Councillor target of anti-Semitic abuse campaign
Local democracy reporter A COUNCILLOR who had swastikas posted to her house has spoken out about how she’s been targeted by anti-Semitic abuse.
Conservative Cardiff councillor Jayne Cowan, whose father was Jewish, says Nazi symbols have also been drawn on buildings she’s been associated with and on her election campaign boards.
Cllr Cowan, who represents Rhiwbina and has close links with the Jewish community, described the abuse she received as Cardiff councillors unanimously endorsed the internationally-recognised definition of anti-Semitism.
She said: “I have spoken out publicly about the anti-Semitic incidents involving myself over a number of years and I will continue to do so until the person or persons are caught and hopefully dealt with severely.
“I have had swastikas drawn on leaflets posted to my house, swastikas drawn on buildings I have been associated with and on my election campaign boards.
“During one election the only boards displaying the swastika belonged to my family, and my German friends, on a road where there were other boards.
“Why was the board in the garden of my German friends chosen? It must be someone who knows the houses of Rhiwbina intimately or someone who knows me exceptionally well and this in itself worries me greatly.
“But do you know what? My German friends said: ‘We won’t let this stop us publicly supporting you – put another board up today’ and that is what we did.’
“These people who commit these antiSemitic crimes need to go to jail for a very, very long time and made examples of. It won’t stop me working hard. It’s driving me to work even harder.”
Cllr Cowan said the police were investigating the anti-Semitic incidents and she is prepared to go to court.
The motion to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism was brought forward by the Conservatives after a record number of anti-Jewish hate crime incidents were recorded in the UK this year.
There were 892 reported anti-Semitic incidents between January and June this year and anti-Semitic hate crime incidents have been rising since 2014 when there were 310 incidents during the same period according to figures from the Community Security Trust.
Cllr Cowan told Thursday’s council meeting: “I hope the day will come when the Cardiff United Synagogue needs to stop paying for security on their gates and the community are allowed to pray, worship, and celebrate in peace without fear of horrible people trying to disturb the service, cause damage to the building, or even cause injury, or worse, to members of the community.”
Councillors also told the meeting about family members who had died during the Holocaust.
Joe Boyle, leader of the Liberal Democrats in Cardiff, said his great-grandfather died in a cattle truck outside Theresienstadt and his great-grandmother was gassed in Auschwitz.
Plaid Cymru councillor Keith Parry told the meeting about his Jewish wife whose father escaped Germany on the kindertransport; her grandparents died under the Nazi regime.
He said the Labour Party has a problem with anti-Semitism but the Conservatives were “not free from racial prejudices either”, bringing up Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s comparison of Muslim women wearing burkas with “letterboxes”.
“Every citizen regardless of their faith and mode of dress should be equal,” he said. “We must all be aware of racism.”
The IHRA definition of anti-Semitism is “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews”.
It adds: “Rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”
Council leader Huw Thomas has said he and other Labour councillors have been “uncomfortable” with the spike of anti-Semitic incidents within the party in recent years. He called for people holding anti-Semitic views to be expelled from the party.
“Your values are not my party’s values and the sooner you are excluded and permanently ejected from my party the better,” he said.
He added: “As the IHRA makes clear adopting this definition does not disallow criticism of the state of Israel and surely we must all have concerns about the continuing plight of Palestinian people.
“But holding all Jews responsible for the actions of the Israeli state is simply wrong.
“We live in dark times where extremist views have been given platforms they don’t deserve and were too often to be a minority is to be threatened and fearful.
“I hope we remind the Jewish community in Cardiff of our friendship and our love for them as we have for all of Cardiff’s minority communities.”