants as part of their integration curriculum. "Muslim
communities must credibly and thoroughly fight anti-Semitism within their
own ranks and make it their own matter," Daniel Botmann of the Central
Council of Jews in Germany stated in a recent speech.
But solving Muslim anti-Semitism in Germany addresses only a small part
of a problem that threatens to take over all of Western Europe. As James
Kirchick observed in Tablet, "a third of respondents [to the FRA
survey] have considered emigrating from Europe because they no longer feel
safe there as Jews."
Hence, when Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad surveyed both Jews and non-Jews about their experiences
and views of anti-Semitism, one man recalled the armed military police that
stood outside his synagogue on his wedding day. "It is an image that
remains with me always," he said. And David Suurland, a professor of
political theory, noted that much of the hatred came from "people from
Islamic cultures."
"People pretend it's about Israel and 'Zionists,'" he told the
NRC, "but in fact they're talking about Jews. 'Zionists' run
the media, the banks, the money, politics – everything that is wrong in the
world is the fault of the Zionists."
But perhaps most telling of all was the
incident last Saturday, Dutch Remembrance day, at a service honoring the
victims of the Holocaust at the former concentration camp in Vught. As
every year, the entire country came to a standstill for two minutes at
precisely 8 p.m. Trains stopped along the tracks. Planes were grounded at
the airports. The country stood in silence. And then, from the prison
nearby Kamp Vught, several voices rang out against the stillness.
"Allahu Akbar!" they cried – Allah is great.
None of which should be surprising. Among Jews responding to the FRA
survey in the Netherlands, 35 percent said that the anti-Semitism they had
experienced came from "[s]omeone with a Muslim extremist view."
In addition, countries with smaller Jewish populations have also noted a
major increase in Jew-hate, particularly, but by no means exclusively,
among Muslims. In Sweden, a far-right politician hideously joked about Anne Frank, calling her "the
coolest girl in the shower room." On at least two occasions,
synagogues have been bombed by Muslims. Hence, reports the Times of Israel, "In Sweden,
Muslim extremism and the far right are part of a broader set of challenges
to Jewish communal life. So while the Jewish community of Stockholm may be
growing, the problems are nonetheless causing some Swedish Jews to fear for
their future as a minority here."
And well they might. A February NGO Monitor report noted that the Swedish government is helping to fund
"radical anti-Israel NGOs that routinely use anti-Semitic motifs in
their demonization of the Jewish State and the Jewish people ... During its
tenure, the Secretariat funneled over $13 million (2013-2016) to Palestinian
NGOs that promote anti-Semitism, the elimination of Israel, the so-called
'right of resistance' (a euphemism for terrorism), violent imagery, and
anti-Israel national origin discrimination. Several of these groups also
have links to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a
terrorist organization designated as such by the EU, the US, Canada,
Australia, and Israel."
So sympathetic is Sweden to their cause, in fact, that a
Palestinian-born Muslim who took part in throwing Molotov cocktails into a
Swedish synagogue, was saved from deportation by a judge who feared that
"the anti-Semitic nature of this attack could put him in danger from
Israel" – effectively demonstrating more concern for his well-being
than for the well-being of Swedish Jews.
No wonder, then, that the FRA report showed a full 40 percent of Swedish
Jews cited Muslims as the perpetrators of attacks.
Still, nowhere has violence against Jews been more dire than in France,
where a group of more than 250 intellectuals and politicians signed a statement warning of "ethnic cleansing" of
Jews by Muslim extremists. Despite oft-voiced concerns about
"Islamophobia," the statement claims, "Jews are 25 percent
more likely to be the victims of violence than Muslims." Indeed, from 2012
to 2018, 11 Jews were murdered by Muslim extremists, simply because they
were Jews.
Fully 10 percent of French Jews have left the country in that time – a
total of about 50,000 people. And more are strongly considering leaving.
They no longer feel safe in their homeland.
The statement, published in Le Parisien and signed by such
notables as Alain Finkielkraut, Carla Bruni, Bernard Cazeneuve, Gerard
Depardieu, Nidra Poller and several Muslim activist leaders, further
demands the abolition of verses in the Quran that "refer to the
killing and punishment of Jews, Christians, and unbelievers.... so that no
believer can rely on a sacred text to commit a crime.
We expect the Islam of France to lead the way. We demand that the fight
against the democratic bankruptcy of anti-Semitism become a national cause
before it is too late. Before France is no longer France."
And yet France is not leading the way. French Muslims, like those
elsewhere in Europe, are substantially more likely to protest against
Islamophobia and Israel than to defend the Jews.
To their credit, several British Muslims have founded Muslims
Against Anti-Semitism, a nonprofit devoted to uniting Muslims to fight
Jew-hate. Last May, the organization ran a full-page ad in the Telegraph that announced: We
Muslims have one word for Jews: Shalom."
Similarly, German Jews' idea to introduce Jewish history and culture
lessons to immigrants as part of their integration process – an initiative
no other European country has apparently considered – also would be a
commendable approach to addressing the problem. But it has yet to be
enacted.
And even if it is, neither of these efforts will change the course of
European anti-Semitism on its own. For this both offer far too little. And
for far too many Jews, they come far too late.
Abigail R. Esman, the author, most recently, of Radical State: How Jihad Is Winning Over Democracy in
the West (Praeger, 2010), is a freelance writer based in New
York and the Netherlands Her next book, on domestic abuse and terrorism,
will be published by Potomac Books. Follow her at @radicalstates.
Related Topics: Abigail
R. Esman, anti-Semitism,
European
Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, German
BfV, Muslim
anti-Semitism, refugees,
Central
Council of Jews in Germany, Daniel
Botmann, David
Suurland, NGO
Monitor, anti-Zionism
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