Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur (Senior Rabbi Paris Liberal Community) discussing antisemitism in France
IF YOU HAVE WITNESSED AN ANTISEMITIC INCIDENT,
OR YOU HAVE BEEN A VICTIM OF ANTISEMITISM YOURSELF:
• Write down all the details before you forget
• Contact the police directly
• If you need help, email us at investigations@antisemitism.uk or call 0330 822 0321
• You should also tell the organisations responsible for the Jewish community’s security, the Community Security Trust (cst.org.uk) and Shomrim, or you can ask us to tell them for you
Identifying Antisemitic Tropes (Wikipedia)
WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT ANTISEMITISM
The following is reproduced from information supplied by the Campaign Against Antisemitism
WHAT DOES ANTISEMITISM LOOK LIKE?
Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.
Manifestations might include the targeting of the State of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. However, criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic. Antisemitism frequently charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong.” It is expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action, and employs sinister stereotypes and negative character traits.
Contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, but are not limited to:
- Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion
- Making mendacious, dehumanising, demonising, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions
- Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews
- Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust)
- Accusing the Jews as a people,or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust
- Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations
- Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination (e.g. by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour)
- Applying double standards by requiring of Israel a behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation
- Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g. claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterise Israel or Israelis
- Drawing comparisons of contemporaryIsraeli policy to that of the Nazis. Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel
If you hear someone making use of these, it is extremely likely that they are engaging in antisemitism.
THE LANGUAGE OF ANTISEMITISM
The vocabulary of antisemitic abuse is both extensive and vicious. Much of it harks back to the ideology and behaviour
of nazi Germany or the Soviet Union, while more recent anti-jewish language is often disguised as discourse about Israel. The most frequently used expressions are included here:
JEW, JEWBOY, YID, KIKE
As strange as it may sound, the word ‘Jew’ itself can be a term of antisemitic abuse, depending on the context in which it is used. It can even be heard as a playground insult.
HOLOHOAX
A word used by Holocaust-deniers to portray the extermination of six million Jews as a fraud that has been carried out by the Jewishpeople for financial gain.
ROTHSCHILDS
The Rothschilds were a Jewish family of successful bankers and philanthropists in the early nineteenth century. They appear in many anti-Jewish conspiracy theories as a sinister, controlling force. The use of ‘Rothschild’ (i.e. ‘a Rothschild plot’) is invariably a device to avoid saying ‘Jew’ or ‘Jewish’.
BLOOD LIBEL
The original antisemitic blood libel dates from the Middle Ages,and is the fictitious accusationthat Jews murder Christian children in order to use their blood in Passover rituals. In 1290, it was the pretext for the confiscation of all Jewishproperty and the complete expulsion of Jews from England. They were not permitted to return until 1655. Blood libel has been responsible for the persecution and killing of Jews ever since, for example Jewish doctors have been accused of harvesting bodily organs from non-Jewish victims.
SOROS AND THE ‘GREAT REPLACEMENT’
This is an antisemitic theory claiming that Jewish businessman and political activist George Soros is orchestrating a ‘globalist’ plot to divide and destroy traditional Western culture by causing mass migration by non-white people, especially Middle Eastern Muslims, to Europe and North America in a supposed ‘white genocide’
ZIONIST, ZIO
An extremely complicated and often confusing term, as it can be used quite legitimately in political discussion. Zionism is simply the belief of the Jewish people in their right to exist, free from persecution, in their own country. Those claiming to be only anti-Zionist, not antisemitic are saying that Jews uniquely should not have the right to self-determination afforded to all other peoples.
‘Zionist’
is increasingly usedas a way of avoiding saying‘Jew’. People who do this willusually exhibit other forms of antisemitic behaviour. The use of modifications, suchas Zio, ZioTroll, and especially ZioNazi is always clearly antisemitic in intent. Criticismof specific policies of the Israeli government is not antisemitic.
ZOG (Zionist Occupied Government)
This idea holds that the officialgovernment of a country is just a puppet, while the real control is exercised behind the scenes by a cabal of Jews.
JEWISH IMMORALITY
A key antisemitic theme asserts that Jews are greedy and immoral, and even naturally inclined towards paedophilia and orchestrating war. This portrayal of Jews as a nefarious, self-serving, deleterious force corrupting society has been used to justify persecution of the Jews and was a central pillar of Nazi propaganda.
CONSPIRACY THEORIES
The persecution of Jews has always been underpinned by the idea that they participate in secret and sinister plots to exert wide-ranging control throughout the world. The belief that Jewsuse this control in order to profitwhile non-Jews suffer was oneof Hitler’s key justifications forthe Holocaust. Here are some of the most common conspiracy theories. The slur that European Jews are engaged in “white genocide” – a plan to eradicate “the white race” by engineering mass-immigration into Europe from non-white countries – is prevalent on the far right.
JEWISH TREACHERY
This slur is centred around the false idea that Jews are more loyal to the state of Israel and other Jews globally than to the countries of which they are citizens. Therefore, by extension, Jews cannot be trusted as they are likely to act against the interests of their fellow countrymen.
VIDEOS: Rabbi Sacks on "The Mutation of Antisemitism" & "BDS"
VIDEO: Howard Jacobson
Recorded in May 2016, novelist Howard Jacobson picks apart the disingenuous argument that "criticism of Israel" or "anti-Zionism" must be distinguished from "anti-Semitism."
(Since the recording, Naz Shah has abjured antisemitism and made many bridges with the Jewish community)
(Interview by Chris Cook; video, 18 minutes)