Wiesenthal Centre to European Commission: “EU Adoption of the IHRA Definition of Antisemitism Appears an Empty Gesture while Member States Fund Palestinian Jew-Hatred.”

December 6, 2020

“The Definition applies to antisemitic terrorism and hatred evoked by the perpetuation of the Middle East conflict as also to in-house charges of antisemitic behaviour.”


PARIS - In a letter to European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels recalled that, in 2017, he had "commended the European Union (EU) on its adoption of the IHRA (International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance) Definition of Antisemitism. One might now view that endorsement as an empty gesture, as long as Member States continue to fund Palestinian Jew-hatred."
 
The letter argued, “In a time of economic crisis, unemployment and Pandemic devastation at home, taxpayers of those countries are abused into funding Palestinian NGOs that incite to violence and glorify terrorism.”
 
“Within the purview of EU concerns is the misuse of school textbooks to spread racism and all forms of prejudice... We annually monitor such texts on the stands of the Frankfurt Book Fair. I was invited to address a Committee of the European Parliament on this scourge. Do EU State donors ever check for antisemitic content in the Palestinian schoolbooks they fund? They would be shocked at the hate and violence they are, unwittingly, inciting,” continued Samuels.
 
The Centre urged the European Commission “to clarify to its institutions that the IHRA Definition applies also to antisemitic terrorism and hatred evoked by the perpetuation of the Middle East conflict... Indeed, it must also be applied to in-house charges of antisemitic behaviour, as in recent articles regarding the case of ‘Eva’ (a pseudonym) in Paris Match Belgium and the Jerusalem Post.”
(see links:

https://parismatch.be/actualites/societe/444953/une-fonctionnaire-europeenne-denonce-une-cabale-et-se-dit-victime-dantisemitisme
and
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/jaccuse-in-the-shadow-of-dreyfus-at-the-european-union-650621)

“To do otherwise renders a whitewash of the definition’s objective,” concluded Samuels.


For further information contact Dr.Shimon Samuels at csweurope@gmail.com, join the Center on Facebook, or follow @simonwiesenthal for news updates sent directly to your Twitter feed.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in the United States. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament (Parlatino).