Summary of the day
Antisemitism is a “deeply ingrained racism in European society” that poses an existential threat to the continent’s Jewish community and the fundamental aims of the European Union, warned Michael O’Flaherty, the director of the bloc’s agency for fundamental rights.
A legislator with the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party was arrested on charges including displaying forbidden totalitarian symbols, with neighbours of his fraternity complaining of often hearing the Nazi “Sieg Heil” victory salute.
Politicians and officials raised concerns about antisemitism in Russia and beyond, after a mob in Russia’s mostly Muslim region of Dagestan stormed the airport in Makhachkala in search of Jewish passengers arriving from Israel.
The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, spoke out about the incident in Dagestan, writing on social media that “hate will not win”.
Emma Hallali, the president of the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS), told the Guardian today that Jewish students across the continent were feeling scared and that universities were largely ignoring concerns from Jewish student organisations.
Aiman Mazyek, the head of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, said in a statement today that “the verbal violence directed at me has massively increased in the past few weeks”.
Shada Islam, a Brussels-based analyst and commentator, said that the war in the Middle East was bringing to the fore persistent racism – and that EU leaders should be careful not to exacerbate divisions.
Deborah Lipstadt, the US special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, said overnight that Washington was “deeply concerned by the dramatic increase in antisemitic incidents”.
Updated
Far-right German politician arrested after ‘Sieg Heil’ salutes heard
A legislator with the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party was arrested on Monday on charges including displaying forbidden totalitarian symbols, with neighbours of his fraternity complaining of often hearing the Nazi “Sieg Heil” victory salute.
Newly elected Daniel Halemba, 22, was due to take up his seat in the Bavarian regional parliament later on Monday. He is a member of the Teutonia Prague student fraternity, whose premises were raided by police in September.
During the raid, officials said, they found forbidden symbols – Germany’s constitution forbids the display of symbols of totalitarian regimes such as the swastika – and neighbours complained of hearing “Sieg Heil” (Hail Victory) from inside.
A prosecution spokesperson said Halemba would be brought before court later on Monday or Tuesday. Charges include inciting racist abuse.
Read the full story here.
Updated
In a recent interview, Germany’s antisemitism commissioner condemned the country’s recent increase in anti-Jewish violence, warning that it risked transporting the country back to its “most horrific times”.
Felix Klein said he was also worried about an erosion of basic rights as officials sought to crack down on expressions of support for the Palestinian people.
The remarks tap into a debate that has played out across Europe, and in particular in Germany and France – home to the EU’s largest Jewish and Muslim communities – as officials scramble to contain the spillover of tensions sparked by the Israel-Hamas war.
Klein, who became Germany’s first federal commissioner tasked with battling antisemitism in 2018, said many in the country were worried that the situation would continue to deteriorate.
“People are shocked to hear news of houses where Jews live being marked with a Star of David,” he said. “Because that, of course, rings a bell and brings us back to the most horrific times we had in this country.”
Catch up here on the full story.
Updated
Key event
Daniel Schwammenthal, director of the American Jewish Committee’s Transatlantic Institute, said in a statement today that “what we are witnessing isn’t simply a global spike in antisemitism but a civilisational rupture.”
A sea of protesters fill our streets not to condemn the burning of Jewish babies but to justify and celebrate it. Western media, constantly warning about fake news, violate the most basic rules of journalism in their eagerness to demonize the Jewish state.
“The deceit, the betrayal, the reversal of victims and perpetrators, the total moral collapse, it’s hard not to despair,” he said, “not just for Jews but the West in general.”
Since the Hamas attack and the Israeli government’s bombardment of Gaza, there has been an increase in hate crimes against Jewish people recorded in the UK.
Catch up here on the Today in Focus podcast episode on the rise of antisemitism in the UK.
Kremlin calls meeting after Dagestan incident, blames west
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, called a meeting of top security and law enforcement officials today, the Associated Press reported, after hundreds of men rushed onto tarmac of the airport in Makhachkala.
The Kremlin blamed the unrest on “outside interference” and Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the meeting would discuss “attempts by the west to use the events in the Middle East to divide the [Russian] society,” according to the AP.
“It is well known and obvious that yesterday’s event around the Makhachkala airport is largely the result of outside interference, including information influence from outside,” Peskov said.
Updated
The president of Russia’s Federation of Jewish Communities has called on the authorities to find and harshly punish the participants and organisers of an antisemitic riot in Dagestan yesterday, Reuters reported.
Rabbi Alexander Boroda said that the riot “undermined the basic foundations of our multi-cultural and multi-national state”.
Updated
Police in the UK have said a petrol can thrown into the car park of a mosque in Oxford is being treated as a potential hate crime, the BBC reported.
The petrol can had writing on it that “may be related to the ongoing conflict in Israel and Gaza”, police said.
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Lithuanian minister compares Russia to Nazi Germany
Gabrielius Landsbergis, Lithuania’s outspoken foreign minister, has criticised Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, over the incident in Dagestan, where a mob targeted Jews.
“Are the pogroms convincing enough? Do you need Putin to actually grow a moustache and raise his right hand?” he wrote on social media.
Even after Bucha there were still people saying we can't compare Russia to Nazi Germany. Well... how about now? Are the pogroms convincing enough? Do you need Putin to actually grow a moustache and raise his right hand?
— Gabrielius Landsbergis🇱🇹 (@GLandsbergis) October 30, 2023
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Verbal violence has increased, says head of Central Council of Muslims in Germany
Aiman Mazyek, head of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, said in a statement today that “the verbal violence directed at me has massively increased in the past few weeks.”
“One response to our condemn statement after the Hamas attack said: ‘I’d throw these bastards out of the country or just hang them from the nearest tree,’” Mazyek said in an email, adding that “there’s nothing new for me in all these attacks” but “there’s a new dimension to the latest stuff – this absolute refusal to have a constructive dialogue”.
“Positions have become much more hardened,” he said.
Nevertheless, Mazyek pointed to longstanding concerns about Islamophobia.
“Even before the escalation in Middle East, Muslim communities in Germany were having to deal with racism on an almost day-to-day basis – the attacks on mosques, the pigs’ heads left at people’s doors,” he said.
Updated
France records 719 antisemitic acts in 3 weeks
The French interior ministry said this weekend that 719 antisemitic acts had been recorded in the three weeks since 7 October, the date of the Hamas attacks on Israel, compared to 436 for the whole of 2022.
Anecdotally, many French Jews have told local media they have removed the Mezuzah scroll from their doorposts, stopped wearing their yarmulke skullcap outdoors, or changed names when ordering a cab or food delivery.
The ministry said 389 arrests had been made between 7 and 27 October but gave no further details on the people involved or the nature of the acts, which can include verbal aggression.
France, which has Europe’s largest Jewish and Muslim communities, has deployed 7,000 additional troops and heightened security at hundreds of Jewish schools, synagogues and other places across the country since the start of the conflict.
Violence in the Middle East has frequently led to an uptick in anti-semitic acts in France since the year 2000 and the start of the second Intifada, authorities say, with surges recorded in 2004, 2014 and 2015.
“These acts are responding to two forces: indignation, and the contagion or copycat effect,” Yonathan Arfi, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (CRIF), told Le Monde.
“My first reflex on 7 October was to call the interior ministry at 8am to ask it to step up security around our community’s buildings ... It’s less about the threat of discrimination now than the threat of aggression. That’s our fear.”
A helpline set up to provide support to people in the community affected by the latest Israel-Hamas war is receiving dozens of calls a day, French Jewish groups have said.
More than 60 psychologists and psychiatrists, including child psychiatrists, have volunteered to call back people who leave a message, said Fabien Azoulay of the United Jewish Social Fund (FSJU) which is organising the service.
Azoulay said callers range in age from teenagers to elderly people, including Holocaust survivors for whom rising anti-semitism “brings back childhood traumas they thought they’d never see again”, Azoulay said.
“They see it in the country (Israel) that was supposed to be the refuge for Jews. So it’s very, very traumatic,” he told the Associated Press.
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Jewish students in Europe living in 'constant fear', union leader says
Emma Hallali, president of the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS), told the Guardian today that Jewish students across the continent were feeling scared and that universities were largely ignoring concerns from Jewish student organisations.
In an interview in Brussels, Hallali said the EUJS had launched a survey of Jewish students across Europe and was hearing that some had begun having conversations in lower voices and hiding their magen davids.
They are just living in this constant fear that something can happen to them.
When Hamas declared a “day of rage” on 13 October, some Jewish students were advised not to show up to classes for their own safety, Hallali said.
She also described a recent incident at a Belgian university where students were granted permission to put up posters of hostages taken by Hamas, but then were told the university was recommending they not go ahead because it could not guarantee their safety.
The union president said that while she was not opposed to the idea of pro-Palestinian protests on campuses, Jewish students were concerned about violence that comes after demonstrations.
The organisation had plans before the war for a Jewish heritage week on campuses but “we have to cancel” because “if we organise these things it is going to put our students in danger”, she said.
And Jewish students feel that university administrations are not listening to their worries.
“We sent out more than 300 letters to universities, to more than 15 countries” in Europe outside the UK and France, Hallali said, adding that five or six universities had responded.
Jewish students, she said, felt “stuck” and “not heard” by universities.
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'Horrifying and abhorrent', London mayor says of Dagestan mob
Sadiq Khan has spoken out about the incident in Dagestan, Russia, writing on social media that “hate will not win”.
This is horrifying and abhorrent. I can only imagine how it must make Jewish people feel. I stand with London’s Jewish community against antisemitism.
This is horrifying and abhorrent. I can only imagine how it must make Jewish people feel.
— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) October 30, 2023
I stand with London’s Jewish community against antisemitism. Today, and always.
Together, we are strong and we will defeat the forces of hate who seek to divide us. Hate will not win. https://t.co/PD1nnTtawe
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EU must pre-empt rising antisemitism and Islamophobia, analyst says
Shada Islam, a Brussels-based analyst and commentator, said today that the war in the Middle East is bringing to the fore persistent racism – and that EU leaders should be careful not to exacerbate divisions.
“Events in the Middle East or linked to the region have a deep and almost immediate impact on European societies and public attitudes towards our Jewish and Muslim citizens,” she told the Guardian today.
The events “provoke an increase in antisemitism and Islamophobia, bringing to the fore systemic and persistent racism and discrimination across the EU against ethnic minority Europeans and people of colour”, she said.
The analyst underscored that minorities already face discrimination.
“Among Jews, 11% feel discriminated against, and most Muslims experience prejudice in a broad range of settings, particularly when looking for work and while on the job, as well as when seeking to access public and private services.”
She also emphasised the impact on women.
“Muslim women who wear the hijab are especially affected” and “there are only a handful of Muslims working in the EU institutions or elected to the European parliament,” she noted.
And, the analyst said, racist discourse is becoming more deeply embedded.
Racism is thriving across Europe because racist and xenophobic discourses and dog whistles to populists and far-right extremists have become deeply embedded in Europe’s mainstream politics, policies and institutions.
I’ve warned since the start of the Israeli - Palestine conflict that EU leaders must pre-empt such a rise in antisemitism and Islamophobia and be careful not to exacerbate domestic divisions. They should focus on uniting rather than dividing their citizens. Very few have done so.
Updated
“Lovers and defenders of democracy, it’s high time to stand up,” tweeted the EU’s coordinator on combating antisemitism Katharina von Schnurbein.
She was responding to the incident in Dagestan, describing the mob as “hatred unleashed by globally downplaying the barbaric acts of Hamas of 7 Oct and allowing antisemitism and anti-Zionism to fester around the globe.”
Horrific to see a mob chasing Jews in #Dagestan. Hatred unleashed by globally downplaying the barbaric acts of #Hamas of 7 Oct and allowing #antisemitism and anti-#Zionism to fester around the globe.
— (((k schnurbein))) (@kschnurbein) October 29, 2023
Lovers and defenders of #democracy, it’s high time to stand up. 🇪🇺 https://t.co/euJp5501Gf
Rights groups have raised concerns over the past days about the rise in Islamophobia and antisemitism.
Human Rights Watch said in a recent statement that “responses from European governments to the hostilities between Israel and Palestinian armed groups in Gaza are having harmful effects on human rights in Europe.”
The group said its concerns “include inadequate responses to growing reports of antisemitism and Islamophobia; the use of immigration policies that risk discrimination against people perceived to be Arab, Palestinian, or Muslim; and bans and other restrictions on peaceful pro-Palestinian protest and expression.”
Benjamin Ward, Human Rights Watch’s deputy Europe and Central Asia director, added:
The authorities in European countries have a responsibility to make sure that everyone is safe and protected from violence and discrimination.
It’s also important for the authorities to protect people’s right to peaceful protest and expression and ensure that governments’ security responses to violence don’t harm rights.
A mob in Russia’s mostly Muslim region of Dagestan has stormed the airport in Makhachkala in search of Jewish passengers arriving from Israel.
In the past day, local people have besieged a hotel in search of Jewish guests and stormed the airport after reports emerged that a flight from Tel Aviv was arriving in the city. Passengers were forced to take refuge in planes or hide in the airport for fear of being attacked.
Here is video footage of the incident.
US raises alarm over global rise in antisemitism - including in Europe
Deborah Lipstadt, the US special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, said overnight that Washington was “deeply concerned by the dramatic increase in antisemitic incidents”.
“Governments, law enforcement, and community groups in Europe, Latin America, Australia, South Africa, North America, Russia, and elsewhere have reported a sharp increase in antisemitic incidents, rhetoric, and incitement in the past three weeks,” she noted.
Violent incidents throughout the world in October have included harassment of and attacks on Jewish individuals, and defacement of and attacks on Jewish sites.
Targeting Jewish communities with hate, intimidation, or violence in relation to the conflict in the Middle East is intolerable and antisemitic – and without justification. Full stop.
Jewish people around the world should never be held responsible for the words and actions of the Israeli or any other government.
Lipstadt also emphasised that “there is no place for hatred of Jews, Muslims, Arabs, Palestinians, Israelis, or anyone else”.
Updated
‘Pervasive and relentless’ racism on the rise in Europe, survey finds
Racism is “pervasive and relentless” and on the rise in Europe, with nearly half of black people in member states surveyed by the EU reporting discrimination, from the verbal abuse of their children to being blocked by landlords from renting homes.
In every walk of life, from schools to the job market, housing and health, a survey by the EU’s rights agency of people of African descent found high levels of discrimination, with some of the worst results recorded in Austria and Germany, where far-right parties have been on the rise.
The survey of 6,752 people of African descent in 13 countries – Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden – found 45% had experienced racial discrimination, an increase of six percentage points from 39% in 2016.
In Austria and Germany, three in four of those questioned (72% and 76%) said they had felt discriminated against in the last five years, up from half (51% and 52%) when the same question was asked in 2016.
Read the full story here.
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Zelenskiy calls out 'appalling' Dagestan incident and 'Russian antisemitism'
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken out after a mob in Russia’s Dagestan region stormed an airport in search of Jewish passengers arriving from Israel.
This is not an isolated incident in Makhachkala, but rather part of Russia’s widespread culture of hatred toward other nations, which is propagated by state television, pundits, and authorities.
The Russian foreign minister has made a series of antisemitic remarks in the last year. The Russian president also used antisemitic slurs. For Russian propaganda talking heads on official television, hate rhetoric is routine. Even the most recent Middle East escalation prompted antisemitic statements from Russian ideologists.
Russian antisemitism and hatred toward other nations are systemic and deeply rooted. Hatred is what drives aggression and terror. We must all work together to oppose hatred.
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'We cannot allow the forces of hatred to divide us,' Humza Yousaf says
Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, has spoken out about the incident in Dagestan, calling footage “absolutely terrifying”.
There is real fear amongst our Jewish communities worldwide about the rise of antisemitism.
Absolutely terrifying footage.
— Humza Yousaf (@HumzaYousaf) October 29, 2023
There is real fear amongst our Jewish communities worldwide about the rise of antisemitism.
I stand with our Jewish community in Scotland against antisemitism. We can not allow the forces of hatred to divide us. https://t.co/N0bp9Y3GbV
Updated
Mob storms Dagestan airport in search of Jewish passengers from Israel
A mob in Russia’s mostly Muslim region of Dagestan has stormed the airport in Makhachkala in search of Jewish passengers arriving from Israel.
In the past day, local people have besieged a hotel in search of Jewish guests and stormed the airport after reports emerged that a flight from Tel Aviv was arriving in the city. Passengers were forced to take refuge in planes or hide in the airport for fear of being attacked.
Local health authorities said 20 people had been injured, including two who were critical. The RIA news agency said nine police officers had received injuries, two of whom were being treated in hospital. The passengers on the plane were safe, security forces told Reuters.
Sixty people were later detained, RIA reported on Monday, adding that 150 of the protesters had been identified.
Video posted to social media showed hundreds of young men, some carrying Palestinian flags or placards denouncing Israel, storming on to the tarmac of the Makhachkala international airport and climbing on to idling planes, attempting to break through the windows.
The riots appear to have been inspired by a number of posts on the social media platform Telegram, where followers were told that a flight from Tel Aviv would be arriving that evening with refugees from Israel.
Some of the signs held by the rioters read, “We are against Jewish refugees.”
Read the full story here.
Updated
Antisemitism is deeply ingrained in European society, says EU official
Antisemitism is a “deeply ingrained racism in European society” that poses an existential threat to the continent’s Jewish community and the fundamental aims of the European Union, an EU official has warned.
Michael O’Flaherty, the director of the bloc’s agency for fundamental rights, said it was worrying that only a third of the general population considered antisemitism a big problem, when there was no doubt “dramatic moments in our societies trigger antisemitic responses”.
He told the Guardian: “It happened with Covid, it’s happening now with the Russian aggression [in Ukraine] – and now it’s happening again. Media and civil society organisations warn of a rise of antisemitism as the crisis in the Middle East unfolds.
“I honestly think that with any big negative issue in our society, you’re going to find antisemitic tropes finding their way in there. It’s indicative of the extent … antisemitism is a deeply ingrained racism in European society.”
O’Flaherty added that it was “also important at this time to be vigilant and condemn all forms of hatred that manifest themselves in Europe, including hatred against Muslims”.
Read the full story here.
Welcome to the blog
Good morning and welcome back to the Europe blog.
Today we will be delving into concerns about rising antisemitism and Islamophobia across Europe.
Send your thoughts and comments to lili.bayer@theguardian.com.
