Media Bias Can Sow Hate and Discord

The week in antisemitism By GIL HOFFMAN International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about antisemitism following the unfortunate shooting death of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh while covering clashes between the IDF and Palestinian gunmen in the West Bank city of Jenin on Wednesday.  

Israel has been pleading with the Palestinians to allow a proper investigation into the circumstances of her death. Foreign Minister Yair Lapid offered Palestinian Authority Civil Affairs Minister Hussein Al-Sheikh either a joint probe or one that would also involve the United States, where Abu Akleh was a citizen.   

But the Palestinians have refused to hand over the bullet to check whether it was fired from an IDF weapon. Because it was fired by an M-16, which both sides have, without a proper probe, it may never be possible to be completely certain who killed Abu Akleh.  

Regardless, the international media adopted the Palestinians' claims and pronounced Israel guilty immediately.  Media around the world has parroted the Palestinian line - advanced by Al Jazeera - that Israel killed Abu Akleh, not only in the crossfire, but even on purpose.   This is especially dangerous, because Abu Akleh was a revered journalist who thanks to Al-Jazeera, is known throughout the Arab world.  

There is reason to fear that the calls for revenge at Abu Akleh's funeral and memorial ceremonies will result in the killing of an Israeli journalist reporting in the West Bank, more of the recent stabbing and shooting attacks in Israel, or perhaps an attack on Jews in an unexpected location around the world.   

Jenin has been a hotbed of terror, and the murderers in recent attacks in Israel came from the city.   Israel will be taking additional steps to protect its people, due to the incitement that emerged following Abu Akleh's death.  Unfortunately, steps will also have to be taken to protect Jews in Canada, the US and around the world.   America's new envoy responsible for monitoring and combating antisemitism, Prof. Deborah Lipstadt, said in her first speech in her new job on Thursday that antisemites use Israel as an excuse to justify their actions.  “They camouflage their antisemitism in attacks on Israel: 'We're not attacking Jews, we're criticizing the sovereign state,' they assure you,” she said. 

"Let me state something which the United States government has repeatedly affirmed - criticism of Israeli policies is not antisemitism. But when there is an imbalance in the criticism, a failure to see the wrongs of others, and attributing blame to only one party and the use of double standards, one is compelled to ask what's the basis for this imbalance.” 

The week in antisemitism By GIL HOFFMAN International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about rising antisemitism around the world and endorsed the view of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett that no event in human history should be compared to the Holocaust.  

In his Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day speech at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem on Wednesday, Bennett rejected such comparisons, which have been made more and more since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He was believed to be referencing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who compared the Russian attacks of his country to the Holocaust in a speech to the Knesset.

  "My brothers and sisters, the Holocaust is an unprecedented event in human history," Bennett said. "I take the trouble to say this because as the years go by, there is more and more discourse in the world that compares other difficult events to the Holocaust. But no. Even the most difficult wars today are not the Holocaust and are not comparable to the Holocaust. No event in history, cruel as it may have been, is comparable to the Holocaust – the extermination of Europe's Jews by the Nazis and their collaborators."  Bennett said that unfortunately, history is full of cruel wars, brutal murders and also genocide. But he said such wars are usually a means designed to achieve a goal, some sort of expectation - military, political, economic, religious.

   "The case of the extermination of the Jews is different," he said. "Never, in any place or during any time, has one people acted to destroy another in such a planned, systematic and indifferent way, from a place of absolute ideology and not out of utilitarianism. The Nazis did not kill Jews to take their jobs or their homes. The Nazis sought to hunt all Jews and exterminate every last one of them."

  The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom published a new report on Monday, detailing shockingly disturbing levels of antisemitism in Turkey and the Islamic Republic of Iran, The Jerusalem Post reported.  “Iran also continued to spread antisemitism," the report said. "It released the results of its third Holocaust denial cartoon contest in January. Several submissions critical of Israel contained explicitly antisemitic tropes. In December, a state media outlet criticized a Shab-e Yalda display reminiscent of a Jewish Sukkah as a ‘distortion.’”

  The commission listed the clerical state as a “country of particular concern” – the most severe designation – because of its harsh treatment and repression of religious minorities and freedom.  The USCIRF report took Turkey to task for state-sponsored Jew-hatred. “Government officials at various levels expressed antisemitism through statements and social media posts. In May, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan used antisemitic language in a televised speech, prompting strong condemnation from the U.S. Department of State."

  The number of antisemitic incidents recorded in the Netherlands reached a 10-year high of 183 cases in 2021, a Dutch Jewish watchdog group said, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The 2021 tally was a 35-percent increase over the previous year, said the Hague-based Center for Information and Documentation on Israel, or CIDI.  At least 72 of the incidents happened in what the CIDI, called “real-life” conditions, meaning in physical spaces and not online. Of those, 21 were acts of vandalism and three incidents were violent assaults.  In one assault, three men punched a Jewish man and his sister on the street in western Amsterdam. The woman was wearing traditional Jewish Orthodox clothes and had a mask with a star of David on it that she got from the Jewish old age home Beit Shalom while volunteering there. One of the attackers told the siblings “Jews don’t belong here,” the siblings told police. 

 Likud MK Ophir Akunis used a Holocaust memorial ceremony at the Knesset on Thursday to criticize Germany. Akunis spoke at the event, whose guest star was German Bundestag President Bärbel Bas. He made a point of speaking in English when he spoke about the town where his family lived in Europe.  “97% of the community (was murdered), Madame Speaker,” he said.  Akunis then added in Hebrew: “Others can forgive the Germans. I don’t forget or forgive.”  Bas lit a memorial candle at the Knesset in memory of Irma Nathan, a woman from her hometown who was murdered in the Holocaust.  In positive news on antisemitism, Alaska became the 25th state to adopt the IHRA working definition of antisemitism this week, through a proclamation by Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy.  Pennsylvania's attorney-general, Josh Shapiro, who is the democratic candidate for the state's governor, vowed to intensify Pennsylvania's efforts against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. 

  "At the state level, we can make clear that not only do we not condone BDS, we downright oppose it," he said. "There is no doubt that it causes a threat to Israeli security. I will oppose policies that condone BDS."  Pennsylvania is already among the at least 35 US states with anti-BDS laws that have taken effect. Shapiro said he intends to better enforce the law and give it more teeth, both as governor and in his current post as attorney-general in his second term. He said he wants to do more to use the law to take action against Unilever, the parent company of Ben & Jerry's, which has broken its contract with its Israeli licensee who refused the company's request to stop selling over the pre-1967 border. 

 "It's great that we have the law, but with Unilever, we saw the shortcomings in the legislation, which didn't let the state government sever contracts with the company," he said. "I hope Republicans and Democrats join forces in amending the law to give the offices of the attorney general and the governor the ability to better enforce the BDS law. Any company that promotes BDS shouldn't not be doing business with the commonwealth of Pennsylvania."  In archaeological news, a team of Canadian and Australian researchers have identified what they claim is evidence of Crusader-era hand grenades in Jerusalem, the Times of Israel reported. 

  The so-called “Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch” was parodied in the 1975 movie, “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”  Now, led by Griffith University’s Associate Professor Carney Matheson, a team of researchers analyzed residue discovered inside four spherical ceramic vessels dating to the 11th–12th century that were excavated between 1961-67 in the Jerusalem Old City’s Armenian Gardens. The vessels are consistent with Mamluk pottery and were found at the site of a Crusader royal palace. They were left untouched in the Royal Ontario Museum collections, merely lightly brushed for dirt.

  The scientists’ explosive new findings indicate that while three of the containers were used to contain oils for foods, medicines and perfumes, one of the examined vessels was likely used for “the storage of chemicals or may have held the chemical ingredients for an explosive device, consistent with a medieval grenade.”

Israel returns to political chaos By GIL HOFFMAN International Correspondent for AGPI  

One of the most memorable lines of the third Godfather movie that came out in 1990 was when Michael Corleone, played by Al Pacino, says "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."  The same could be said by the people of Israel regarding this week's political developments in the Jewish state.  Israel endured an unprecedented four elections in two years before Prime Minister Naftali Bennett formed a government and ousted Benjamin Netanyahu, who was responsible for much of the political chaos. 

The coalition was narrow, diverse and barely workable, but at least it functioned.  One of the reasons why Bennett's governing coalition had a difficult time passing bills was that its chairwoman Idit Silman was not particularly good at her job of rallying the troops and ensuring that votes pass.  On Wednesday morning, Israel time, Silman dropped a bombshell, announcing that she was defecting from the coalition to the opposition, led by Netanyahu.   

She tried to paint her decision in ideological terms, speaking about the Jewish character of the State and complaining about the health minister's decision to allow people to bring sandwiches into public hospitals on Passover.  But it was quickly revealed that she received a commitment from Netanyahu for a safe slot on the next Likud Knesset list and an appointment as health minister if the Likud would form a government. 

Silman had come under pressure from her own right-wing husband, Shmulik, who repeatedly insulted her on social media and in radio interviews.  Bennett should have seen this coming. He has made very little effort on internal politics inside his Yamina Party since becoming prime minister, and now he is paying a price for that neglect.  He was too busy mediating between the presidents of Russia and Ukraine to deal with the likes of Silman. He did not know that he should have been mediating between his coalition chairwoman and her husband.  

The result of that neglect is Bennett losing his 61-59 majority over the opposition. It is now 60-60 but actually 60-54-6, because the six MKs of the Arab Joint List neither want to keep Bennett in power, nor crown Netanyahu.  A poll taken Wednesday for Israel's Channel 12 found that 34% of Israelis want the current government to find a way to continue, 21% want elections and 29% want a new government to be formed by the current Knesset without going back to the polls.  Each option is hard to achieve. The most likely result now is that if more MKs do not jump ship, the current government will try to bide time and stay in power for as long as possible.  

The Knesset is on recess till May 9. Then another recess for the summer and subsequent Jewish holidays beckons. Meanwhile, the coalition won't accomplish much, other than its primary goal of keeping Netanyahu away from the Prime Minister’s Office.  Legislation cannot be passed without a majority, but Bennett can continue to deal with Russia and Ukraine and try to prevent a deal from being reached with Iran. He can focus on fighting the menacing evils of terror and COVID-19.   But an election will happen sooner or later, in the second half of this year or first half of 2023. 

Who knows if a government can be formed after that and if another race would follow.  Israel will return to proving Einstein's theory of insanity by holding perpetual elections and expecting a different result.  If Israelis thought they were out of that political insanity, they have been pulled back in.   May God (and whatever godfather he sends) help Israel emerge from this cycle and restore its political stability. 

Since Russia invaded Ukraine, there has been a constant attempt by both sides in the conflict to drag the Jewish people and the Jewish state into the war.  Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has resisted those efforts and instead tried to mediate, becoming the first world leader to meet with Russian leader Vladimir Putin last Saturday and speaking by phone several times with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Zelenskyy complained to Israeli journalist Etai Engel that Bennett had not taken Ukraine's side in the war. Noting a photo that spread on social media of Israelis wrapping themselves in the Ukrainian flag at the Western Wall, Zelenskyy said it bothered him that Bennett had not done the same.   The response from Bennett's associates has been that he can play a useful role as a mediator and that Israel must be careful, because Putin's Russian army is right on its border in Syria.    Not giving up, Zelenskyy has asked to speak by video to the Knesset and the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Museum.  In an exclusive interview with 

The Jerusalem Post, Kyiv mayor and former heavyweight boxing champion Vitali Klitschko went further. Klitschko said his models for how to win against all odds are Israel - a country he has visited and admires - and the IDF, which has been successful in mobilizing and maximizing its reservists.   "We have to learn from Israel how to defend our country, with every citizen," he said. "If they love the country, they need to be ready to defend the country. We have a lot to learn from Israel, because we need every citizen to defend his home and his future."  The Jewish people have also been dragged into the propaganda war on both sides. First there were reports that Russia hit the Babyn Yar Holocaust memorial site, when in fact it was a nearby communications tower that was hit. 

That fake news was intended to make Russia look bad.  In an attempt to make Ukraine look bad, reports were spread that staff from the orphanage in Zhytomyr and other Jews in the city were beaten by non-Jewish Ukrainians after the orphans were evacuated to Israel and greeted by Bennett. Zhytomyr Rabbi Shlomo Vilhelm, who runs the orphanage, vigorously denied the reports.  The way that Israel and many Jewish organizations are truly involved in Ukraine is in helping ease the humanitarian crisis. AGPI partnered with JCC Krakow to provide emergency relief to both Jewish and non-Jewish Ukrainian Refugees fleeing from the war  The organization Isra-Aid has specifically targeted non-Jewish women and children in its humanitarian efforts on Ukraine's border with Moldova. 

    Israel has welcomed more than 2,000 refugees from Ukraine who have immigrated to Israel since the war began. More than 15,000 Jews who are entitled to immigrate according to the Law of Return have applied for aliyah to Israel.    Israeli Aliyah and Integration minister Tamano-Shata set a goal of 100,000 immigrants in the next six months. Israel has provided more than 100 tons of supplies and is opening up a field hospital in Ukraine. 

  Last Friday night, Rabbi Pinchas Zaltsman, the rabbi of the Orthodox community of Moldova, drove to the Ukrainian border on the Sabbat, took dozens of calls and texts, paid money where necessary, gave orders to cook on Shabbat for women and children and made life-or-death decisions about who to take and who to keep waiting. In Jewish law, pikuah nefesh (saving lives) overrides observance of the Sabbath.  He estimated that in one day he received between 400 and 500 Ukrainian Jews, gave them a hot meal and helped them find a place to stay. Dozens slept on mattresses in his small synagogue or the tents built across the street.  "We did this for the Jewish people," Zaltsman said.  

When I was asked to fly to Moldova to report on Ukrainian refugees, I was hesitant at first.   Though I was raised in Chicago and like Canadians, take pride in handling the cold, I knew I would have a challenging experience reporting from the border with Ukraine.

  I am glad I accepted the challenge, because it gave me a new perspective on life. Not only did I travel through four countries to get here, it felt like I also traveled through time.  Through my own eyes, I saw sights I never thought I would see of people fleeing across a border in fear for their lives. I met people who drove for hours and then walked for hours in the rain, facing one bureaucratic hurdle after another, to bring their families to safety.   When they got to Moldova, they were wet and covered in mud, but they were so happy to not have to worry anymore about losing their lives, due to a war they could not even begin to understand.

  I met 89-year-old Anna Galanichka of Vinnytsia, Ukraine, who ran away to the Ural Mountains with her father on a horse drawn cart and a freight train as a nine-year-old child during the Holocaust and now had to run away again, this time to Moldova.  "I fled the Nazis, and now I am fleeing the Russians," she lamented "No one believed the Russians would do such a thing until the last minute when it happened."

  Anna will soon be making aliyah to live in a Jewish State, where she won't have to run away anymore.  I am proud to live in a country that cares about saving lives around the world and provides the shelter for the Jewish people that was so sorely needed when Anna was a child.  Israel has opened its doors to both Jewish and non-Jewish refugees. Its international aid organization Isra-Aid set up a tent that provided games, toys, diapers and baby food to the many Ukrainian mothers who crossed the border with kids and left their husbands at home to fight.

   The Moldovan people have also been very impressive in opening their homes to complete strangers. They came to the border with empty cars and vans and offered to take refugees anywhere they wanted. Restaurants have given away food for free.  In Kishinev (now Chisinau), Moldova, there were horrible pogroms in 1903 and 1905 that killed dozens of Jews. Now there is a thriving Jewish community in Moldova's capital that gets along well with its non-Jewish neighbors and is hosting innumerable refugees for Shabbat. 

  It is hard to get over the past. My own great-grandparents were murdered by Ukrainians, and my grandfather told me the Ukrainians were the world's cruelest people.   But we live in a very different era right now, when instead of harming the Jews, the Ukrainians elected a brave Jew to be their president. 

  Coming here has been a life-changing experience. I am glad I have had an opportunity to tell the stories of the Ukrainian refugees to the world and to see the outpouring of support for them that gives me so much hope for the future. 

 02/25/22 The Abraham Global Peace Initiative continued to express outrage on Friday over Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine and support for the people of Ukraine, including its strong community of 300,000 Jews. 

  Israeli Diaspora Minister Dr. Nachman Shai, who met in Jerusalem with AGPI chairman Avi Abraham Benlolo months ago, announced Friday that he would immediately transfer emergency aid in the amount of 10 million NIS to assist Ukraine’s Jewish community.   Shai said the State of Israel, as the nation-state of the Jewish people, must support Jewish individuals and communities in harms way. Shai has been in contact with Ukrainian Jewish leaders to monitor the evolving situation and evaluate needs, including security, food, medicine and transportation to safe sites.

   "We are following developments in the area with great concern," he said. "Our hearts are with the Jewish people of Ukraine.  We will continue to closely monitor the needs and developments in the field, and respond accordingly."  Israeli Minister of Immigration and Absorption Pnina Tamano Shata reported a drastic increase in the number of applications to the Ministry for immigration to Israel from Ukraine, with about 400 applying on Thursday.   

There are also 17 non-Jewish Ukrainians still alive who saved Jewish lives in the Holocaust and have been officially declared as "Righteous Among The Nations." When granted the title, they were given honorary Israeli citizenship, which entitles them to make aliyah to Israel.  Far away from Ukraine, flyers were found this week in Colleyville, Texas, accusing Jews of causing COVID-19. The flyers found in the town where the January 15 hostage standoff took place, also made hate-filled racist statements about black people. 

  The antisemitic and white supremacist flyers were found in the driveways of members of Congregation Beth Israel, where the incident took place. Police and the FBI are investigating the flyers as a hate crime.  “Every single aspect of the COVID agenda is Jewish,” the flyers said.   Flyers blaming the Jewish community for Covidwere also strewn Sunday around the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus. The university administration took immediate action to launch an investigation into who was responsible.

   The same university's student government held a hearing this week considering bringing the antisemitic BDS movement to the campus.   "While these flyers do not reflect the Illinois leadership and campus community in any way, actions such as these darken our campus somewhat and call for a renewed expression of light since this happened here," campus Chabad Rabbi Dovid Tiechtel wrote on Facebook. "We are asking everyone to do an extra good deed to bring more light to our community. When we are faced with opposition and anti-Jewish sentiment, we cannot back down." 

 Finally, in good news, Israel made history on Monday when its judicial selection committee appointed Kahled Kabub, the first Arab Muslim, to the Supreme Court.   Kabub, who  has spent most of his career handling economic crime issues, is replacing retiring Justice George Karra, a Christian Arab, who convicted Israeli President Moshe Katsav in a historic verdit, when he was a lower court judge. Before Kabub, all Arab-Israeli justices were Christian.

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday that the tension between Russia and Ukraine could lead to not only war but also antisemitic violence.   Ukrainian president  Volodymyr Zelenskyy is Jewish. Ukraine’s parliament passed a law on Wednesday criminalizing antisemitism,  The bill adopted the definition of antisemitism of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), in which antisemitism when committed by an individual is punishable by a fine or a prison sentence of up to five years.  

According to the bill, public officials would also be fined or imprisoned for up to five years, and banned from holding certain offices for up to three years. Organized groups committing acts of antisemitism, or acts with severe consequences, would be punishable with prison sentences of up to eight years.  Governments and states around the world, including Canada, have passed the IHRA definition. The State of Israel has, but the Knesset has not.  Knesset member Zvi Hauser proposed a new bill on Thursday that would adopt the IHRA definition in the Knesset. But former Knesset members expressed concern that it would be hard to enforce the decision in the Knesset, where Israel is singled out and besmirched by its parliament members on a regular basis.  Meanwhile, there continued to be antisemitic incidents around the world this week.   

The words “F*** Jews” were spray-painted three times on the outdoor dining shed of a new restaurant on New York's Upper West Side, which has a strong Jewish population. The incident occurred late Thursday at Miriam, an Israeli restaurant, JTA reported. Police said they were investigating the incident as a hate crime.  The European Parliament may sanction a Bulgarian lawmaker who made what appeared to be a Nazi salute on Wednesday, The Jerusalem Post reported. Angel Dzambazki, of the Bulgarian nationalist VMRO Party, part of the Eurosceptic ECR group, allegedly made the gesture in a European Parliament debate.  

A video shows Djambazki walking out of the parliament plenum and lifting his right hand in a way that resembles a Nazi salute. The gesture sparked an uproar, with European Parliament President Roberta Metsola preparing to launch proceedings to sanction Djambazki for violating a rule that MEPs must conduct themselves “based on the values and principles laid down in the Treaties, and particularly in the Charter of Fundamental Rights.”   Metsola said a fascist salute in the European Parliament "offends me and everyone else in Europe," because it "is from the darkest chapter of our history and must be left there.”  But Dzambazki said he was “humbly waving to the chair” and not making a Nazi salute. In an email to MEPs, he called the accusation “libel and defamation.” 

 A former Massachusetts resident has been indicted for allegedly obstructing an investigation into fires at Jewish-affiliated institutions in May 2019, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said on Wednesday, the JNS news syndicate reported. The man was arrested by Swedish authorities in Stockholm at the request of U.S. authorities, which plans to seek his extradition so he can face charges in Boston.  He was indicted by a federal grand jury in Boston for “making false statements in a matter involving domestic terrorism; falsifying, concealing and covering up a material fact in a matter involving domestic terrorism by trick, scheme and device; concealing records in a federal investigation; tampering with documents and objects; and tampering with an official proceeding.” His younger brother was the prime suspect in an investigation into four fires at Chabad centers and a Jewish-affiliated business that took place in Boston areas with large Jewish populations in May 2019.  

Nearly 1,500 students at the University of Southern California petitioned the university to amend its policies so that Zionist students will be considered eligible for protection from harassments. The petition came after an uproar over the university’s failure to adequately respond to virulently antisemitic and threatening tweets from a USC graduate student, and over other incidents of cyberbullying and a more general sense of personal insecurity felt by pro-Israel students on campus.  "There is a strong sense among students, faculty and members of the Jewish community that had a USC graduate student’s social media messages threatening to kill Zionists and cursing Jews been directed, instead, against another minority, the University would have responded far more promptly and vigorously to such threatening verbal harassment,” the 1,444 petitioners wrote.   In positive news, the No Camels website reports that Israeli sugar reducing technology is revolutionizing the fruit juice market.   

Health organizations and governments around the world are seeking effective sugar reduction solutions in food and beverage products, and specifically reduced-sugar juices. In two labs in Israel, scientists and entrepreneurs are using their expertise to innovate solutions for that next glass of juice – no matter where you live.  Yuval Klein, CEO of Blue Tree, told NoCamels that orange juice contains three types of sugars: Sucrose, (which makes up 50 percent of the total sugar), and glucose and fructose which together make up the last 50 percent. Blue Tree’s innovative technology selectively removes sugars from sucrose without touching the other sugars or introducing additives. The process maintains the drink’s original composition, except for the sugar.   “The way that we are going to change the industry is by reducing sugar in natural juices,” Klein said. “Natural orange juice contains about 10 percent sugar, which is a lot. It causes obesity, diabetes, and it may cause cancer; everything that is bad in regular sugar- it is there as well.”     

The week in antisemitism By GIL HOFFMAN International Correspondent for AGPI   Incidents of antisemitic hate have hit a new peak in the United Kingdom in 2021, breaking a record achieved in two years earlier, due in part to Israel’s defensive military operation against Hamas in May, according to a study by the Community Security Trust, which monitors UK antisemitism.   

The CST recorded 2,255 incidents last year, a 34% increase from the 1,684 incidents recorded in 2020.   The figures include 155 includents each in London and Manchester of people shouting abuse from passing vehicles, more than half during May-June Gaza conflict. There were 173 violent assaults. There was also a rise in incidents among students and professors.    Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Nachman Shai said the figures proved that governments must devote greater resources to educate about antisemitism and combat it and that Israel must be more proactive in the broader struggle against the modern rise of antisemitism.  

"From Colleyville, Texas to Stamford Hill in London, and many places in between, 2022 has already proven that many Jews around the world live in dangerous times," Shai said. "Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people has a moral obligation to assist its brethren in combatting this ongoing threat to our well-being."   

Following the release of the report, far Right Religious Zionist Party leader Bezalel Smotrich visited London, where the British Board of Deputies called him a “disgrace” and asked him to never visit the UK again, due to his past statements against Arabs and the LGBT community. Board of Deputies CEO Michael Wegier said, “British Jews cannot fight antisemitism, anti-Zionism and racism while condoning Smotrich’s views.”   

“It is ridiculous to bring up antisemitism on a day when a report is published on the massive rise of antisemitism in Britain, long before I arrived,” Smotrich said. “Those who say the way to deal with antisemitism is to hide who and what we are repeat the awful strategy of German Jewry ahead of World War II, who thought if there is antisemitism, let’s be more like the non-Jews and they will forgive and accept us. The opposite is true. The response to antisemitism must be a strong and secure Israel that can justify the Zionist vision and the belonging of Israel to the Land of Israel and the entire Jewish people, and the strong connection of the Diaspora to Israel, instead of trying, yet again, to find favor with the hegemony and renounce anyone because someone thinks they should, due to warped, progressive, almost sick dictates.”   

In positive news,  Israeli skier Barnabas Szollos finished in sixth place overall in men’s alpine skiing at the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, setting a new Israeli record for skiers in the Winter Olympics.  Szollos came in 11th in downhill skiing and then took second place in speed slalom. He was just 1.07 seconds away from winning a medal in his first Olympics. He has two more events scheduled – giant slalom on Sunday and slalom on Wednesday.   Israeli delegation was the 18th country to enter the stadium for the opening ceremony on February 4, led by flag bearers Evgeni Krasnopolski and Barnabas's sister, Noa Szollos.

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday over a series of antisemitic attacks in Chicago and incidents at Brooklyn College.   Last weekend, a suburban Chicago man was arrested and charged with four counts of felony hate crime, two felony counts of criminal defacement, and two felony counts of criminal damage to property in connection with several acts of vandalism against synagogues and Jewish businesses in West Rogers Park, a Chicago neighborhood with a large Orthodox Jewish population.   

Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown identified the man as 39-year-old Shahid Hussain, who when apprehended wore a mustache similar to Adolf Hitler, and a red cape with a yellow swastika. CBS News reported that Hussain screamed to “get the Jews and break all the windows of every synagogue” and made a saluting motion “similar to a Nazi salute.”   Police responded to a 911 call complaining about a man shouting anti-Semitic slurs and threats. Police detained Hussain and charged him with other incidents of vandalism at a school and synagogue in the neighborhood.   Yellow swastikas were discovered spray-painted on the wall of a synagogue and a girls high school. 

Other Jewish owned businesses, including a kosher bakery, were also vandalized. Hussain, who has a criminal record, is being held on $250,000 bail.  Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights announced a formal investigation into a complaint alleging Jewish students at Brooklyn College have been subjected to severe and persistent anti-Semitic harassment from professors and peers, JNS reported.  The complaint alleged that the college has allowed a hostile environment to proliferate on its campus, with professors maligning Jews on the basis of race and ethnic identity, advancing age-old anti-Semitic tropes concerning Jewish power, conspiracy and control, and endorsing the narrative that Jews are “white” and privileged, and therefore contribute to the systemic oppression of people of color.  

The complaint documented examples of harassment of Jewish students. In one incident cited, a student expressed her desire to strangle a Jewish student and others showed support in a student Whatsapp group. When another Jewish student came to the victim’s defense, the person who made the attack accused the Jewish student of being racist, claiming they were “part of the dominant culture” of “white people” who “continue to perpetuate power structures.”  At the Knesset on Tuesday, Japanese citizens who took steps to save Jews fleeing Europe during the Holocaust were honored at a special virtual event of the Israel-Japan Friendship Group held in honor of last week’s Holocaust Remembrance Day and marking 70 years of relations between Israel and Japan.  

The head of the group in the Knesset, MK Zvi Hauser singled out Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat in Lithuania who helped thousands of Jews flee Europe by issuing transit visas so that they could travel through Japanese territory. Lesser known is Prof. Setsuzo Kotsuji, who helped the refugees extend their stay in Japan from a few days on their permits to many months.  Kotsuji, who was the top scholar on Judaism in Japan, was tortured for refuting Nazi propaganda and saving some 300 yeshiva students from Lithuania, including Rabbi Pinchas Hirschsprung, who later became chief rabbi of Montreal, and Rabbi Dr. Avraham Mordechai Hershberg, who was the chief rabbi of Mexico for 25 years.  “We cannot leave the chapter of Jewish-Japanese relations in the Holocaust to Consul Sugihara alone,” Yad Vashem chairman Dani Dayan said. “We should do much more to reveal acts of heroism, which are under-researched and under-exhibited to the public. More education and recognition is necessary in this sacred endeavor.”  

Finally, in good news from Israel, Israeli astronaut Eytan Stibbe will be taking off on March 31 on the ground-breaking Rakia mission to the International Space Station. The Jerusalem Post reported that Stibbe will be conducting experiments in space on growing chickpeas for hummus.    A number of Israeli experiments are heading to the space station where they will be tested to see if they can be a viable option for bringing a sustainable food source to space.  “We don’t know if chickpeas can grow in space,”  SpaceIL co-founder Yonatan Winetraub said. “The challenge is not just how to grow as many chickpeas as possible, but how to control the way they are grown – so that we maximize our limited resources. The more we learn to grow food with fewer resources, the more prepared we will be for the challenges that await us on Earth, as well.” 

The week in antisemitism: From Jerusalem
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative joined the world in marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Thursday, when there were some memorable events, especially in Europe.

Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer apologized to Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid in the name of Austria for the murder of his grandfather in a ceremony marking the day at the Mauthausen Concentration Camp. In his address, Lapid told the story of his grandfather, Bela Lampel, who was taken from his home in front of his wife and Lapid's 12-year-old father and murdered at Mauthausen in April 1945.

"The Nazis thought they were the future, and that Jews would be something you only find in a museum," Lapid said. "Instead, the Jewish state is the future, and Mauthausen is a museum. Rest in peace, grandfather. You won." 

Lapid and Nehammer also participated in a memorial event at Vienna’s new Holocaust memorial. He was not the only member of his Yesh Atid Party to take part in emotional events in Europe on Thursday.

Knesset Speaker Mickey Levy broke down in tears as he said the Kadish memorial prayer in an unprecedented speech in Hebrew at the Bundestag in Berlin. The speaker read from a Jewish prayer book originally used by a German-Jewish bar mitzvah boy in 1938, on loan from Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center.

Levy, who also met with new chancellor Olaf Scholz, pleaded with German parliament members to take additional Holocaust commemoration measures.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that as much as we have done, it is our obligation to do more,” Levy said. “We are called upon to preserve the memory, to ensure its commemoration for the eternity of humankind. But alongside the memory, we are also called upon to shape a vision from it. We are called upon to preserve hope, and to plan a future together – a future based on shared values and dreams. We must connect and empower our young people – the generation of grandchildren and great-grandchildren; the third and fourth generations and the generations to come, and guide them to join together forces and minds, to advance a future filled with inspiration; a future based on the values of democracy, freedom and tolerance, which are shared by Israel and Germany.”

Levy also took part in a ceremony at the Wannsee Villa, where the Nazis decided 80 years ago on the “Final Solution to the Jewish question” in which the Jews of German-occupied Europe were deported to occupied Poland and murdered. 

Unfortunately, in a sign that antisemitism remains, on Wednesday night, there was an antisemitic hate crime in Stamford Hill, a London neighborhood that has the largest concentration of Hasidic Jews in Europe.

A man launched into an anti-Semitic assault on two Jewish men as they closed their bakery, throwing a bottle at them and hitting the elderly of the two on his head. The assailant knocked the victim to the ground, as his kippa flew off. He then attacked the other Jew and threw him into a fence.

The two men were taken to hospital, one victim suffering from a broken nose and fractured wrist, and the other bruises and injuries to his eye and wrist. Scotland Yard confirmed they had one man in custody and were treating the attack as a hate crime, the Evening Standard reported.

To end on a positive note, Israel 21C reported that 21-year-old downhill skier Sheina Vaspi will be Israel’s sole competitor at the Winter Paralympics in Beijing on March 4-13.
Although Israel has always sent a team to the Summer Paralympics, this marks the first time Israel will be competing in the Winter Paralympics.

When she was three years old, Vaspi was seriously injured in a car accident and her left leg was amputated.

Raised in a Lubavitch Hasidic family in Yesod HaMa’ala in the Hula Valley of northern Israel, she wears a skirt over her ski pants in keeping with modest religious dress codes, and she does not ski on the Sabbath.

The week in antisemitism: From Colleyville, Texas, to Wannsee, Germany  
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

January 21, 2022

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday that the FBI only announced Thursday that is is treating Saturday's hostage crisis at Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville, Texas  as “an act of terrorism targeting the Jewish community.”

At a news conference on Saturday night after Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker and three other hostages were free, Dallas FBI special officer Matthew DeSarno said gunman Malik Faisal Akram was motivated by an issue “not specifically related to the Jewish community” when he held the four hostage at the synagogue for 11 hours. 

Akram, a 44-year-old British citizen, went on a tirade against Jewish people. One hostage said he yelled, “Jews control the world, Jews control the media, Jews control the banks.” The terrorist thought the men in the synagogue could call US President Joe Biden or former US President Donald Trump and relay his demands, "because Jews control everything.” 

In a conversation between Akram and his brother Gulbar that was obtained by the Jewish Chronicle in London, the terrorist threatened the United States and continued his antisemitic rant: 

"Maybe the U.S. will have compassion for f—ing Jews, but guess what? I’m opening the doors for every f—ing youngster in England to know, live your f—ing life, bro, you f—ing coward. We’re coming to f—ing America and f— with them. If they want to f— with us, we’ll give them f—ing war.”

As mentioned in a release sent Monday, the AGPI, sees the attack on the Beth Israel Synagogue as another wakeup call about the threat of terrorism and violent antisemitism and the critical role of law enforcement in protecting our communities. The AGPI is actively engaged with the police community at home and around the world, and in honor of Raoul Wallenberg Day in Canada and Martin Luther King Jr. Day in America, was delighted to launch its new Power of One exhibit at the Vancouver Police Department headquarters.  

In another symbolic gesture following the hostage incident, Jewish students at the University of Florida in Gainesville on Tuesday rallied their peers to fight against antisemitism on Tuesday.

As part of the third annual “Spread Cream Cheese, Not Hate” campaign, the University of Florida's Hillel gave away free bagels to students who signed a pledge to “combat antisemitism and all forms of hate,” and ensure the campus “is a welcoming and safe place for all.” Hillel Rabbi Jonah Zinn told The Algemeiner he will follow up with people who sign the pledge with additional learning and advocacy opportunities.

The importance of education about antisemitism worldwide was underscored by the other big news in the Jewish world of the past week: Former FBI agent Vince Pankoke's conclusion that  a Jewish notary forced to work for the Nazis betrayed Anne Frank and her family. 

Pankoke's team came to the conclusion after six years of research to blame Arnold van den Bergh, a member of the Jewish Council that was established by the Nazis. The findings could indicate why Anne Frank's father Otto stopped looking for who betrayed his family and never spoke about the conclusions of his own research.

Professor Emerita at the University of Toronto Rosemary Sullivan elaborated on the accusation in her book “The Betrayal of Anne Frank”  that was published this week.

Looking ahead to next week, Mickey Levy will become the first Knesset speaker ever to address the Bundestag when he travels to Berlin to take part in Thursday's events marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Thursday's anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Levy was invited by his German counterpart, MP Bärbel Bas, the president of the Bundestag, to address the parliament, which Levy will purposely do in Hebrew.

He will attend events marking the 80th anniversary of the Wannsee Conference in which the Nazis decided on the "Final Solution to the Jewish question" in which the Jews of German-occupied Europe were deported to occupied Poland and murdered. Levy will represent Israel at a memorial ceremony at the Wannsee villa.

"The speaker of the Knesset's visit to Berlin before the Bundestag and the entire German leadership is an important testament to the strength of Holocaust remembrance and the unique bilateral relationship," Israeli ambassador to Germany Jeremy Issacharoff said.

The week in antisemitism: From COVID comparisons to correcting quotas
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about the COVID-19 Omicron wave leading to antisemitic statements. AGPI wishes everyone a happy Tu Bishvat holiday.

On Thursday, Congressman Warren Davidson of Ohio became the latest among several American Republican elected officials who have been forced to apologize for publicly comparing mandates aimed at preventing the spread of the coronavirus to the Holocaust.

Davidson attached a photo of a Nazi-era health status card and quoted a tweet by Washington DC Mayor Muriel Bowser mandating proof of vaccination for city residents going outdoors. “This has been done before,” Davidson said in a reference to the Nazi era. He added the hashtag “#DoNotComply.”  

Ohio Jewish organizations expressed their outrage, resulting in the apology.

“Bad things happen when governments dehumanize people,”  Davidson said in the apology he posted on Twitter. “Sometimes there is a next step — to systematically segregate them. Unfortunately, any reference to how the Nazis actually did prevents a focus on anything other than the Holocaust. I appreciate my Jewish friends who have explained their perspectives and feel horrible that I have offended anyone. My sincere apologies.”

In more positive Holocaust related news, the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, commissioned portraits of seven Holocaust survivors, which will be hung at Buckingham Palace, The Jerusalem Post reported. 

Different British artists will be chosen to paint each survivor as part of the BBC Two documentary “Survivors: Portraits of the Holocaust”, which will be released on Holocaust Memorial Day, which falls on January 27th. The same day, the exhibition will open in the Queen’s Gallery. 

The documentary will feature the survivors' accounts of what they lived through during the Holocaust. The survivors are mostly over 90 and came to Britain as children or young adults during or after the Holocaust. 

Meanwhile, in Uruguay, a Jewish businessman offered to buy an 800-pound eagle and swastika crest from a former Nazi ship that is sitting in a warehouse in the country and explode it into “a thousand pieces,” JTA reported.

Argentine Jewish businessman Daniel Sielecki, 64, told a local news site that he wants to buy the eagle — and subsequently destroy it — to keep it out of the hands of neo-Nazis.  

A private expedition recovered the 6-foot-tall Nazi swastika and eagle crest in 2006. It had been affixed to the front of the Admiral Graf Spee Nazi warship, which was scuttled by British ships in a Montevideo harbor in December 1939.

After its recovery, the eagle was briefly shown to the public in Montevideo, sparking controversy. Germany criticized the display of “Nazi paraphernalia” and the eagle was moved to a naval warehouse. It was nearly put up for auction, but the head of the Uruguayan Jewish Committee and others objected, arguing that it could end up in the wrong hands. It was reportedly offered to Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, which rejected it.

In 2019, a Uruguayan court ruled that the government must auction the crest, and that the proceeds must go to the investors behind the team that recovered it. Past reports claimed that buyers had floated offers in the tens of millions of dollars.

Back in the US, Stanford University has created a task force to investigate allegations that in the past, it had implemented quotas on the number of Jewish students admitted in the 1950s, JNS reported.

According to the Stanford Report, university president Marc Tessier-Lavigne appointed the task force made up of faculty, staff, trustees, alumni and students and asked them to report back to him by the spring. The panel members will also look into enhancing Jewish life on campus.

In a different study taken at a university, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev found that a green Mediterranean diet, high in polyphenols and low in red and processed meat, appears to slow age-related brain atrophy, Israel 21c reported.

The 18-month trial among 300 participants is one of the longest and largest brain MRI trials in the world. Participants were chosen based on abdominal girth, and high cholesterol levels, and divided into three groups according to diet, and whole brain MRI measurements were taken before, and after the trial.

One group ate a regular healthy diet, another the Mediterranean diet, and the last a green Mediterranean diet – which included high polyphenol green components: 3-4 daily cups of green tea and a daily green shake of Mankai duckweed, as a substitute for dinner, with minimal consumption of red and processed meat. Walnuts, which are high in polyphenols, were also provided to the Med-diet participants. 

All three groups were given free gym memberships and participated in physical activity programs based on aerobic exercise. The trial, which was published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, was led by Dr. Alon Kaplan and Prof. Iris Shai, professor at Ben-Gurion University and adjunct professor at Harvard University, together with several international teams of brain experts.

Lastly, in honor of the Tu Bishvat holiday on Monday, Knesset member Alon Tal will present what he billed as the first comprehensive forestry law proposed in Israel for a century

Tal said the present statute regulating tree planting and forestry in Israel is the 1926 “Forests Ordinance” from the British Mandate, which is similar to a 1921 version, adopted soon after the British conquered Palestine from the Ottoman armies in World War I. Since that time, modifications and amendments of the Ordinance have been modest.

Given the significance of Israel’s trees and forests to human health, recreation, ecological corridors, species preservation and climate change, Tal declared that it is high time that Israel adopt legislation that is appropriate for the national and global challenges of the 21st century.

"The best birthday present we can give the country’s forests and those that will yet be planted is legislation that appreciates trees and gives them new levels of protection,” Tal said.

The week in antisemitism: From Hassidim in Brooklyn to Harry Potter

By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  
 

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about the new year starting off with yet another antisemitic attack in Brooklyn.

A Hasidic Jewish man was beaten up on the street by at least two attackers in Brooklyn on Sunday night in what the New York City Police Department is probing as a potential hate crime, The Jerusalem Post reported.

The attack allegedly took place late on January 2 in Williamsburg, a Brooklyn suburb where thousands of Hasidic Jews live. A a witness claimed the attackers beat the victim, a 26-year-old man, with sticks. He was hospitalized due to a head injury.

In Iran, hours after a statue to honor the slain Iranian commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force Qassem Soleimani was erected on Wednesday, unknown assailants burned it, Iranian media reported on Thursday.
 

The statue was put up in the southwestern city of Shahrekord days after the second anniversary of the assassination of Soleimani in Iraq by an American drone.

A judge in Brazil fined American Airlines $1,759 for not providing kosher meals for two passengers who had been assured they would receive it on long-distance flights, JTA reported.
 

One of the passengers had gone without food for 10 hours from New York to São Paulo. The other fasted for a total of nine hours on two flights, first from Madrid to Philadelphia and then again from Chicago to London, the Brazilian law news site ConJur reported Wednesday.
 

American Airlines “failed to provide the services” it had promised to render, the judge of the 23rd Chamber of Civil Court of the Justice Tribunal of Sao Paulo, José Marcos Marrone, wrote in his ruling.

A former prime minister of the Netherlands, Dries van Agt, reportedly said in an interview for a recently aired documentary that Israeli settlers poisoned their Palestinian neighbors in 2015, drawing criticism from Dutch Jews who say he is perpetuating a centuries-old antisemitic blood libel, JTA reported.

“The colonizers who conquered the hill a week or two earlier came each night to pound on their door at night, to achieve maximum intimidation, to tell them to go away and they refused,” Van Agt said in the interview for a documentary on antisemitism that was aired in November by the KRO-NCRV broadcaster. “And then one morning something terrible happened: The olive grove and the vegetable garden below — the colonizers always take to top hills – were strewn with poison. And a three-year-old child became very ill. The only explanation was that she drank the milk of a poisoned goat. She was poisoned.”

Van Agt, 90, then began crying and apologized for his emotional state. The incident occurred in 2015 near Nablus, he said.

Israeli peace organizations said they knew nothing of the incident. 

In Israel, a deputy minister came under fire for reportedly calling settlers of the Homesh West Bank outpost "sub-human." Yair Golan of the Meretz Party declined to apologize and justified his statements because students who study in Homesh had been involved in incidents of vandalism against Palestinians. Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial chairman Dani Dayan said sub-human is a word used by Nazis and should not be used by a member of the government of the Jewish state.

In more positive news in Israel, the Knesset Finance Committee passed the final readings of a bill on Monday that would exempt Olympic medals from income taxes. Finance Committee head Alex Kushnir said the bill would be retroactive, which is very rare for Knesset legislation. That means it would apply to the 14 Israelis who won medals at last summer's Olympics in Tokyo.

"This tax exemption is our way of thanking these athletes who represented Israel with pride and stood on the podium wearing blue and white," Kushnir said. 

Finally, Emma Watson, the actress who played Hermione faced criticism on the weekend that the Harry Potter movies celebrated their 20th anniversary.  The Instagram account belonging to Watson reportedly released a post in support of a “Free Palestine.”
 

Watson, included a collage of photos, including images of Palestinian flags, with the words “Solidarity is a verb.” 

Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, tweeted to Watson “Fiction may work in Harry Potter but it does not work in reality. If it did, the magic used in the wizarding world could eliminate the evils of Hamas (which oppresses women & seeks the annihilation of Israel) and the PA [Palestinian Authority] (which supports terror). I would be in favor of that!”

But following a recent podcast in which he suggested that goblin characters in the “Harry Potter” series resembled antisemitic caricatures, Jewish comedian Jon Stewart posted a follow-up video to Twitter on Wednesday, saying that he did not mean to accuse the series’ author J.K. Rowling of antisemitism.

In the first podcast, Stewart reportedly talked about the series’ goblin characters, who run the wizarding world’s bank and covet gold. Stewart compared the movie version of the characters to stereotypes found in the infamous antisemitic tract “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”

“Let me just say this, super clearly, as clearly as I can… I do not think J.K. Rowling is antisemitic,” Stewart, responding to articles in Newsweek and elsewhere, said about the conversation he had on a late 2021 episode of the podcast tied to his Apple+ show, “The Problem With Jon Stewart.” “I did not accuse her of being antisemitic. I do not think that the ‘Harry Potter’ movies are antisemitic. 

Weekly roundup Christmas Eve Edition
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative wishes its Christian friends a Merry Christmas. In honor of the happy occasion, the following positive news happened over the past week.

More than 1,500 people watched the Christmas tree lighting on the front lawn of the Jerusalem International YMCA, across the street from the King David Hotel. 

YMCA CEO Rana Fahoum told Israel 21C that last year, the YMCA held its tree lighting and other Christmas celebrations online, due to the pandemic and broadcast it on social media. She said she was encouraged to see a large and varied crowd of Chrisitians, Jews and Muslims after last year, when she and her staff were there alone. 

The tree lighting was accompanied by Christmas music and a visit from Santa Claus. Fahoum who is a Muslim, made a point of wishing chag sameach to the crowd.

A snow machine blanketed the YMCA grounds during itsChristmas Market, where vendors sold Christmas treats such as hot chestnuts, mulled wine and cookies; and handcrafted items such as Santa hats, reindeer statues, candles and soaps. YMCA’s traditional Christmas Eve concert, including a popular singalong and several different musical groups, was set for Christmas Eve night.

This week, Marine archeologists diving off the coast of Caesarea discovered a number of ancient artifacts in recent months, including a gold ring with green gemstone carved with the Christian image of the ‘Good Shepherd’ – an early depiction of Jesus some dating back to the third century, the Israel Antiquities Authority revealed to the Times of Israel website on Wednesday.

The finds came from the wrecks of two ships that went down near the northern coastal town during the Roman and the Mamluk periods. Archeologists discovered a thick gold ring with an inlaid green gemstone that depicts a young shepherd boy dressed in a tunic with a ram or sheep on his shoulders. The image is believed to be the Christian symbol of the “Good Shepherd,” an early depiction of Jesus as a benevolent figure, suggesting its owner was likely an early Christian.

In the US, the Illinois Investment Policy Board voted unanimously in favor of divesting the state's pension funds from the Unilever mega-corporation, because it owns Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream and has refused to reverse the company's discriminatory decision to cut ties with its factory in Israel. 

Illinois will join Arizona, Florida, New York, New Jersey, and Texas in divesting from Unilever.

The law in Illinois aims to ensure Illinois taxpayers do not invest in companies that engage in discrimination, through, “actions that are politically motivated and are intended to penalize, inflict economic harm on, or otherwise limit commercial relations with the State of Israel or companies based in the State of Israel or in territories controlled by the State of Israel.” 

The Jerusalem Post reported that a call from a drunken man led German police officers to a secret Nazi altar, filled with memorabilia, weapons and even pictures of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler. The drunken man, 53, had called from his apartment Tuesday night and asked for help. Responding, police arrived at his apartment and found a large arsenal of weapons, including knives and firearms, as well as an altar-like structure filled with Nazi iconography.

Police confiscated, among other things, a belt of ammunition, two knives, a butterfly knife, and three brass knuckles - two of which had blades. It is currently unclear where the weapons came from and the man has no criminal record.

Back in Israel, documents, photos and ancient manuscripts from a monastery in the Sinai Peninsula are now available for free on the National Library of Israel website, the Jewish News syndicate reported. The collection from Saint Catherine’s Monastery includes items from the 12th century. The monastery’s library is considerably older as it was founded in the sixth century by Byzantine Emperor Justinian the first and is believed to be the oldest working library.

It contains works in various languages including Greek, Arabic, Syriac, Georgian, Armenian and more, which library officials say is a “treasure trove” of text related to early Christianity. Additionally, the archive has photos of the monastery and surrounding lands in the aftermath of the Six-Day War in 1967, along with rare colored footage filmed by Jacques Soussana, a cinematographer, photographer and former National Library employee whose wife recently donated the film to the library.

Finally, back to Hanukkah. Rabbi Yonah Grossman, who runs the Chabad House in Fargo, North Dakota, reported that his synagogue's menorah helped him find a lost Jew. 

"I was setting up a giant menorah in front of the Chabad House, when a man passing by stopped and asked what I was doing," Grossman said. "I began to explain what a menorah was, but he stopped me short and said 'I know what a menorah is. My name is Chaim and I live down the block. This is the first menorah I have seen in years!'"

Grossman, whose synagogue is located some 200 miles south of the border with Manitoba, gave Chaim his own menorah. Since then, he has started embracing his heritage after years of isolation from his roots.

The week in antisemitism and hope: From the United Kingdom to Kentucky
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed hope on Friday about efforts to ban the BDS movement in the United Kingdom and praised Israeli NGOs working to save lives in areas of the United States devastated by this week's tornadoes.

The Jewish News Syndicate reported this week about British Parliament member Robert Jenrick's announcement that he believes the British government will soon pass legislation to ban the Boycott Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement in the United Kingdom..

Speaking at the Leadership Dialogue Institute’s 2021 online conference during a discussion titled “Why Do So Many People Hate Jews?”, Jenrick said “In the following months, we will be working to outlaw BDS in the U.K.” 

Jenrick said he thinks BDS is being defeated in his country.

“There is no political party in the U.K. that would support BDS today and [supporting BDS] is becoming much more of a fringe activity,” he said.

But meanwhile in the US, a man vandalized three high profile sites in New York City with swastikas, including City Hall and a statue of a Charging Bull on Wall Street. Local TV reported that police are searching for a man recorded by cameras perpetrating the acts "wearing a black and gray poncho, black jeans and multicolored sneakers, who appeared to "walk with a limp."

On Monday,  44-year-old James Vincent received an 11-year prison sentence for assaulting and strangling a hassidic man walking home from synagogue in Brooklyn in an antisemitic hate crime. He was convicted two months ago of first- and second-degree strangulation as a hate crime, second-degree attempted assault and third-degree assault as a hate crime, and fourth-degree criminal mischief.

In 2018,  Vincent  saw 52-year-old father of nine Rabbi Menachem Moskowitz and shouted "You f**ing Jew, you Jews took my house and mortgage," and then ran up to him and began strangling him and punching him. Moskowitz suffered a broken rib, bruises, swelling and an abrasion, and continues to suffer today, especially in his right shoulder.

Another New York man, Joel Mangal, was indicted on Monday for throwing a Molotov cocktail into a Brooklyn deli and stabbing a deli worker. Mangal faces charges of first-degree attempted murder, first-degree arson, first-degree criminal possession of a weapon, second-degree aggravated harassment and second-degree assault. The Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office will prosecute the case.

In another incident in the US, the Maine Human Rights Commission voted on Monday that a couple had discriminated against their former tenant, who is a black Jew. Mark and Michelle Fortin evicted Yohannis Selassie nine months ago, because he refused to remove a mezuzah from his doorpost. Even though he told his landlord the mezuzah is a symbol of his Jewish faith, they terminated his lease. The landlords responded that Selassie violated his lease by "screwing a metal object into the doorframe."

In Germany, a new analysis conducted by the city’s commissioner in charge of fighting antisemitism that was reported by the Jewish Telegrahic Agency found that at least 290 streets or squares in Berlin are named for people who espoused antisemitic views. Samuel Salzborn, a scholar of political science who was appointed to the commissioner role last year, said he was not calling for the names of the streets to be changed, but he wanted to “create a systematic basis for an important social discussion.”

In positive news from Israel, following four weekend tornadoes that killed dozens and destroyed homes and businesses in western Kentucky, volunteers for Israeli humanitarian aid organization SmartAID are working with local partners to install a coordination center for emergency workers in hard-hit Mayfield and Benton, ISRAEL21c reported.

The coordination center will include solar energy, smartphone connectivity, Wi-Fi and other technologies to help responders efficiently plan operations, said SmartAID founder and director Shachar Zahavi.

“Kentucky was the worst-hit state by far in an unusual mid-December swarm of twisters across the Midwest and the South that leveled entire communities, leaving tens of thousands homeless,” said Zahavi. “Most communities have been left without access to power, clean water, telecommunication, medical treatment and basic survival items.”

Another Israeli humanitarian aid organization, IsraAID, has mobilized an emergency response team to support recovery and cleanup efforts in affected Kentucky communities.

Finally, President Isaac Herzog met Thursday with Eytan Stibbe, the Israeli who will fly to the International Space Station in two months with the Rakia Mission. The President gave Stibbe a special gift: a glass cube inscribed with the Prayer for the Welfare of the State of Israel in the handwriting of its author, the president’s grandfather, Israel’s first chief rabbi, Yitzhak Isaac HaLevi Herzog. 


Stibbe said the mission’s purpose is to arouse curiosity about our existence here on Planet Earth and to allow Israelis to take part in a unique international project in a range of scientific, technological, and artistic fields with an emphasis on innovation and education. He will facilitate dozens of scientific experiments for Israeli companies, conduct educational activities for Israeli children in Hebrew, and give a platform to unique works of Israeli art.   


“The whole nation is watching you," Herzog told Stibbe. " May you influence the whole of humanity for another hundred years. May you continue to bring all of us, your nation, your country, and your family, great pride. Fly in peace and return in peace.”  

The week in antisemitism: From Melbourne to malicious attacks to Miss Universe
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI  

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about antisemitic attacks around the world that took place during Hanukkah, but optimism that when It comes to cybersecurity, Israel is proving itself a light unto the nations. 

There were nearly 50 antisemitc incidents around the world during the Hanukkah holiday, including vandalism to synagogues and menorahs and a busload of Jews who were verbally abused while celebrating the holiday in London. 

The worst incident look place in Kansas, where the Chabad on the Plaza was ransacked by antisemitic vandals. Rabbi Yitzchak Itkin found "papers and books everywhere, electric wires ripped out, plumbing cut with water pouring everywhere." 

Police came to the synagogue after a neighbor reported hearing glass break. The police found that the vandals had broken into the building via a window.

The Kansas City Police Department found a black SUV fitting the description of the suspect vehicle used in the attack, but local media reported that "it left at a high speed, and police were unable to catch up with it."

Across the globe in Melbourne, a Rabbi was the victim of antisemitic acts at the Crown Casino. A man approached the Rabbi and accused him of taking a video of him and his family. While the rabbi denied it, the man used antisemitic slurs.

"You're one of those Hitler didn't finish," the man told the Rabbi.

The New York City Police Department released statistics on Wednesday that found that hate crimes had doubled. Of some 500 hate crimes reported in the city as of November, some 180 were anti-Semitic, up from 121 incidents the year before, the largest number of hate crimes against any group.  

A host on Fox News in America was mocked for saying that the Christmas tree represents the Christmas spirit — and Hanukkah. Ainsley Earhardt made the incorrect statement after a man was arrested for allegedly setting fire to the Christmas tree outside Fox News Channel headquarters in New York, JTA reported.

“It’s a tree that unites us, that brings us together. It is about the Christmas spirit, it is about the holiday season, it is about Jesus, it is about Hanukkah,” Earhardt said. “It is about everything we stand for as a country and being able to worship the way you want to worship. It makes me so mad.”

The JTA noted that not only does Hanukkah commemorate the rededication of the Jewish temple several centuries before the birth of Jesus, its main message is against assimilating into the dominant religious culture. 

In Scotland, a professional soccer team with an Israeli placer suffered from anti-Semitic abuse on social media. Midfielder Nir Bitton was called a “dirty Jew bastard” and a “Zionist rat” on social media when his team lost. His wife received messages calling for her and her husband to “be hung,” and their two children were heckled.

The Celtic FC team promised to probe the incident, which came after FIFA fined the Scottish Football Association $11,000 for an incident in which Israel’s national anthem was booed at the start of a World Cup qualifier against Israel.

In Philadelphia, a government official was forced to resign on Sunday for creating a hostile environment for his staff after he made antisemitic remarks, including referring to the Holocaust movie Schindler’s List as “Jewish propaganda.”  In a post on Facebook, he quoted Malcolm X calling Jewish neighborhoods “Jew town,”  He spoke with Philadelphia Jewish leaders and apologized. 

The contestant from Puerto Rico in the Miss Universe contest that will be held in Israel next week surprised her fellow challengers when she revealed that her Jewish great-grandfather escaped the Holocaust. A video of her speaking when she toured the Yad Vashem Holocust memorial in Jerusalem went viral. 

“I came here to Israel knowing that I would be more connected to my family because my [great] grandfather actually escaped from the Holocaust and all of his other family members, his sisters, his brothers, even their daughters — four daughters — were killed in the concentration camps, especially in Auschwitz,” Michelle Marie Colon said.

"Today’s visit to Yad Vashem was very moving, filled with mixed emotions, and very powerful," she wrote on Instagram. "As some of you may know, my great grandfather, Rodolfo Cohn, was a survivor of the Holocaust. He moved to the Caribbean and met Dorila Thomas, my great grandmother; an empowered Afro-Caribbean woman -descendant of slaves- who was the administrator of a farm at the time. Together, they formed a solid family full of love, built upon empathy and resilience." 

In a sharp contrast, this week Israel led a 10-country, 10-day-simulation of a major cyberattack on the world’s financial system. Israel's finance and foreign ministries led the “war game” exercise, which simulated several scenarios, including sensitive data surfacing on the dark web with fake news leading to global financial chaos.

There were participants from the US, UK, United Arab Emirates, Germany, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Thailand, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in the simulation, which featured multiple kinds of attacks on the international foreign exchange and bond markets, liquidity, integrity of data and transactions between importers and exporters.

The simulation was “further evidence of Israel’s global leadership” in the field of financial cyber defense," Finance Ministry chief economist Shira Greenberg said.

The Week in Antisemitism: From Menorahs to Mossad to Musicians

By GIL HOFFMAN - December 3, 2021

International Correspondent for AGPI   

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about a spate of antisemitic incidents around the world this week that were related to the Hanukkah holiday.

Antisemites marred an observance of Hanukkah in central London on Monday in a frightening incident that went viral on social media. 

It started when a group of young Jews danced to Hanukkah songs they played on loud speakers at an event organized by a Jewish group. A group of men first danced near them to make fun of them.

When the Jewish group boarded their bus, the antisemites pounded on the windows, raised their middle fingers at passengers and shouted "Free Palestine." One of the antisemites used a Nazi salute.

There were incidents of vandalism to menorahs reported all over the world. In one that ended on a good note, after a man in a pickup truck stole a six-foot aluminum menorah from the home of a Florida Rabbi on Saturday, the Dania Beach Synagogue replaced it with a nine-foot one. 

"The way we fight darkness is by bringing light," Rabbi Eli Eckstein said.

In Brooklyn, New York, there were three incidents of antisemitic teen girls attacking Jewish children aged three to 18 one after the other on Monday. Their first victim was a toddler they slapped across the face. They then pushed an an 18-year-old to the floor and then attacked a 9-year-old. All were dressed in a way that clearly indicated they were Jewish. The incidents are being probed by the crime task force of the New York Police Department.

At Syracuse University, antisemitic language was found on a bulletin board that had marked Hannukah, local police chief Bobby Maldonado said.

Maldonado said his team was trying to identify those persons responsible for the incident and to encourage anyone with information to come forward.

There are no suspects, he said.

Politicians from around the world participated in events marking Hanukkah. New York City Mayor-elect Eric Adams lit the world’s largest menorah on the city's Fifth Avenue.

Drafted by sculptor Yaacov Agam, the Agam menorah,'s branches stand 32-feet high, which is the tallest permitted by Jewish law for a menorah to be kosher.

New German Chancellor Olaf Scholz denounced antisemitism and reiterated Germany’s commitment to fighting it at an event marking International Holocaust Survivors Night on Tuesday. He pledged to do everything possible to protect the local Jewish community at the eent, which honored local Holocaust survivors. 

"We will fight darkness with light," he said.

There were events at the United Nations in which Israel was unfairly singled out, including three votes condemning Israel. In Geneva, representatives from around the world took turns attacking Israel, accusing the Jewish state of apartheid.

New Israeli Mossad chief David Barnea vowed on Thursday that "Iran will never have a nuclear weapon, not in the coming years, not ever, that's my commitment, that's the commitment of the Mossad," Mossad chief David Barnea said on Thursday as nuclear deal talks between Iran and other world powers in Vienna begin. 

Barnea slammed the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that the international community reached with Iran.

 "Iran strives for regional hegemony, operates the same terrorists that we're tackling every day worldwide, and continuously threatens the stability of the Middle East," he said. "Therefore our eyes are wide open, we're ready, and we'll act with our colleagues in the defense establishment to do what is needed to distance the threat to the State of Israel, and thwart it in any way."

Defense Minister Benny Gantz added Thursday that Israel must do everything possible to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon

"If not “there may be a point when we will have no choice but to act,” he warned.

Musicians took defiant steps against antisemitism this week. Band member will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas rejected calls from Palestinian activists pressuring him not to perform in Israel.

"Do I turn my back on people that live here because of politics?" he asked. "No, that’s not the way we were built.”

David Draiman, the lead singer for the American heavy metal back Disturbed, came to the Western Wall, and lit a candle at site in the the Old City sin which young South African immigrant to Israel Eli Kay was murdered.

On his Instagram acount, he shared photos of his time in Jerusalem, calling it a wonderful experience.

“We will not be intimidated," he told The Jerusalem Post. "We’re not going anywhere. People need to learn to live with us [Jews].”

The week in antisemitism: From Poland to poll to São Paulo
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI   

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about a series of antisemitic incidents around North America and the world over the past week, starting in a country with a dark past.  

Polish nationalists burned a 757 year-old book documenting a historic agreement protecting the rights of Poland’s Jews last Thursday, while shouting “death to Jews.” 

At a rally in Kalisz, a city 120 miles from Warsaw, far-right activist Wojciech Olszański set on fire a book that was meant to symbolize the Statute of Kalisz, which set the legal status of Jews living in Poland and protected them by penalizing attacks on them. The statute, which was issued in 1264 by Prince Bolesław the Pious, was still used as the legal basis for relations between Jews and non-Jews in Poland hundreds of years afterward. 

The rally was part of a series of Polish nationalist events held on Poland's National Independence Day.

Yesterday, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee’s International Center for Community Development released a poll of more than 1,000 European Jewish leaders and professionals that found that they are worried about antisemitism. 

For the first time since the survey started being taken five years ago, anti-Semitism climbed to first among the "serious threats to the future of Jewish life" they ranked. More than 70% of respondents gave antisemitism either a 4 or 5” on the scale of 1 to 5.  

Nevertheless, 78% of the 1,054 respondents from 31 countries polled in 10 languages said they did feel safe to live and practice as a Jew in their community. Just 17% reported feeling “rather unsafe” and 6 percent “not safe at all.”

Some 71% told the pollsters they were satisfied with how their government was responding to the security needs of local Jews. Two thirds said were not considering leaving their country. 

In good news in Europe, the World Jewish Restitution Organization reported that the Claims Conference has begun allocating $1.1 million to Holocaust survivors who either live in or were persecuted by the Nazis or their allies in Luxembourg. The funding being allocated by the Luxembourg Fund will go to survivors from 11 countries.

In Brazil, a journalist apologized for saying on TV on Tuesday that Brazil could match Germany’s wealth by killing the country's Jews. Right-wing pundit Jose Carlos Bernardi made the comments in a discussion about former Brazilian president Luis Inácio Lula da Silva's visit to Germany.

“Only by attacking Jews will we get there," Bernardi told interviewer Amanda Klein. "If we kill a gazillion Jews and appropriate their economic power, then Brazil will get rich. That’s what happened with Germany after the war.”  

In the United States, a man was sentenced in federal court on Tuesday to a year and a day in prison for conspiring with members of a white supremacist group to vandalize synagogues in the Midwest. Richard Tobin, 20, was charged with conspiracy against the rights of minority citizens, which can carry a maximum sentence of 10 years. 

Tobin called his plot to vandalize synagogues in 2019 “Kristallnacht.” He plotted the attacks with members of a neo-Nazi group called “The Base.” 

On her weeklong tour of the US this week, Israeli interior minister Ayelet Shaked heard from numerous American Jewish officials about the rise of antisemitism, especially on college campuses. After one of her meetings, she said the problem must be addressed immediately.

"Jewish students have become afraid to write on their applications for universities that they support Israel, because they fear they will not be accepted," she wrote on Twitter. "This requires immediate action, including stopping donations to universities that encourage anti-Israel activity on their campuses." 

On a positive note, after a mezuzah scroll was ripped from the doorpost at the Chabad center of Northeastern University in Boston and stolen, the Jewish students of the university came together in a show of Jewish pride. A large number of people showed up for a prayer service and a mega-challah bake at Chabad. 

Belgian-born student Elie Codron vowed to put up 100 new mezuzahs across campus and kept his promise. 

“I’ve been taught so many times and truly believe that the best way to respond to such things is with Jewish pride," Codron told Chabad.org. "I tell people all the time: antisemitism is literally the oldest hatred in the world. It’s up to us how we’re going to respond. We can either cower in fear, or we can go in the opposite direction. From what I’ve seen, it’s only the second option that works. They want us to be scared, so we respond with even more pride.” 

By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI

NOVEMBER 11, 2021

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed appreciation on Friday for events around the world marking he 83rd anniversary of Kristallnacht and arrests of those who perpetrated recent hate crimes against Jews. But AGPI also raised an alarm about a series of antisemitic incidents around North America and the world over the past week.

Knesset members commemorated the 83rd anniversary of Kristallnacht at a ceremony at the parliament on Tuesday together with Christians leaders from Germany's March of Life organization.

The head of the Knesset Christian Allies Caucus, MK Sharren Haskel (New Hope), and caucus members Merav Ben Ari (Yesh Atid), and Ruth Wasserman Lande (Blue and White) participated in the ceremony marking the 1938 “Night of the Broken Glass,” in which more than 1,000 German and Austrian synagogues were attacked, tens of Jews were killed, hundreds were beaten, Jewish-owned businesses were looted and 30,000 Jews were jailed, many of whom were subsequently sent to concentration camps.

At the Knesset ceremony marking the anniversary, the founder of the March of Life organization, Jobst Bittner, acknowledged his feeling of personal responsibility for the horrific attack.

“Many Germans were responsible for this planned pogrom, and many more were simply standing by, indifferent, silent," he said. "These Germans were our fathers and mothers, our grandfathers and grandmothers.”

Since 2007, the March of Life organization has united Jews and Holocaust survivors, together with descendants of Nazi perpetrators for memorial and reconciliation marches to combat anti-Semitism and to support Israel. To date, marches have taken place in 25 countries and more than 400 cities in partnership with Christians and Jews from around the world as well as Knesset Members. In 2021, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, March of Life events took place in over 100 locations throughout 24 nations, reaching millions through online broadcasts of the live events.

But in a sign that antisemitism continues in Europe more than seven decades after the Holocaust, Israel's ambassador to the United Kingdom Tzipi Hotovely had to be evacuated from the London School of Economics Tuesday as students and other pro-Palestinian activists tried to attack her following a speaking engagement.

Hotovely left the event with security guards leading her past the protest, when a man rushed at her. The guards pushed her into her car.  

She stressed afterward that she delivered her full talk for an hour and a half to 200 students “who wanted to hear Israel’s story” and that she will never give in to bullying. 

Last week, AGPI reported that in Austin, Texas, there were multiple antisemitic incidents, which culminated with a fire set outside the Texas capital's Congregation Beth Israel.

This week, Austin authorities arrested 18-year-old Franklin Barrett Sechriest for the arson. Sechriest is suspected of using an accelerant near the sanctuary doors of Congregation Beth Israel to ignite the flames, causing an estimated $25,000 in damage.

In France, a court sentenced the murderer of Holocaust survivor Mireille Knoll to life in prison for the antisemitic attack in March 2018. Mireille was stabbed 11 times before her apartment was set ablaze by the attackers who targeted her because she was Jewish. Yacine Mihoub, 32, was convicted of stabbing 85-year-old Knoll 11 times and then setting her body on fire. Her killing sparked public outcry over anti-Semitism in France.

Just north of Chicago, protesters stormed the field at Northwestern University's Ryan Field on Saturday and brought theit team's football game to a halt for roughly five minutes. Some of them protested against discrimination again blacks in America, while others carried signs condeminng Israel and calling on their university to "divest from death."


But if the protesters were looking to get attention, they missed out by facing the wrong way. The students who walked onto the field displayed their signs toward the end of the stadium that didn't have the cameras for the game broadcast and the signs could not be seen from the press box at Ryan Field.

Finally, in good news, the IDF released figures marking six months since the end of Operation Guardian of the Walls. In that half year, there were only five rockets fired from the Gaza Strip. Following other recent operations in Gaza there were as many as 200 rockets fired. The IDF said the figures proved that the operation was successful in restoring quiet to southern Israel. 
 

From Twitter to Texas to Tehran: AGPI condemns antisemitism
By GIL HOFFMAN
International Correspondent for AGPI

Chief Political Correspondent and Analyst for Jerusalem Post

The Abraham Global Peace Initiative expressed concern on Friday about a series of antisemitic incidents around North America and the world over the past week.

Twitter hired a new staffer responsible for aggregating news coverage from the Middle East and North Africa, who made a point of not including Israel’s flag alongside those of 17 other Middle Eastern and North African countries, including the Palestinian flag, in a tweet announcing her appointment.  

London-based Fadah Jassem, who is a former journalist, apologized for the tweet, as well as much more blatant anti-Israel tweets posted in 2010 and 2011. In September 2010, she wrote that Israel was “not born” but “dropped like a bomb in the middle of Palestine.”

In Austin, Texas, there were multiple antisemitic incidents over the past week, which culminated with a fire set outside the Texas capital's Congregation Beth Israel.

Banners with the words “Vax the Jews” were hung on an overpass by members of the Goyim Defense League, a neo-Nazi group whose name mocks the Anti-Defamation League. The group demonstrated outside the local police office.

There was also after racist and antisemitic graffiti that was found on the wall of a local high school.

In Washington, DC, police have been investigating the desecration of a Torah scroll at the George Washington University's Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity last weekend.

Demonstrations of solidarity with Jewish students were held in the wake of the incident. Campus Chabad director Rabbi Yudi Steiner, encouraged Jewish students on campus to respond to the incident by hanging mezuzahs on their doors to demonstrate their Jewish pride.

The day after the rally, a student reported that a mezuzah was stolen from her door and returned damaged after she demanded its return in a campus chat group.

At  Arizona State University, antisemitic fliers that read, "Who controls the world?" were distributed on the Tempe, Arizona campus.

In Rock Hill, South Carolina, anti-Jewish graffiti was painted on a parking deck near Fountain Park on Wednesday, police say.

In France, Chief Rabbi Haim Korsia called a possible presidential candidate an antisemite and a racist. Korsia spoke about right-wing activist and journalist Eric Zemmour. 

Zemmour has in the past said most French drug dealers were African or Arab and has called Muslim immigrants “invaders.”

But the most high profile incident of antisemitism this week came in Iran, where thousands of people marked the anniversary of the 1979 seizure of the US Embassy by burning Israel and American flags and chanting “Death to Israel” and “Death to America.” 

There were 800 anti-Israel and anti-American protests in Tehran and other cities throughout the Islamic republic.