Europe faces surge of anti-Semitic vandalism

A SPATE of anti-Semitic vandalism has hit Europe with France, the U.K. and Germany reeling from an increase in reported violent crimes against the Jewish community as the political climate coarsens and grows more polarized.

On Wednesday, Germany’s Central Council of Jews called for action following a report showing a rise in antiSemitic attacks in the country. AntiSemitic crimes increased from 1,504 in 2017 to 1,646 in 2018, an annual rise of 10 percent. The number of cases considered violent increased from 37 to 62 over the same period. The figures were given by the German government in response to a request by the opposition Die Linke (The Left) party, as reported in Wednesday's edition of the Berlinbased Tagesspiegel daily. In the 62 violent anti-Semitic incidents, 43 people were injured. Earlier answers from the government also revealed that most of the perpetrators came from extremist right-wing groups.

The crime data came just a day after French politicians spoke out about a sharp rise of anti-Semitic offenses in their own country. The French interior minister earlier this week announced a 74 percent rise in anti-Semitic acts across the country over the past year amid a series of incidents in Paris in recent days, while blaming some far-right groups who infiltrated violent riots during “yellow vest” protests.

In the U.K., recorded anti-Semitic hate crimes hit a record high in 2018 for the third straight year, according to the annual report of the Community Security Trust (CST).

In 2018, 1,652 incidents were reported nationwide, with more than 100 incidents recorded every month of the year for the first time, the report found.

There has been growing concern among Jewish communities over the rise of far-right groups in fostering anti-Semitism and hatred of other minorities throughout Europe. In Germany, the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has representatives in all of Germany’s 16 regional assemblies, has alarmed Jewish leaders who accuse it of contributing to a rise in anti-Semitism. The AfD, which has always rejected charges of racism, entered the Bavarian Parliament for the first time in a regional election last year, winning 22 seats to become the fourthlargest party, on a par with the centerleft Social Democrats.