Survey shows: As the Gaza war rages, anti-Semitic incidents in Europe are increasing | The Mighty 790 KFGO

(Reuters) – The war in Gaza has contributed to a sharp rise in anti-Semitic incidents in Europe, the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) said in a report published on Thursday.

An FRA survey conducted between January and June 2023 showed that anti-Semitism in Europe was already high before the war began in October, and information collected from 12 Jewish community organizations since then showed a further increase, the report said.

“Since October 2023, Jews have been more frequently the victims of anti-Semitic incidents, with some organizations reporting an increase of over 400 percent,” it says.

Three-quarters of Jewish respondents said they felt they were being held responsible for the actions of the Israeli government, and 80 percent believed that anti-Semitism had increased in the European country where they live in the five years prior to the survey.

In the year before the survey, 90 percent of respondents had been confronted with anti-Semitism on the Internet, and more than half had experienced it offline among acquaintances or in the media.

During the same period, more than a third were harassed because of their origins, most of them multiple times.

“Anti-Semitic harassment and violence most often take place on the streets, in parks or shops,” the FRA said.

According to the survey, more than three-quarters of respondents hide their Jewish identity at least occasionally and more than a third avoid Jewish events or places due to safety concerns.

The survey was conducted in 13 member states, representing 96 percent of the EU’s estimated Jewish population, which the FPA says is just over one million.

According to Israeli sources, around 1,200 people were killed and over 250 taken hostage in the attack by Islamist militants on Israel on October 7. Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has claimed the lives of over 38,000 people, according to medical authorities in the enclave.

A monitoring organization said last month that anti-Semitism had risen by more than 80 percent in Germany in the past year. A network of nongovernmental organizations that monitor Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hatred said in June that the number of anti-Muslim incidents recorded in Germany had also risen.

(Reporting by Michal Aleksandrowicz in Gdansk; editing by Milla Nissi and Timothy Heritage)