Source Data: Anti-Semitic & Anti-Israel hatred & violence in the US & beyond

Continued from Research data – Anti-Israel & Anti-Semitic hate & violence I Love Israel 

Contents

(1) Surveys & Reports: Worldwide metrics, in detail

(2) Various anti-Israel & anti-Semitic hate & violence – Worldwide

(3) Various anti-Israel & anti-Semitic hate & violence – North America

(4) BONUS: Americans’ lack of knowledge of, and misperceptions regarding the Holocaust

(1) Surveys & Reports: Worldwide metrics, in details

Poll: Many Democrats want more US support for Palestinians, by Ellen Knickmeyer and Emily Swanson, AP, June 23, 2021. Excerpt:

A new poll on American attitudes toward a core conflict in the Middle East finds about half of Democrats want the U.S. to do more to support the Palestinians, showing that a growing rift among Democratic lawmakers is also reflected in the party’s base.

The poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds differences within both the Democratic and the Republican parties on the U.S. approach toward Israel and the Palestinians, with liberal Democrats wanting more support for the Palestinians and conservative Republicans seeking even greater support for the Israelis.

Antisemitism ‘mainstreamed’ in Western European politics, says Israeli study; Researchers see convergence of far-left and far-right, crack in consensus against hatred of Jews; warn that Israel should not take leading role in fight against world antisemitism, by Lazar Berman, Times of Israel, June 15, 2021. Excerpt:

Fringe ideas and political parties are moving into the mainstream in Western Europe, bringing with them antisemitic views, according to an Israeli study to be released Tuesday that found a worrying convergence of far-right and far-left hate.

“We are seeing the penetration of the extremes into the political mainstream,” said Adi Kantor, one of the authors of “Contemporary Antisemitism in the Political Discourse of Five Western European Countries: Germany, France, Britain, Spain, Ireland.”

The study, a joint project of the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv and the Jewish Agency, studied expressions of antisemitism by politicians and political parties in the five Western European nations between late 2019 and late 2020. The research does not include the spike in antisemitism that occurred in Europe and the US during Israel’s 11-day Operation Guardian of the Walls against Hamas in May 2021.

“We wanted to try to understand how this phenomenon is on the one hand influenced by deep, global trends and broad social trends, where it is influenced by local characteristics, like Islamists in France, the right-wing in Germany, (former Labour Party leader Jeremy) Corbyn in the UK, and where it is influenced by unanticipated events like the coronavirus or the ‘yellow vest’ protests in France,” said INSS researcher Shahar Eilam, a former high-ranking IDF intelligence officer.

A BDS protest against Israel in Barcelona, Spain, June 2014. (YouTube screenshot)

May 2021: Survey reveals 55% of likely American voters support restricting US aid to Israel “to prevent violations of Palestinian human rights”:

Also, here is how Rep. Rashida Tlaib depicted this survey – and Israel’s actions:

Antisemitism surged across US during Gaza conflict, part of multi-year rise: Advocates; Antisemitic incidents more than doubled during the Hamas conflict, by Emily Shapiro, ABC News, June 10, 2021. Excerpt:

Joseph Borgen, a 29-year-old accountant in New York City, was on his way to a protest after work when he was jumped near Times Square.

“Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone chasing me, with their fist raised back, looking to punch me in the face. Before I could even react … I was surrounded by a whole group,” Borgen told ABC News.

The attackers punched, kicked, pepper-sprayed him and beat him with crutches, the New York Police Department said, leaving him with a concussion and bruising.

“I grabbed my head and neck and my face area and just held onto those areas as tight as I could,” Borgen said of the May 20 attack. “I was getting constantly kicked, punched and hit all over my body. But I was just holding onto my face and head, holding on for dear life, hoping I would survive.”

FBI Joins NYPD to Address Rise in Anti-Semitic Crimes in New York City; Federal agents are investigating as more than two dozen hate crimes against Jews were reported in May, By Ben Chapman, Wall St. Journal, May 29, 2021. Excerpt:

Federal agents and the New York Police Department are fighting a rise in anti-Semitic hate crimes by launching new investigations and increasing community outreach and patrols in affected neighborhoods.

Federal Bureau of Investigation officials said agents discussed anti-Semitic crimes with Jewish groups and held meetings and conference calls with community leaders in May as more than two dozen crimes with anti-Semitic motivations were reported to the NYPD.

The FBI also intensified a public-relations campaign to encourage reporting of such crimes to authorities in New York. The push includes posters with instructions for reporting hate crimes in languages including Yiddish, Hebrew and Mandarin.

Antisemitic attacks spread like ‘wildfire’ in the U.S. during Gaza conflict, By William Brangham and Murrey Jacobson, PBS News Hour, May 24, 2021. Excerpt:

The cease-fire in Gaza is holding for now. But while the confrontation between Israel and Hamas was taking place, there were growing reports of antisemitic attacks and slurs in several American cities. William Brangham focuses on the disturbing questions this trend raises about hate in America with Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League.

Officials Say Hate Crimes Against Jews Are Growing In The Aftermath Of Gaza Violence, by Jason Breslow, NPR, May 24, 2021. Excerpt:

The surge in antisemitic incidents comes at a moment when such attacks were already elevated. In 2019, the ADL recorded more than 2,100 cases of assault, vandalism and harassment against Jews across the U.S., the most since tracking began in 1979. In 2020, the number was the third-highest on record, Greenblatt told The Washington Post, even as coronavirus shutdowns kept millions of Americans at home.

Hate Crimes Against Jewish Students Are At An All-Time High, by Evan Gerstmann, Forbes, September 9, 2020. Excerpt:

According to a recent article in Inside Higher Education, “reports show harassment and attacks on Jewish students [are] at an all-time high.” Looking at the ADL Tracker of Anti-Semitic Incidents, it appears that the Covid-driven reliance of educators on the internet has opened up new opportunities for anti-Semitic harassment of students. The last month alone has seen classes disrupted by hackers crashing online classes with messages such as: “Adolph Hitler,” “F*CK JEWS FREE PALESTINE,” “Sieg Heil,” “Kill the Jews,” “Shlomo Rothschild,” “The Holocaust Never Happened,” as well as various swastikas and death threats.

Additionally, religious-based hate crimes on college campuses roughly doubled between 2009 and 2017, mostly targeting Jewish students. This reflects a society-wide spike in anti-Semitism that has been going on for several years.

Detail:

Responding to Rise in Campus Anti-Semitism; As reports show harassment and attacks on Jewish students at an all-time high, advocates are calling on university administrators to forcefully condemn anti-Semitism and work more aggressively to address and prevent it, by Greta Anderson, Inside Higher Ed, September 9, 2020. Excerpt:

The fire and verbal and online harassment targeting Jewish students over the past month are part of a larger trend of rising anti-Semitic incidents at higher ed institutions, Jewish college community leaders say. Hillel, an international Jewish student organization, recently reported that anti-Semitic incidents reached an all-time high of 178 during the 2019-20 academic year at the 550 colleges and universities in North America the organization serves. Anti-Semitism on college campuses has been rising significantly since 2016, according to the Anti-Defamation League.

“There’s more of a heightened anxiety on campus and around the country. It’s not specific to our campus,” Schwartz said. “You’re seeing it on the news, in tweets and social media posts, and it’s hard not to continuously think about that. College campuses are just sort of a great breeding ground for it.”

Jews most targeted group, according to New York and California hate crime stats, by Ilanit Chernick, Jewish Newsstand, July 5, 2020. Excerpt:

Hate crime statistics released by the New York Police Department have highlighted that Jews were the most targeted group in the city during the first quarter of 2020.

Of the 84 hate crimes reported between January 1 and March 31 this year, 45 were antisemitic. This accounts for more than 50% of the cases reported in the city.

The types of antisemitic crimes that took place were not listed in the statistics, but the total number reported was lower during this quarter than it was during this same period in 2019.

Between January and March 2019, 66 hate crimes against Jews were committed.

Hate crimes against Blacks accounted for 12 of the hate crime cases reported while 11 were reported against Asians.

Report: Anti-Semitic crimes rose in California in 2019, by Stefanie Dazio, AP, July 1, 2020. Excerpt:

Anti-Semitic hate crimes in California rose nearly 12% in 2019, including a fatal shooting at a Southern California synagogue, even as hate crimes overall declined statewide by 4.8%, according to a state report released Wednesday. […]

Hate crime events in California that involved a racial bias fell 12% in 2019, from 594 to 523. Crimes motivated by a sexual orientation bias decreased by 2.1%, from 238 to 233.

Yet hate crime events involving a religion bias rose 3.5%, from 201 to 208, according to the state’s data. Anti-Jewish bias events, such as the fatal synagogue shooting, went from 126 to 141, increasing by nearly 12%. Crimes with an anti-Islamic bias, however, decreased from 28 to 25 events, or 10.7%.

ANTISEMITIC INCIDENTS HIT ALL-TIME HIGH IN 2019; ADL annual report found more than 2,100 acts of antisemitic hate; 56 percent increase in assaults, five fatalities, by Charleston Jewish Federation, May 19, 2020. Excerpt:

Atlanta, May 12, 2020 … The American Jewish community experienced the highest level of antisemitic incidents last year since tracking began in 1979, with more than 2,100 acts of assault, vandalism and harassment reported across the United States, according to new data from ADL (the Anti-Defamation League). The record number of incidents came as the Jewish community grappled with vicious and lethal antisemitic attacks against communities in Poway, Jersey City and Monsey, and a spree of violent assaults in Brooklyn.

The 2019 ADL Audit of Antisemitic Incidents, issued today, found that the total number of antisemitic incidents in 2019 increased 12 percent over the previous year, with a disturbing 56 percent increase in assaults. The audit found there were, on average, as many as six antisemitic incidents in the U.S. for each day in the calendar year – the highest level of antisemitic activity ever recorded by ADL.

Anti-Semitic Crime In The U.S. Reaches Record Levels, by Quincy Walters, WBUR, May 12, 2020. Excerpt:

An arson at a Needham synagogue and vandalism at a Fall River cemetery contributed to a record high number of anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S last year.

The Anti-Defamation League says there were 2,107 hate crimes against Jewish people nationwide in 2019, according to the organization’s annual survey. That’s the highest the number since the ADL began tallying hate crimes in 1979.

Massachusetts has seen a decrease in anti-Semitic crime over the last few years: 177 reported incidents in 2017, 144 in 2018 and 114 last year. That’s not comforting, ADL New England Executive Director Robert Trestan said, because the numbers are still too high.

Jews still most targeted group for hate-motivated crimes, by Paul Lungen, Canadian Jewish News, February 28, 2020. Excerpt:

It was a good news/bad news scenario for Canadian Jews – with an emphasis on the bad news – when it came to hate crimes reported to police in 2018 and compiled by Statistics Canada.

First, the good news: the number of incidents targeting Jews declined in 2018 to 347 from 360 the year before, a drop of four per cent.

Now, the bad news, and there was plenty of it. Jews were again the most targeted victim group in Canada in 2018, accounting for more than 19 per cent of all incidents. While the number of events in which Jews were victims fell, the decline experienced by Jews was far less than the overall drop in criminal incidents based on religion, which plummeted by 24 per cent.

Other minority groups fared better than Jews. The next most targeted victim group, black people, saw a 12 per cent drop in the number of incidents, from 321 in 2017 to 283 in 2018.

Over Half of Religious Bias Crimes Target Jews, FBI Says in New Report, by Asher Stockler, Newsweek, November 12, 2019. Excerpt:

Almost 60 percent of hate crimes based on religious bias were motivated by anti-Semitism, the FBI reported on Tuesday as part of its annual Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) program.

In 2018, the year covered by the FBI’s most recent report, 57.8 percent of religious bias offenses were categorized as anti-Jewish. A total of 896 anti-Jewish offenses were reported to local and federal law enforcement agencies, forming a data set that is ultimately collected and released by the bureau.

Although thousands of agencies participate in the hate crimes reporting program, such participation is voluntary at the local level, meaning that the data underestimate the larger number of such crimes committed in smaller jurisdictions.

The number of anti-Jewish offenses dropped off in 2018 from the previous year, when there were 976. But the share of offenses directed against Jews or those perceived as Jewish remained consistent. About 58 percent of religious bias crimes in 2017 had an anti-Semitic motivation, roughly the same share as in 2018.

Report: Anti-Semitic Harassment at U.S. College Campuses Hits Historic Levels; ‘Israel-related anti-Semitic harassment increased 70 percent’, by Adam Kredo, Washington Free Beacon, September 17, 2019. Excerpt:

Anti-Semitic harassment on college campuses aimed at pro-Israel students jumped by 70 percent in the past year, the highest levels ever seen, according to a new study showing that the endorsement of anti-Israel causes by students and professors has created an unsafe environment for Jewish students.

Harassment of students who expressed pro-Israel ideologies jumped 70 percent from 2017 to 2018, according to a new report by the AMCHA Initiative, a campus organization that monitors anti-Semitism on more than 400 college campuses and that has recorded some 2,500 anti-Semitic incidents across the U.S. since 2015.

AMCHA found in its latest report that while examples of classical anti-Semitism decreased overall, there has been a major spike in students being targeted for hate speech and violence due to their open support for the state of Israel.

Detail:

The Harassment of Jewish Students on U.S. Campuses: How Eliminationist Anti-Zionism and Academic BDS Incite Campus Antisemitism, by AMCHA Initiative, September 2019. Excerpt:

While acts of classical antisemitism in the U.S. reached near-historic levels in 2018 and included the deadliest attack against Jews in American history,1 the nation’s colleges and universities revealed a somewhat different but nonetheless troubling story.

According to AMCHA Initiative’s survey of antisemitic activity in 2018 on campuses across the country, harassment motivated by classical antisemitism actually decreased, and significantly so. At the same time, however, the number of Israel-related acts of harassment increased significantly. Last year also saw two much-publicized incidents, the first of their kind, in which faculty on two U.S. campuses admitted to taking actions in compliance with the official guidelines of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI), which call for cutting all ties with Israeli universities, and boycotting or working to cancel or shut down events, activities, agreements or projects on their own campuses that promote the “normalization of Israel in the global academy.”2 In September 2018, a faculty member at the University of Michigan, himself a supporter of the academic boycott of Israel (academic BDS), refused to write a letter of recommendation for his student wanting to study on a university-approved program in Israel.3 Soon after, 1,000 individuals signed a petition stating, “We, too, are supporters of the BDS Movement, and would not provide a letter of support for a student seeking to study in an Israeli University.”4 Then in November, the faculty senate at Pitzer College, a small private school in Southern California, voted to shut down the school’s study abroad program in Israel, a vote spearheaded by a professor who is very active in the academic boycott movement.5

Report: Nearly half of young European Jews victims of anti-Semitism in past year; Newly released data from unprecedented EU survey suggests people aged 16-34 are considerably more likely to face bigotry than older Jews, much of it related to Israel, by Robert Philpot, Times of Israel, July 20, 2019. Excerpt:

Nearly half of young Jewish Europeans have been the victim of at least one anti-Semitic incident in the past year, newly published findings from an unprecedented survey reveal.

They are also considerably more likely to experience anti-Semitism than older Jews, the European Union report finds.

The research also suggests that young Jews in Europe are particularly likely to believe that they are accused or blamed by people in their countries for the actions of the Israeli government because they are Jewish. Eighty-five percent of the 16-34 year-olds surveyed said this happens to them at least occasionally; nearly one-quarter said it occurs “all the time.”

New Survey Shows Rise in Number of Americans Who Believe Refusing Service to Jews Should Be Allowed, by Benjamin Kerstein, The Algemeiner, June 25, 2019. Excerpt:

A new survey showed a rise in the number of Americans who said small businesses should have the right to refuse service to Jews if doing so would violate the owners’ religious beliefs.

Conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute, which has partnered with the Brookings Institution and Georgetown University, the survey revealed that 19 percent of Americans felt discrimination against Jews on religious grounds was acceptable.

This marked a seven-percent rise since 2014, when only 12 percent agreed.

According to the data, 24 percent of Republicans, 17 percent of Democrats, and 16 percent of independents said such discrimination should be permitted.

In 2014, only 16 percent of Republicans and nine percent of Democrats did so.

Skyrocketing Attacks On NYC Jews Ignored Because Of Race; An epidemic of anti-Jewish violence in Brooklyn is being virtually ignored because many of the assailants are black and Hispanic, by David Marcus, The Federalist, May 10, 2019. Excerpt:

Imagine that members of a religious minority were being frequently physically assaulted in America’s largest city at alarming rates. Imagine if members of that minority were being cold-cocked or spit on randomly for doing nothing more than being who they are and dressing how they dress. Imagine what a powerful and important story this would be to our country, how mobilized the media and government would be to stop it. But what if I told you that this is happening in New York City right now, and nobody seems to care very much? How can this be? I’ll explain it.

Orthodox Jews in New York City, specifically in Brooklyn, have experienced alarming rates of physical assault over the past year. The New York Police Department says that hate crimes in the city are up 67 percent this year. Of those, a whopping 80 percent have been anti-Semitic hate crimes. Just this week an Orthodox Jew just walking down the street was attacked from behind, punched in the head by an attacker who then ran away. In another incident this week, an Orthodox Jew was attacked by a group of men, one of whom shouted “You (expletive) Jew.”

This is an all too familiar story in Brooklyn these days, and there is a reason it isn’t being treated as a crisis by our media or government. That reason is that many if not most of the assailants are black or Hispanic men. In an article in The New York Times last October that was careful to point out, although without much evidence, that people of all descriptions are committing acts of anti-Semitism, Ginia Bellafante writes (emphasis mine), “In fact, it is the varied backgrounds of people who commit hate crimes in the city that make combating and talking about anti-Semitism in New York much harder.”

A new perspective on Americans’ views of Israelis and Palestinians, by Carroll Doherty, Pew Research, April 24, 2019. Excerpt:

Americans have more favorable views of the Israeli and Palestinian peoples than of their governments, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. And as previous surveys on this subject have shown, there are substantial partisan differences in these attitudes.

The survey was conducted April 1-15 among 10,523 adults on the Center’s nationally representative American Trends Panel. It asked one group of people whether they had favorable or unfavorable opinions of the Israeli people and, separately, of the Palestinian people. Another group of respondents was asked for its opinions of the Israeli government and the Palestinian government. […]

In the new survey, majorities in both parties have favorable opinions of Israel’s people, though Republicans and Republican-leaning independents (77%) are more likely than Democrats and Democratic leaners (57%) to have a favorable view. The gap is considerably wider in views of Israel’s government: 61% of Republicans and just 26% of Democrats view Israel’s government favorably.

German Government Records 60% Surge in Violent Attacks Targeting Jews During 2018, by Ben Cohen, The Algemeiner, February 13, 2019. Excerpt:

In yet another dramatic sign of rising antisemitism on the European continent, Germany’s government disclosed on Wednesday that violent attacks against Jews in the country surged by 60 percent during 2018.

The numbers were published in answer to a request for information from German parliamentarian Petra Pau, a prominent leader of the left-wing socialist party Die Linke (“The Left”). Figures gathered by the German authorities showed an overall rise of 10 percent in antisemitic incidents compared to 2017, with 1,646 offenses reported last year.

Of those, 62 were classified as “violent crimes,” compared with 37 crimes in the same category in 2017.

A total of 43 people were injured in 2018’s violent incidents, while police said they had identified 857 suspects and made 19 arrests.

Full List of Crown Heights Attacks on Jews, by Jewish Press Staff, January 23, 2019. Excerpt:

In the last four months, at least 15 Jews have been attacked in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, NY. Detective Vincent Martinos of the 71st Precinct told The Jewish Press that the police are doing all they can to protect local Jewish residents – including placing 10-15 more policemen on the street every day – but attacks keep on occurring.

Martinos said that making it more difficult to stem the crime wave is the lack of any pattern in when and where attacks occur. Below is a list of recent attacks against Jews in Crown Heights:

Video footage of the Oct. 15 attack

Hate crimes in NY: Jews targeted in 2018 more than all other groups combined, by JTA, December 28, 2018. Excerpt:

New York saw more hate crimes against Jews in 2018 than all other targeted groups combined, according to police figures.

Anti-Semitic incidents rose by 22 percent from last year, NYPD figures show, according to a report Wednesday on Patch. Of the 352 hate crimes this year recorded as of Sunday, 183 were anti-Semitic incidents. Brooklyn has seen a spate of hate crimes against Jews in recent months, but the Patch report did not break down the figures by boroughs.

Overall, the tally of hate crimes in New York is up about 6 percent from 331 in the same time last year.

Evan Bernstein, the Anti-Defamation League’s New York Regional director, told Patch that those holding anti-Semitic beliefs are feeling emboldened. ADL believes that 12 to 14 percent of Americans hold such beliefs.

Major Violent Attacks Against Jews Spiked 13% Worldwide In 2018, by Eurasia Review, May 3, 2019. Excerpt:

Thirteen Jews were murdered as the result of anti-Semitic attacks in 2018, and the number of other major violent anti-Semitic attacks, including assault, vandalism and arson, spiked 13%, from 342 to 387 incidents worldwide, according to an annual report from Tel Aviv University’s Kantor Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry.

The United States registered the highest number of violent attacks on Jews — more than 100 cases — followed by the United Kingdom with 68 incidents and France and Germany, both of which saw 35 violent attacks on Jews in 2018. The report did not include figures from the recent attack near San Diego on the Chabad of Poway synagogue, in which one woman was killed and three others wounded.

“There is a growing sense that Jewish people in many countries are living in a state of emergency,” Prof. Dina Porat, head of the Kantor Center and chief historian of Yad Vashem, told reporters at a news conference at Tel Aviv University on May 1. “Physical insecurity and the questioning of their place in society and in the parties that were once their political homes are more prevalent than ever.”

“Anti-Semitism peaked recently in a manner that casts doubt on the very existence of Jews in many parts of the world,” Dr. Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress, said in a news release. “As we have seen following the second mass shooting incident at a U.S. synagogue, many parts of the world are no longer safe for Jews as we thought they were in the past.”

Is It Safe to Be Jewish in New York?, by Ginia Bellafante, The New York Times, October 31, 2018. Excerpt:

During the past 22 months, not one person caught or identified as the aggressor in an anti-Semitic hate crime has been associated with a far right-wing group, Mark Molinari, commanding officer of the police department’s Hate Crimes Task Force, told me.

Democrats, Independents and the nonreligious in the USA have almost equal sympathy for Israelis and the Palestinians in their ongoing conflict (2014)

From: More Express Sympathy for Israel than the Palestinians; Many Have Some Sympathy for Both Sides in Mideast Conflict, by Pew Research, August 28, 2014. Excerpt:

Most Americans say they sympathize “a lot” (34%) or “some” (32%) with Israel, while roughly a quarter sympathize with Israel “not much” (15%) or “not at all” (12%).

There is less public sympathy for the Palestinians: 11% sympathize with Palestinians a lot, though 35% have some sympathy for them. Nearly half say they have little (20%) or no sympathy (27%) for the Palestinians.

Israel ranked in global survey 4th greatest threat to world peace, alongside Iran & North Korea (2014)

From:A new poll says these nations are the top 4 threats to world peace. Guess who’s number one, by Sarah Wolfe, GlobalPost, January 3, 2014. Excerpt:

US President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize four years ago. Today, the country he leads is seen — according to a new poll — as the biggest threat to world peace.

The global survey, conducted by WIN/Gallup International, polled residents in 68 countries on everything from the global economy to politics and living conditions.

According to the poll, 24 percent of the surveyed countries ranked the United States as the greatest threat to world peace today, followed by Pakistan at 8 percent, China at 6 percent and four countries (Afghanistan, Iran, Israel and North Korea) tied at 5 percent.

Israel ranked third greatest threat to world peace, behind only Iran and Pakistan in UK-European-EU survey (2012)

From: Israel ranked third behind Iran and Pakistan for ‘negative influence’ in BBC survey; Americans buck the global trend with increasingly positive attitude to Israel, Times Of Israel, May 17, 2012. Excerpt:

Israel, along with North Korea, ranks third behind only Iran and Pakistan in the latest annual Country Ratings Poll of the BBC World Service. Bucking the global norm, a growing proportion of Americans — 50% in the latest survey — have a favorable view of Israel in 2012.

The 22-country survey, conducted by GlobeScan/PIPA among 24,090 people around the world, asked respondents to rate whether the influence of each of 16 countries and the EU is “mostly positive” or “mostly negative.” The most negatively rated countries were, as in previous years, Iran (55% negative), Pakistan (51% negative), and Israel and North Korea (both 50% negative).

Israel ranked greatest threat to world peace in European survey (2008)

From: Israel Troubled by Poll Calling It A Threat to World Peace, by Julie Stahl, CNS News, July 7, 2008. Excerpt:

The Israeli government, American Jewish groups, and the head of the European Commission have expressed serious concerns about the results of a recent poll in which a majority of Europeans said they believed that Israel posed more of a threat to world peace than any other nation. […]

Respondents were given a list of 15 countries and asked if each country was a “threat to world peace.”

Fifty-nine percent – the highest percentage – said they believed Israel to be such a threat, while 53 percent viewed the U.S., Iran and North Korea as a threat to world peace.

Israel ranked greatest threat to world peace in European survey (2003)

From: European poll calls Israel a big threat to world peace, by Thomas Fuller, New York Times, October 31, 2003. Excerpt:

Almost 60 percent of Europeans say that Israel is a larger threat to world peace than North Korea, Iran or Afghanistan, according to a poll scheduled to be made public Monday by the European Commission. The result from a survey of about 7,500 people across the European Union was confirmed Thursday by an official at the commission.

(2) Various anti-Israel & anti-Semitic hate & violence – Worldwide

Where Europe stands on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Polls; European leaders are divided. So are their voters, by Cornelius Hirsch and Giovanna Coi, Politico, May 21, 2021. Excerpt:

The recent flare-up of violence in Israel and Gaza has placed a spotlight European divisions over the issue.

The 11-day conflict ended early Friday morning with a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, a development EU leaders uniformly welcomed. Yet during the deadly clashes, the EU itself struggled to present a unified front on the issue, with Hungary blocking a joint statement in a meeting of EU foreign ministers earlier this week.

A POLITICO analysis of Continent-wide sentiment on Israel and its treatment of Palestinians suggests those divisions are reflected in public opinion across different EU countries.

And while Brussels and EU capitals wrestle with the current crisis, the European public appears to not be highly engaged with the issue in general. To the extent that surveys are able to paint a representative picture, Europeans admit their knowledge about Israel is limited, with almost two-thirds saying it is fairly weak to nonexistent. That’s in contrast to the self-reported knowledge about Europe in Israel.

Israelis and Europeans also have different expectations of each other, with the former expecting Europe to show a greater sense of responsibility against the background of the history of the Holocaust.

(4) Reports exposing mass incitement of hatred against Israel

Palestinian Leaders Use Coronavirus to Attack Israel, by Khaled Abu Toameh, Gatestone Institute, March 20, 2020. Excerpt:

  • On March 18, Israel delivered hundreds of kits for detecting the coronavirus into the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, together with equipment for medical protection. This is the same Gaza Strip from which Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups have been firing thousands of rockets at Israel for the past few years, and launching party-balloons carrying hidden bombs as recently as last week. In February alone, more than 40 rockets were launched into Israel from the Gaza Strip.
  • The Palestinian leaders, who are pursuing their efforts to prosecute Israelis for “war crimes,” have been concealing from their own people and the international community the fact that Israel is assisting them in the war on the coronavirus.
  • For Palestinian leaders, it seems that the war on Israel is more important than the battle against a pandemic and saving the lives of their own people. Yet, these leaders and their families, if they are diagnosed with the disease, will undoubtedly be the first to rush to Israel to seek medical treatment there.

Cartoonist Carlos Latuff Spreads the Antisemitism Virus, by David Lange, IsraellyCool, March 15, 2020.

I already posted many of the vile Israel-bashing and Jew-bashing social media posts as the coronavirus wreaks havoc around the world. But trust antisemitic cartoonist Carlos Latuff, (with some help from Mondoweiss MondoScheisse) to team up for this:

Of course, this cartoon conveniently ignores the facts that Gaza also shares a border with Egypt (who similarly restrict movement), Hamas has now closed Gaza’s border crossings with Israel and Egypt for travel due to the coronavirus, and Israel is cooperating with the palestinians in the fight against this common enemy.

But why allow truth to get in the way of some good old fashioned Jew-bashing?

Palestinians Revive Blood Libels as Israel Saves Their Lives, by Khaled Abu Toameh, Gatestone Institute, March 9, 2020. Excerpt:

  • Earlier, the Israeli authorities announced that they had facilitated 105,495 humanitarian crossings for Palestinians to receive medical treatment in Israel during the last week of February.
  • Yet, rather than showing gratitude toward the Israeli authorities for their assistance, the Palestinian Authority and its media outlets and officials are continuing their campaign of incitement against Israel.
  • If, as the Palestinians claim, the Jews have been using wild boars for the past two decades, why has no one snapped even one photo of an Israeli truck carrying the animals into Palestinian villages?
  • What about the hundreds of thousands of Jews living in the West Bank? How come they too have not been attacked by wild boars? And how are these wild boars able to distinguish between Arabs and Jews?
  • While this sort of perverse Palestinian payback is nothing new, it nonetheless ought to interest anyone in the international community who is considering contributing to the Palestinian cause.

1 in 5 Europeans says secret Jewish cabal runs the world, survey finds, by Cnaan Liphshiz, Jerusalem Post, February 26, 2020. Excerpt:

In each of the countries polled, a representative sample of 1,000 adults was presented with 45 questions or statements in face-to-face interviews about Jews and Israel.

PARIS – A secret network of Jews influences global political and economic affairs.

That’s the feeling among a fifth of the 16,000 respondents to a survey among Europeans from 16 countries. The same number also agreed with the statement that “Jews exploit Holocaust victimhood for their own needs.”

The survey was presented Monday at a conference about antisemitism organized in Paris by the European Jewish Association. It was conducted in December and January in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Poland, among other countries.

Other findings:

      • A quarter of respondents agreed with the statement that Israel’s policies make them understand why some people hate Jews.
      • More than a quarter concurred with the statement that “Israel is engaged in legitimate self defense against its enemies.” A quarter of respondents disagreed and 46% did not express a position.
      • More than a third agreed with the assertion that “During World War II, people from our nation suffered as much as Jews.”

Protesters hold placards and flags during a demonstration, organised by the British Board of Jewish Deputies for those who oppose antisemitism, in Parliament Square in London. (photo credit: HENRY NICHOLLS/REUTERS)

Israelis brutally beaten in Poland club, attackers said to scream ‘f**k Israel’; Brother of one of the victims says group of ‘Arabic speakers’ asked men if they are from Israel before assaulting them, by Times of Israel, September 2019. Excerpt:

Yotam Kashpizky after being beaten in an allegedly nationalistically motivated attack in Poland on September 8, 2019.

Several Israelis were brutally assaulted in Poland after the assailants asked where they were from, the brother of one of the victims alleged on Sunday.

Barak Kashpizky posted to Facebook a pair of pictures of his bloodied twin brother Yotam, taken shortly after the attack, in an account that quickly went viral.

In it, Kashpizky said that Yotam had gone out to a club in Warsaw with several other Israeli students attending a summer semester abroad at the local law school.

At 4 a.m., the Israelis were approached by a group of “Arabic speakers” who asked them if they were from Israel.

“When they answered in the affirmative, they were relentlessly attacked, [in blows] accompanied by shouts of ‘fuck Israel,’” wrote Barak Kashpizky, adding that his brother was briefly knocked unconscious.

https://www.facebook.com/barak.kashpizky/posts/2994518973923055

Is anti-Semitism becoming mainstream? Experts see alarming trend in media, campus and public life, by Josh Hasten, JNS, June 13, 2019. Excerpt:

“The ongoing decades-old long demonization and dehumanization of the Jewish state has been misunderstood as political criticism when in truth, it has been the new virulent form of anti-Semitism,” said Dan Diker, a fellow and senior project director at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.

‘A rapidly spreading crisis’; A 12-year-old student in Melbourne was verbally abused, physically assaulted and forced to kiss the feet of a Muslim boy – all because he is Jewish, by Rebecca Davis, The Australian Jewish News, October 3, 2019. Excerpt:

The 12-year-old Jewish student was forced to kiss the feet of a Muslim child.

A FIVE-YEAR-OLD student began wetting himself in class after he was subjected to antisemitic bullying over the course of four months, while a 12-year-old student was forced to kiss the feet of a Muslim child and was physically assaulted.

Both Jewish students, who have asked to remain anonymous, had to leave their public schools because their families felt the principals did not provide them adequate support.

The first child, a prep student at Hawthorn West Primary School, started wetting himself in bed at night, and in class. He also became agitated, began using derogatory language and looked for an excuse each morning to avoid going to school. His parents knew something was wrong, but were unsure if it was all a part of the adjustment process from kindergarten.

Then, after spilling his cereal one morning, the five-year-old broke down. “He literally fell down on the floor,” his mother shared with The AJN, “and said, ‘Mummy, you shouldn’t love me. I’m a worthless, Jewish rodent. I’m vermin.’”

Mortified, his mother crumbled on the floor with him.

It was later revealed that the young boy was being bullied on a daily basis by five classmates in the school bathrooms. It started when he was questioned about being circumcised. Then came the barrage of antisemitic insults, including “Jewish vermin”, “the dirty Jew” and a “Jewish cockroach”.

Experts Weigh In: Why Is Israel Losing The PR War And How Can We Save Ourselves?, by Lex, IsraellyCool, April 25, 2018. Excerpt:

It doesn’t take a genius to know that Israeli PR has much to be desired, that slowly but surely the world is being won over by Hamas and Fatah and their smear campaign.

It is not a particularly brilliant smear campaign. Anyone with a third grade education could see through the smoke and mirrors and understand their strategy to lie their way into the hearts and minds of the influencers of the younger generation.

It is almost as if people want to believe the smears. It is almost as if it makes them feel good to see Jews as perpetrators of oppression, in the same way that when Jews were powerless and their ancestors were in power, they perpetrated violence against Jews.

I was talking to my friend Virag Gulyas, a Hungarian non-Jewish Hasbara powerhouse, and we were griping yet again about what a disaster Israeli PR is, how sometimes it seems they feed right into the hand of the enemy.

Pro-Palestinians Attack Students at Pro-Israel Event, by CBN News, October 29, 2016. Excerpt:

Attendees of a pro-Israel event at University College London were forced to barricade themselves in a room following an attack by more than 100 pro-Palestinian protestors.

According to Jewish News Israeli activist Hem Mazzig was scheduled to speak to an audience about his job as a pro-Israel activist, but the event was cut short by the loud, angry screams of pro-Palestinian students who came to protest the event.

CBN News has reported on the growing problem of anti-Semitism on college campuses, including pro-Palestinian protestors disrupting and shutting down events by pro-Israel groups.

Cell phone footage showed the crowd trying to intimidate the students by chanting “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” a common chant calling for the destruction of the Jewish state.

(3) Various anti-Israel & anti-Semitic hate & violence – North America

Poll: Majority of Jewish College Students Feel ‘Unsafe’ on Campus
50 percent report hiding their Jewish identity, by Adam Kredo, Washington Free Beacon, September 20, 2021. Excerpt:

More than 65 percent of Jewish students on America’s college campuses report feeling unsafe, and around 50 percent say they have hidden their religious identity to avoid physical or verbal attacks, according to a recent poll.

A rising number of Jewish students feel unsafe on college campuses as anti-Israel and anti-Zionist organizations mount increasing attacks on the Jewish state and its supporters, according to the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, an advocacy organization that conducted the first-ever poll to examine the rates of anti-Semitism faced by Jewish college students.

“Students are feeling unsafe and, as a result, are learning that to avoid anti-Semitism they must view their religion as something to hide, not celebrate,” the group said in a press release announcing the findings. “In fact, the survey indicates that the longer students stay on campus, the less safe they feel and the more they feel the need to hide their identity.”

Anti-Semitism has skyrocketed on college campuses in recent years as a result of a coordinated push by organizations that are opposed to the Jewish state and any support for it on college campuses. Jewish students have been verbally and physically attacked on campuses across the country and now report they are being forced to hide their Jewish identity to avoid these incidents.

American antisemitism – Israeli paralysis; All signs indicate that the new Lapid-Bennett government is constitutionally incapable of contending with the problem of Jew hatred in America, by  Caroline B. Glick, Israel Hayom, June 25, 2021. Excerpt:

It seems that a day doesn’t go by without another report of yet another outrageous attack by leftists against Jews in America.

This week, a food truck in Philadelphia was barred from participating in an ethnic street food festival in Philadelphia because it sells Israeli street food and is owned by an Israeli Jew.

The lesbian parade in Chicago published an advertisement of the event that showed a woman standing on a car burning the American and Israeli flags.

According to community data, during last month’s mini-war, Operation Guardian of the Walls, American Jews suffered 193 violent attacks. Another 17,000 verbal online assaults were tallied by the Anti-Defamation League. The violent attacks didn’t end when Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire.

Normally, the government of Israel would have something useful to say or do about these devastating developments. But tragically, all signs indicate that the new Lapid-Bennett government is constitutionally incapable of contending with the problem of Jew hatred in America.

Israeli food truck is BANNED from Philadelphia food festival: Organizers are accused of bowing to anti-Semitism after they claimed it would cause a ‘safety risk’, by Peter Belfiore, Daily Mail (UK), June 21, 2021. Excerpt:

A Philadelphia food festival was condemned for banning an Israeli food truck on ‘safety’ grounds after telling the small business owners they feared its presence would trigger violent protests.

The city’s A Taste of Home event, organized by local food group Eat up the Borders, announced the food truck – Moshava Philadelphia – was no longer welcome to attend just a month after Moshava launched its business at the very same event.

Moshava’s cancellation triggered a huge backlash, with supporters insisting that A Taste of Home would have happily hired security to protect any other nationality that had received such threats.

It ultimately led to the entire event being canceled, although a statement by Eat up the Borders did not apologize, and was promptly condemned on social media.

The statement read: ‘Our mission at EUTB, is to uplift as many passionate small businesses in the Philadelphia areas as possible.

‘We want to provide a platform where we can gather around a table to share history, culture, language, and most importantly, FOOD.

Israeli street food business Moshava Philadephia launched at last month's Taste of Home food festival in Philadephia, but this month was asked to stay away after threats of violent protests to the festival's organizers. Founder Chef Nir Sheynfeld (right) said he was disappointed with the decision

Voters Are More Likely to Sympathize With Israel Than Palestine, Though Many Feel for Both Sides; Amid latest conflict, 28% sympathize with the Israelis while 11% side with Palestinians, by Eli Yokley, Morning Consult, May 19, 2021. Excerpt:

There is no unified position among U.S. voters on the escalating fighting between the Israeli military and Hamas militants, according to a new Morning Consult/Politico survey.

The survey, conducted May 14-17 as the conflict was entering its second week, found 28 percent of voters said they were more sympathetic toward the Israelis, compared with 11 percent who aligned themselves with the Palestinians. Another 29 percent of voters said they sympathized with both sides equally, while a third said they did not know or had no opinion on the issue.

Americans Still Favor Israel While Warming to Palestinians, by Lydia Saad, Gallup, March 19, 2021. Excerpt:

Gallup’s annual update of Americans’ views on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict shows Israel remains well-liked in the U.S. At the same time, Americans’ favorable views of the Palestinian Authority are at a new high of 30%, as is the percentage sympathizing more with the Palestinians than the Israelis (25%).

Similarly, Americans continue to be more inclined to want the U.S. to pressure the Palestinians than the Israelis to resolve the Mideast conflict. But support for emphasizing pressure on Israel is also at a new high of 34%, with a majority of Democrats taking this position for the first time.

California State University Professor Spreads ‘Coronavirus’ Blood Libel about Israel, by David Lange, IsraellyCool, March 10, 2020. Excerpt:

As’ad AbuKhalil is a Lebanese-American professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus.

He is also a virulent antisemite who spreads conspiracy theories about the world’s only Jewish state.

Here’s what he decided to tweet in response to news Israel is trying to do it’s best to protect her citizens from coronavirus:

https://www.israellycool.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/asad.png

Perverted Israel-Haters Claim Israel Trying to Hurt Palestinians with Covid-19, by Elder of Ziyon, The Algemeiner, March 11, 2020. Excerpt:

There is nothing too low for Israel-haters.

The Students for Justice in Palestine chapter at the University of Maryland is having a conference where they want to somehow tie the coronavirus to Israel’s “occupation.”

And at California State University, which employs Asad Abukhalil (who has a blog called The Angry Arab), the professor accuses Israel of planning to put all non-Jews in mass prisons.

Really.

Hating Israel Means Never Having to Say You’re Sorry, by Steven Emerson, IPT News, March 6, 2020. Excerpt:

Professional politicians say a lot of things that just aren’t true, so perhaps it’s not fair to hold others to a higher standard than the people we put in power. But when it comes to anti-Israel activists, it seems that anything goes, including claims that cross the line into outright anti-Semitism. And the bigger the whopper, the better.

Marc Lamont Hill can make the outrageous claim that Israel poisons Palestinian water and still be invited to speak at fundraisers and other events. Linda Sarsour can repeat the blood libel that Jews and Zionists justify police killings of unarmed black people in America – and worse, are responsible for them – and still get a lucrative Simon & Schuster book deal and serve as an official surrogate for Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign.

Her chronic displays of anti-Semitism largely are overlooked by national news outlets.

Fellow Sanders surrogate Amer Zahr can equate Israel with ISIS, a sentiment repeatedly uttered by Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) chapter directors Zahra Billoo and Hussam Ayloush, without consequence. Billoo comes right out and says she does not “believe [Israel] has a right to exist.”

She’s still CAIR’s top official in the San Francisco Bay area.

Their obsessive focus on Israel is telling. China is imprisoning and indoctrinating 1 million Muslims. Syria has spent years engaging in mass murder of hundreds of thousands of its own people and displacing millions more, numbers exponentially greater than Palestinian casualties in all the wars and conflicts with Israel. But thus far, none of these activists have advocated ending these, or any other states. Just the world’s lone Jewish state.

And that brings us to a protest held Sunday in front of the White House. A small group met for the anti-Israel group Al-Awda: The Right of Return of Palestinian Refugees’ “national rally to support Palestine and protest AIPAC.” The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) was holding its annual convention a short distance away.

Scripps College to host professor who wrote book claiming Israel purposely harms Palestinians, by Jackson Richman, JNS, March 6, 2020. Excerpt:

“The Right to Maim: Debility, Capacity, Disability” by Jasbir Puar asserts that the Israeli Defense Forces believe in “rehabilitation through the spatial, affective and corporeal debilitation of Palestine,” as well as “the sovereign right to maim, wielded by Israel, in relation to the right to kill.”

Scripps College, a private woman’s liberal-arts institution and part of The Claremont Colleges in Southern California, is scheduled to host a keynote this month by Rutgers University professor Jasbir Puar, who wrote a book accusing Israel of maiming Palestinians to assert control over them.

The March 12 address at the school, titled “Debility and Disability in Palestine: Notes Towards Southern Disability Studies,” is presented by Scripps’ anthropology department, the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, and the college’s Department of Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies.

It is also co-sponsored by Claremont Graduate University’s Cultural Studies Department and the Pomona College Politics Department.

“This keynote will detail various strands of histories of disability in Palestine and their import in terms of activism, advocacy and the field of southern disability studies,” according to the event description. “Based on fieldwork with disability and rehabilitation center workers in 2016 and members at refugee camps in the West Bank from the summer of 2018, Jasbir Puar’s research suggests that disability is lived as an inevitable consequence of Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation.”

Note: Richard Cravatts, President Emeritus of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East (SPME), said on Facebook, in response:

“The fact that this anti-Semitic Israel-hater was invited to Scripps, not only by the virulent student group Students for Justice in Palestine, but by several academic departments from the college itself, indicates the depths to which academia has sunk when it comes to talking about the Middle East. Puar engages in what is at best pseudo- scholarship, making up facts and statistics to support her odious thesis that Israelis deliberately maim and harm Palestinians in order to erase their cultural identities and to keep them subservient to the Jewish state. It’s a resurrection of the Christian blood libel of Jews who specifically wish to harm and kill non-Jews. To make matters worse, her last book was published by the extremely biased Duke University Press, another indication that academia has been taken over by ideology instead of intellect.”

Catholic Antisemite Incites Against American Jews and Israel on Iranian Television, by Dexter Van Zile, CAMERA, January 8, 2020. Excerpt:

E. Michael Jones, a well-known Catholic antisemite who resides in South Bend, Indiana, has spent the past few days giving advice to the leaders of Iran, telling them that they should not regard U.S. President Donald Trump as their enemy, but that their real problem is with Israel and Jews who control American foreign policy in the United States.

He offered this advice in two recent appearances on Iran’s PressTV.

Jones’s cozying up to the mullahs should come as no surprise. Over the years, he has established himself as a booster for the ayatollahs who have murdered thousands of Iranian citizens since the 1979 revolution in that country.

Speaking at a conference in Tehran in February 2013, during which he portrayed Jews as having a corrupt influence on American society, Jones declared, “Iran is the leader of the free world.” He also described the shootings of Jews at synagogues in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Poway, California as a response to the role “the Jews” have played in undermining the moral order. The Christian moral order, Jones says, has been “overridden by an operating system or by software that you would call ‘The Jews.’”

“They’ve been undermining the moral law in the name of liberation,” he said. “That’s what abortion is. That’s what pornography is. That’s what gay rights is. And now, that’s what Zionism is.”

In Survey, UC Berkeley Prof. Finds Most Students ‘Passionate’ About ‘Israeli Occupation’ Can’t Find Palestinian Territories on Map, The Algemeiner, November 27, 2019. Excerpt:

Most students who care strongly about the “Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories” do not have knowledge of basic facts surrounding the subject, and do not share similar concerns about other geopolitical conflicts, a recent study has suggested.

The survey, carried out among 230 undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley, was conducted by Ron Hassner, the Helen Diller Family Chair in Israel Studies at the school who published an essay on his results on Monday.

Pro-Israel Student Group ‘Silenced’ at Williams; The student government at Williams College drew the ire of the college president and national organizations for rejecting official recognition of a student group supportive of Israel, by Jeremy Bauer-Wolf, Inside Higher Ed, May 9, 2019. Excerpt:

Members of a pro-Israel group at Williams College had everything in order to be recognized by the student government, including a constitution and signatures of support from their peers.

But when the time came for the Williams’s College Council to vote on the Williams Initiative for Israel’s affiliation with the college last month, it rejected the organization in a 13 to 8 vote, with one abstention. The council seemingly did so on the basis of not agreeing with the mission or perceived politics of the organization, also known as WIFI.

A new perspective on Americans’ views of Israelis and Palestinians, by Carroll Doherty, Pew Research Center, April 24, 2019. Excerpt:

Among the public overall, larger shares have favorable opinions of both the Israeli people (64% very or somewhat favorable) and the Israeli government (41%) than of the Palestinian people (46%) and the Palestinian government (19%).

In last year’s survey, more Americans (46%) said they sympathized more with Israel, compared with 16% who sympathized more with the Palestinians; another 5% volunteered their sympathies were with both sides and 14% volunteered neither side, while nearly one-in-five (19%) did not express an opinion.

2019 HATE CRIME REPORT — Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations. Excerpt:

Anti-Jewish Crimes Grow

As in the past, the great majority of [religiously-motivated hate] crimes (89%, up from 82%) targeted the Jewish community. Anti-Jewish crimes rose 18% from 79 to 93. This is the highest percentage of anti-Semitic crimes since 2012 and the largest number since 2009.

This increase was mirrored by a national 2019 Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents issued by the Anti-Defamation League. The study found that the number of anti-Semitic incidents in 2019 (both hate crimes and non-criminal hate incidents) increased 12% percent compared to the previous year. That included a 56% increase in the number of assaults and 5 fatalities, including a white supremacist shooting at a Chabad center in Poway, California that took the life of a 60 year-old woman and wounded two others.

Anti-Jewish crimes were followed by those targeting Muslims (7%) and Catholics (2%). There were also single crimes targeting Christians, Mormons, and Scientologists. There was also a case in which white supremacists committed aggravated assaults against four Somali victims who were part of a Muslim youth camp. Because of the nature of the slurs, these crimes were classified as racially-motivated.

New poll: Americans’ support for Israel falls to lowest point in a decade; Gallup survey finds Republican sympathy for Israel declined 13% over the last year, while Democratic sympathy dropped by 6%, by Eric Cortellessa, Times of Israel, March 6, 2019. Excerpt:

Support for Israel in the American public is at its lowest point in a decade, according new Gallup poll released Wednesday, with a whopping decline among self-identified Republicans who said they sympathized more with Israelis than Palestinians.

Whereas 65 percent of Americans said they were “more sympathetic” to Israel over the Palestinians in 2018, 59% said the same in 2019, marking a six point drop. That decline is the biggest over a one-year period in the history of the poll, which began in 2001.

The number of Americans who said they sympathized more with the Palestinians, however, went unchanged during the last year, remaining at 21 percent.

Americans are increasingly critical of Israel, by Shibley Telhami, Brookings Institution, Wednesday, December 12, 2018. Excerpt:

[T]here is a growing sense that the Israeli government has “too much influence” on U.S. politics and policies: 38 percent of all Americans (including 55 percent of Democrats, and 44 percent of those under 35 years old), say the Israeli government has too much influence on the U.S. government, compared with 9 percent who say it has “too little influence” and 48 percent who say it has “about the right level of influence.” While the number of Jewish participants in the sample (115) is too small to generalize with confidence, it is notable that their views fall along the same lines of the national trend: 37 percent say Israel has too much influence, 54 percent say it has the right level, and 7 percent say it has too little influence.

Anti-Israel sentiment sweeps U.S. college campuses, by Cheryl K. Chumley, The Washington Times, April 28, 2018. Excerpt:

College students the nation over have been embarking on an unsettling mission that involves boycotting all things Israel.

Wishful thinking would hope that at least some of this Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is based more on the failure of said college kids to be properly educated about Middle East affairs — more on the ignorance of the students — than on actual and outright hostility against the Jewish nation.

Neither scenario is good news. But at least the ignorance factor can be fixed.

The anti-Semitic factor is hard to overcome.

Here’s a sampling of what’s been taking place regarding BDS votes at America’s places of higher learning of late: Barnard College students passed a referendum demanding the Student Government Association pen a letter to the administration that demanded the campus divest from eight companies that “profit or engage in the State of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.”

Members of the Student Association at George Washington University, meanwhile, passed a resolution by an 18-6 vote — cast anonymously, during a secret meeting — that called for the campus to divest from all-things-Israel, and accused the Jewish nation of being an apartheid state. The resolution also accused the university of violating international law by profiting from investments in Boeing, Lockheed-Martin and Caterpillar.

‘Devastating’ survey shows huge loss of Israel support among Jewish college students; Brand Israel Group raises the alarm on a widening gap in the US between older supporters and the increasingly pro-Palestinian next generation, by Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel, June 21, 2017. Excerpt:

According to the report’s executive summary, since 2010, claimed knowledge of Israel has increased 14 percentage points nationally (from 23% to 37%) and is up among every demographic group (except for college students, where it is down 16 percentage points, from 50% to 34%). These increases, however, have not translated into increased favorability, which is down 14 percentage points (from 76% to 62%) nationally and by large margins across the board.

5 facts about how Americans view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, by Samantha Smith and Carroll Doherty, Pew Research, May 23, 2016. Excerpts:

(1) Views of Israel and the Palestinians have become more ideologically polarized.

In early September 2001, just before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, there were only modest partisan and ideological differences in Israeli-Palestinian sympathies. But since then, and especially over the past decade, the share sympathizing more with Israel than with the Palestinians has increased among all ideological groups, with the exception of liberal Democrats.

(4) There is a growing generation gap in Mideast sympathies. A decade ago, Millennials and older generations held similar views on the Israel-Palestinian dispute. But today, Millennials are less likely than older Americans to sympathize more with Israel, and more likely to sympathize more with the Palestinians.

Millennials are the only generational cohort in which fewer than half (43%) sympathize more with Israel. And about a quarter of Millennials (27%) sympathize more with the Palestinians, the highest share of any generation.

A New Strategy on Campus: Blame the Jews, by Jonathan Marks, Commentary, November 15, 2019. Excerpt:

n a riveting and sad New York Times op-ed, Blake Flayton, a student at George Washington University and a “gay abortion rights advocate and environmentalist,” explained why his fellow progressives call him a “baby killer” and “apartheid enabler.” Like 95 percent of Jews, according to Gallup, the op-ed’s author has a “favorable” view of Israel.

George Washington University has been in the news lately for a blatant kind of anti-Semitism. A “pro-Palestinian” student was captured on video, saying, “We’re going to f**king bomb Israel, bro. F**k out of here, Jewish pieces of s**t.” The student, who says she was intoxicated, has apologized profusely and claimed she didn’t “even know why I said that.” I take her at her word. But the line between “Zionist” and “Jew” can be thin in anti-Israel discourse. In vino veritas.

Brooklyn Jewish girls’ school first in NYC to install bullet-resistant doors, by Isabella Simonetti and Susan Edelman, NY Post, August 10, 2019. Excerpt:

In the wake of the latest mass shootings, a Crown Heights yeshiva for girls is the first school in NYC to install metal security doors aimed at protecting kids from active shooters, The Post has learned.

The first door of 90 planned for the Bnos Menachem school was installed last week by Remo Security Doors, a company that manufactures them in Israel.

The 150-pound classroom doors, made of galvanized steel, are fortified inside by metal bars, the company says. The doors can be locked from the inside with a thumb turn, and no electricity is required. Each has a bullet-resistant window.

Company president Omer Barnes said a bullet may penetrate the door, but a shooter could not get in.

“No weapon will open the door,” he said.

Everybody Knows: As the leading targets of hate crimes, Jews are routinely being attacked in the streets of New York City. So why is no one acting like it’s a big deal?, by Armin Rosen, The Tablet, July 15, 2019. Excerpt:

The incidents now pass without much notice, a steady, familiar drumbeat of violence and hate targeting visibly Jewish people in New York City.

Early on the morning of June 15, a Saturday, two men in a white Infiniti drove around Borough Park, a vast, traditional Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in central Brooklyn. Surveillance footage posted on the local website BoroPark24 showed a man jumping out of the car’s passenger side as someone in a shtreimel and long black jacket walked down the sidewalk in their direction. As the car idled, the passenger approached the Jewish stranger, lunged at him in a linebacker-like stutter-step, and then darted to the waiting vehicle, which promptly sped away.

Levi Yitzhak Leifer, head of the Borough Park Shmira neighborhood patrol, said there were at least six and as many as nine reported incidents that night involving the same vehicle. Beresch Freilich, a rabbi who serves as a community liaison with the NYPD in Borough Park, said that some of the targeted individuals sensed a violent intent: “The car passed by going back and forth, and they felt it was trying to run them over.”

On a Saturday night in mid-January, Steven, a student and member of the Chabad Hasidic movement in his late teens, was returning to his apartment on Empire Avenue after a trip to the gym. (Nearly all victims interviewed for this piece asked to be identified by first name only, due to their involvement in ongoing legal cases). Steven saw what he described as a “rowdy group” of between six and eight “older teens” gathered on the sidewalk on a poorly lit stretch between Schenectady and Troy avenues. One of the teens sucker punched Steven in the back of the head as he walked past. “At first I honestly thought a car ran into me—it was such a blow.” Steven was then struck in his right cheek and fell to the sidewalk. He realized he was outnumbered but some irrational part of him couldn’t accept the insult.

Israeli-Founded Burger Chain’s Opening in Michigan Delayed Following Threats, by Aaron Bandler, Jewish Journal, July 24, 2019. Excerpt:

The opening of a burger chain in Dearborn, Mich., founded in Israel, was delayed after the owner received threats following calls to boycott the restaurant.

The Detroit Free Press reports that University of Detroit Mercy Adjunct Law Professor Amer Zahr called for a boycott after hearing that the chain — Burgerim — was founded in Tel Aviv in 2011.

“Building their company on stolen Palestinian land is how they established themselves,” Zahr, a supporter of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, told the Free Press. “Whether they ended up moving (headquarters) … it doesn’t really matter. The genesis of the company was in Israel.”

UC Berkeley Offers Class in Erasing Jews From Israel, Destroying Jewish State,
by Abraham H. Miller, The Algemeiner, September 8, 2016. Excerpt:

I, for one, am not upset that the University of California, Berkeley is offering an anti-Israel course so biased that it mocks the very purpose of a university.

Typically, in the leftist-dominated university, the prevailing paradigm of the Arab-Israeli conflict is that Israel is the last bastion of British imperialism and needs to be eradicated, with every Jew either thrown into the sea or sent back to Europe, even if their families have been living in the land of Israel for 1,000 years.

Most university courses on the conflict hide this from public view.

So, the new course offering at Berkeley should be praised, not condemned, for publicly announcing that its goal is to explore how Israel might be destroyed. This is incredibly refreshing, a peeling away of the sensitivity and compassionate newspeak that so shelter the reality of universities as cesspools of leftist propaganda.

Outrage over anti-Semitic taxi assault in Montreal; Quebec had the most anti-Semitic incidents in Canada in 2018, with 709 of Canada’s 2,041 total incidents occurring in the province, by Arutz Sheva, January 8, 2019. Excerpt:

Jewish advocacy organization B’nai Brith Canada expressed outrage after a Jewish man was assaulted by a taxi driver amid a barrage of anti-Semitic slurs earlier this week.

On Sunday, July 28, the victim, who has asked B’nai Brith not to share his name publicly, was visiting his elderly parents at a condo building in the Saint-Laurent borough of Montreal.

While waiting for a cab operated by the Taxi Champlain company to stop blocking the underground garage, the victim heard the taxi driver shout, “I won’t move for any f***ing Jews!” The driver then allegedly threatened to kill the victim, who was visibly identifiable as a Jew because he wears a kippah, or Jewish head covering.

The victim then attempted to photograph the taxi number in order to file a complaint, at which point the driver exited his car and punched him repeatedly until a parking supervisor intervened. The victim’s phone was also smashed.

Much of the incident was captured on a nearby security camera. The victim was injured and had to go to a nearby emergency room for treatment.

The Silencing of Pro-Israel Students on Campus; Campus anti-Israelism isn’t merely an attack on Israel, or even Jews in general. It is an attack on the very norms and values of the university—and with it, on the norms and values at the heart of Western civilization, by Andrew Pessin and Doron Ben-Atar, The Tablet, March 20, 2018. Excerpt:

Ismael Khoufaify, Director of Advocacy of the Governance Council of Minority & Marginalized Students at New York University, recently had a rough week. Swastikas had again been discovered in a campus building; someone in the dining halls marked Black History Month by serving watermelon kool-aid; some pro-Israel students expressed polite disagreement at a Jewish Voice for Peace anti-Israel hatefest. Khoufaify wrote on Facebook: “The last few days have sent me spiraling into a deep state of reflection. In the last week our NYU community has gone through hell and back. From swastikas, to kool-aid, to Zionism.” For Mr. Khoufaify, Nazism, racism, and Zionism were equally egregious.

Campus anti-Israel activists like to claim there is a “Palestine exception” to free speech, but from where we stand, Khoufaify’s flippant, arguably antisemitic, remark reflects what is really occurring on campuses all over the globe. Here are just a few more examples. Last week a University of Virginia panel featuring Israeli military reservists was forcefully disrupted, apparently violating multiple campus rules. Several days earlier, at the University of California at Berkeley, there was an antisemitic death threat against a Jewish professor. A week prior to that, students wishing to hear the moderate Israeli former minister Dan Meridor at London’s Kings College were confronted with a menacing mob of screaming demonstrators. At Princeton University in November the local Hillel chapter cancelled at the last minute a talk by Israel’s deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely in response to pressure from “pro-peace” students. In January 2017 the School of Oriental and African Studies student union passed a resolution banning anyone affiliated with Zionist ideology from speaking on campus on any topic whatsoever. Other veritable mob scenes have also occurred in recent years, in some cases (the University of California at Irvine, University College London) requiring police intervention to escort audience members or speakers out of the venue.

As Tel Aviv prepares to welcome Beyoncé, here’s a review of Israel’s atrocious record towards black people, by Dan Cohen, MondoWeiss, February 12, 2016. Excerpt:

Days after her Super Bowl halftime appearance, Israeli outlet Yedioth Ahronoth has confirmed rumors that Beyoncé Knowles will perform two dates in Tel Aviv, Israel this August, which would be in violation of the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions.

Her recent performance referenced the Black Panthers, the Black Lives Matters movement, and Malcolm X. Beyoncé’s dancers wore Black Panthers style berets and black leather, and were photographed raising their fists in an homage to Tommie Johnson and John Carlos salute at the 1968 Olympic games in Mexico City. They were also photographed holding a sign that read “Justice 4 Mario Woods,” who was killed by San Francisco police last December.

The day before, she released a video for “Formation,” her latest song which references police brutality and Hurricane Katrina.

In light of her decision to perform in Israel – which would put her at odds with Malcolm X’s sharp criticism of Israel – I have compiled a review of Israeli policy towards people of African descent.

New docs reveal Third Grade Anti-Israel event much worse than thought; Ithaca (NY) presentation by Bassem Tamimi and Jewish Voice for Peace incited hatred of Israel, by William A. Jacobson, Legal Insurrection, November 8, 2015. Excerpt:

On Friday morning, September 18, 2015, the third grade classes at the Beverly J. Martin School in Ithaca, NY, heard a presentation on “human rights” by Palestinian activist Bassem Tamimi and local anti-Israel activists, including Ariel Gold of the local chapter of the anti-Israel Jewish Voice for Peace.

On Sunday night, September 20, Legal Insurrection broke the story, Anti-Israel activism hits elementary school in Ithaca, NY. Because of Tamimi’s notoriety for exploiting children in videotaped confrontations with Israeli soldiers, Tamimi’s mere appearance in a third grade class raised suspicions about the event.

After our report, a firestorm of controversy erupted, with the Superintendent of the Ithaca City School District (ICSD), Dr. Luvelle Brown, conducting an investigation, after which he issued a statement that the event was “politically skewed, inflammatory, and not endorsed by the Ithaca City School District.”

The Superintendent’s statement, though, contained few details of his investigation.

But now Legal Insurrection exclusively has obtained documents pursuant to a Freedom Of Information Law (FOIL) request that show the event was even worse than we thought.

While numerous documents, including a video of the event, have been withheld by ICSD, what was produced is enough to declare without doubt that the event was an anti-Israel presentation in which both the activists and the teacher leading the discussion skewed the conversation against Israel to the extent that one or more students were incited to express hatred of Israel.

The reaction to Brown’s statement from anti-Israel activists was furious, with JVP national launching a petition drive claiming the statement was part of an effort to silence Palestinian voices. The activists involved claimed that the event was just about peaceful coexistence and was not anti-Israel. Based on those activists’ representations, a letter writing campaign was launched demanding that Brown retract his criticism of the event. We now know that these complaints about the Superintendent’s handling were not based on fact.

The Campus War over Israel; As the movement in academia to boycott and sanction Israel grows more virulent, it threatens to infect mainstream politics, too, by David Greenberg, Democracy, Summer 2015. Excerpt:

No issue on American college campuses today is more toxic and divisive than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For a decade now, “Israeli Apartheid Weeks,” which posit Israel as another South Africa, have featured extreme anti-Zionist events. Guest speakers friendly to Israel have been shouted down and silenced. At UCLA, candidates for student government were asked to pledge not to go on trips abroad sponsored by certain pro-Israel Jewish groups, but were not asked to avoid trips sponsored by pro-Palestinian or other organizations. At Ohio State, the police had to break up a student government meeting days after one undergraduate doused herself in blood (spoofing the “ice bucket challenge”) to protest Israel’s policies. At Temple University, a pro-Israel student was assaulted at a Students for Justice in Palestine leafleting booth. […]

But the relative stability of American public opinion conceals a worsening polarization in academia—a development to which non-academics should be paying much more attention, as The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel, edited by Cary Nelson and Gabriel Noah Brahm, drives home. As Samuel and Carol Edelman write in one essay in this authoritative volume, campuses lately have been experiencing “a barrage of anti-Israel films, speakers, panels, editorials, and faculty presentations portraying Israel as . . . a racist nation” and often championing a policy of boycotts, divestments, and sanctions (BDS) against the state of Israel. Within scholarly professional societies, such as the American Studies Association (ASA) and the Modern Language Association (MLA), activists have mounted campaigns to pass boycotts and related resolutions, including efforts to shun travel to Israeli conferences, bar intellectual collaborations with Israeli researchers, exclude Israeli academics from scholarly activities, and so on. According to Eric Fingerhut, the former Democratic congressman from Ohio who now heads the national Hillel organization, the last year witnessed “the most organized campaign to demonize Israel and attack pro-Israel students we have ever seen.”

Machete Attack on Pro-Israel Students Illustrates Why Ban on Anti-Israel Campus Agitation Needed, by SPME, April 11, 2010. Excerpt:

B’nai Brith Canada has called on Canadian universities to ban anti-Israel agitation on campus in light of an alleged machete attack on pro-Israel students. Reportedly, on April 5th, two Ottawa students, both well-known for their pro-Israel views, were assaulted when they left a local lounge in the early hours of the morning, by a large group of anti-Israel agitators, one of whom was wielding a machete.

“It is simply outrageous that pro-Israel students have been assaulted in our nation’s capital for nothing more than their pro-Israel views,” said Frank Dimant, Executive Vice President of B’nai Brith Canada. “One of the assaulted students, who is not Jewish, was reportedly first struck in the back of the head, and then chased with a machete swinging within inches of his neck. The Jewish student, who along with his friend was called numerous derogatory and antisemitic slurs during the assault, was a local organizer of B’nai Brith’s recent Imagine With Us pro-Israel campus initiative – an initiative which was banned by York University.

(4) BONUS: Americans’ lack of knowledge of, and misperceptions regarding the Holocaust

50% of Americans don’t know how many Jews died in Holocaust; New Pew poll shows that 66% of Americans know the Holocaust involved the mass-murder of Jews, and pluralities of Americans have basic understanding of Holocaust in multiple choice questions, by Jeremy Sharon, Jerusalem Post, January 22, 2020

More than half of Americans do not know how many Jews were murdered in the Holocaust, nearly a third do not know when the Holocaust took place, and over half do not know how Nazi leader Adolf Hitler came to power.

These are the findings of a recent survey by the Pew Research Center which have been released today (Wednesday) ahead of the World Holocaust Forum at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem on Thursday.

Although the results displayed a concerning lack of knowledge about the exact details of the Holocaust, the survey did however demonstrate that a plurality of Americans do have a basic understanding of what occurred during the Holocaust when answering multiple choice questions.

The Pew Research Center posed four questions on the Holocaust as an extension to its religious knowledge survey conducted in 2019 which polled 10,429 adults in the US.

In response to the question “How many Jews were killed in the Holocaust,” a plurality, some 45%, chose the answer “approximately 6 million, with 55% giving incorrect answers.

Study Shows a Third of Americans Think Holocaust Murders Exaggerated, by JNS (via Algemeiner), April 15, 2019. Excerpt:

A survey released by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, otherwise known as the Claims Conference, has revealed that a third of all Americans believe the scope of the murder of Jews in the Holocaust has been exaggerated.

The data, released ahead of Yom Hashoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day, showed that the large swath of Americans believe that just 2 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust, rather than 6 million.

In addition, 45 percent of Americans could not name any of the 40 ghettos or concentration camps erected by the Nazis, with a whopping 66 percent of millennials being unable to state the significance of “Auschwitz.”

While 93 percent of those polled said they believe students should learn about the Holocaust in schools, 70 percent said people are less concerned about the Holocaust than in the past, and 58 percent said a Holocaust or similar catastrophe could occur again.

The Claims Conference also showed that 68 percent of Americans believe antisemitism exists in the United States, with 37 percent saying neo-Nazis were present in large numbers.

Americans Lack Basic Knowledge of the Holocaust; The knowledge gap is particularly troubling among U.S. millennials, by Megan Trimble, US News & World Report, April 12, 2018. Excerpt:

A survey released in tandem with Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day, found a startling number of American adults lack basic knowledge of what happened during the genocide.

That knowledge gap is more pronounced among U.S. millennials – people ages 18 to 34, according to the national study commissioned by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany and released Thursday. The survey, conducted by Schoen Consulting from Feb. 23-27, involved 1,350 American adults interviewed by phone or online. Millennials were 31 percent of the sample.

Forty-one percent of millennials, and nearly one-third of all Americans, believe that 2 million or fewer Jews were killed in the Holocaust. The actual number is about 6 million. Moreover, 45 percent of Americans could not name a single concentration camp, despite more than 40,000 camps and ghettos operating in Europe during the Holocaust, and 41 percent of respondents – and 66 percent of millennials – couldn’t identify what Auschwitz was.

The survey also found that some respondents had not heard of, or are not sure if they had heard of, the Holocaust.