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Europe:  An ugly surge in anti-Semitism (Reprinted from THE WEEK, August 1, 2014, p. 13)

The conflict in Gaza is spilling into the streets of Europe, said Jill Reilly and Allan Hall in the Daily Mail (U.K.).  Over the past two weeks, as Israeli forces have pounded Gaza and Hamas has fired rockets into Israeli towns, anti-war demonstrations across the Continent have shifted from anti-Israeli to anti-Jewish.  In France, protesters torched cars in Jewish neighborhoods, destroyed several Jewish-owned stores, and even attacked synagogues.  “They are not screaming, ‘Death to the Israelis,’ on the streets of Paris,” said Roger Cukierman, the head of the Representative Council of French Jewish Institution.  “They are screaming, ‘Death to the Jews.’”  In Germany, demonstrators holding Israeli flags were kicked and beaten, while pro-Palestinian camp chanted “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas.”  One imam at a Berlin mosque reportedly told worshippers to murder Jews.  “We are currently experiencing in this country an explosion of evil and violent hatred of Jews.” Said Dieter Graumann, president of Germany’s Central Council of Jews.

In France, much of the anger comes from a perception that the government has sided with Israel, said Marion Garreau in Le Monde (France).  France has 600,000 Jews – the third-largest population anywhere, after Israel and the U.S. – and 6 million Muslims, the largest population in the EU.  The government therefore ought to be especially careful in its pronouncements on Israel and Palestine.  Yet President Francois Hollande, breaking with years of diplomatic precedent, announced his support of Israel’s right to defend itself at the start of this conflict.  After the first outbreak of ant-Jewish violence, the government even banned pro-Palestinian protests in Paris, which only encouraged the radicals to turn out.

In any case, the troublemakers aren’t the ethnic French, said Paul-Henri du Limbert in Le Figaro (France).  Most of those who rioted this week, as in every other riot in recent memory, are children of immigrants from Arab and African countries.  They hate Jews, yes.  But not just Jews.  The French are discovering that “more and more of our compatriots are French citizens who hate France.”  It’s thanks to them that we are getting a reputation as “the most anti-Semitic country in the Western world.”

Germany can’t let itself off so easily, said Ulf Poschardt in the Berliner Morgenpost (Germany).  Anti-Semitism is certainly rife among the Muslim community here, but they weren’t the only ones screaming, “Jews, cowardly pigs,” at demonstrations last weekend – there were plenty of neo-Nazis and leftist activists as well.  Such a repellant display is “a national scandal.”  Jews are already emigrating from France in record numbers because they don’t feel safe.  Germany simply cannot let that happen here.  “Our history prohibits it.”  If Jews are hounded out of Germany once again, we will have lost our claim to democracy – and our soul.”