Holland Appoints a National Co-Ordinator to Tackle Antisemitism as Cases Multiply

“Defiant and hopeful, just as we have always been,” says organisers of EU event after traumatic few months. Chanukah is first significant Jewish holiday since events on October 7^th.

(Brussels 7 December 2023) European Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen and other European Dignitaries will be at EuroChannukah 2023, taking place between the European Council and Commission buildings at Schuman in Brussels, Belgium on Sunday evening. The Commission President will light a giant Menorah marking the Jewish Holiday of Chanukah – the festival of light.

The theme of EuroChannukah this year, which takes place in the heart of the European Quarter, is ‘Shining Together’.

Chanukkah this year takes place against the backdrop of huge spikes in antisemitism and is the first major Jewish holiday following the Hamas Massacre in Israel and subsequent war in Gaza. The organisers, the European Jewish Community Center , say that it is a showcase for unity and resilience in difficult times.

Avi Tawil, Director of the European Jewish Community Centre, speaking ahead of the event said,

“We were concerned that this year, we would hear from communities across Europe that they were scaling down Chanukah celebrations, hiding away, keeping their heads down. In fact, the opposite is true, now more than ever, the desire is to come out and celebrate the holiday. To Shine together.

“Chanukah, at its core, is a holiday about light overcoming darkness, that good can and will always prevail. Our friends, like Commission President Vpn Der Leyen, are standing with us in solidarity, in a common bond, and in this spirit of unity and resilience.

“It’s been an awful few months. But Jews are defiant in the face of darkness, and always hopeful in the light, just as we have always been, and especially during Chanukkah.”

Ends.

Such an event is being held for the first time in our country and it will be attended by Prosecutors General and supreme prosecutors from states of the European Union and the region, senior clerics of various religions, representatives of state institutions, non-governmental organizations, academic society, human rights defenders and civil activists. The main goal of the conference is to create a platform for the exchange of experience and good practices, which will help to effectively and timely counter xenophobic, anti-Semitic and discriminatory acts, as well as against the incitement and commitment of hate crimes.

The international conference will be opened by Prosecutor General of the Republic of Bulgaria Ivan Geshev. Welcome speech will be addressed to the participants by the Vice President of the Republic of Bulgaria Iliana Yotova, the Interim Minister of Justice Krum Zarkov, Rabbi Menachem Margolin, Chairman of the European Jewish Association and representatives of the executive and judicial authorities.

Video message to the participants will be addressed by Manfred Weber – Chairman of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, Ilhan Kyuchuk, MEP from the “Renew Europe” Group in the EP and co-chairman of the European Liberals, Adrian Vázquez Lazara – Chair of the Legal Affairs Committee in the EP.

At the invitation of the Prosecutor General Ivan Geshev, the Prosecutor General of Romania Gabriela Scutea, the Prosecutor General of Lithuania Nida Grunskiene, the Prosecutor General of Slovenia Drago Šketa, the Chief Prosecutor of the State of North Rhine Westphalia – Germany Markus Hartmann, the Deputy Republic Public Prosecutor of Serbia Tamara Mirovic, the Deputy Prosecutor General of Albania Thoma Jano, the Head of Odesa Regional Prosecutor’s Office – Ukraine Sergiy Kostenko, chief prosecutors from the Republic of Slovak, the Czech Republic, Latvia and Estonia, experts from Eurojust and the Council of Europe, the leadership of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Bulgaria, etc. will take part in the International Conference.

The international conference STOP HATE SPEECH will gather in one place clerics from four religions. Guests at the event will be Bishop Polycarp, Vicar of His Holiness the Bulgarian Patriarch and Metropolitan Neophyte of Sofia, Alexander Moshev- representative of the Apostolic Nuncio in our country, Grand Mufti Mustafa Hadji. The chief rabbi of the Netherlands, Benjamin Jacob is arriving for the forum in Sofia.

A lecturer at the event will be the photojournalist Marissa Roth, Pulitzer Prize-winner for coverage of the 1992 Los Angeles riots sparked by police brutality against a black biker.

An example of the increasing risk of hate crime these days, related to killing a defenseless person because of his ethnicity, will be presented by Keren Knoll. She is one of the heirs of Mireille Knoll, an 85-year-old French woman of Jewish descent who survived the Holocaust in World War II and was murdered in her Paris home in 2018 because of her ethnicity.

Within the framework of the two-day conference, a discussion will be held on protection of human rights and respect for ethnicity and gender and speakers on the topic will be representatives of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, the Bilitis Foundation, activists for the rights of the LGBT community, the Center for Inter-Ethnic Dialogue and tolerance “Amalipe” and others.

Representatives of the academic society will take part in the separate discussions, as Prof. Dr. Vili Lilkov will present a historical overview of the rescue of Bulgarian Jews during the Second World War, and Assoc. Prof. Simeon Groisman will present an analysis of the topic: “The religious – source and object of hatred in the age of “Online Crowds”. Among the participants of the International Conference are Assoc. Prof. Iva Pushkarova, Assoc. Prof. Rumyana Hristidi, Milena Kotseva, Director of the Directorate “Procedural Representation before the ECHR” in the Ministry of Justice, Yulia Dandolova, executive director of the organization of Jews in Bulgaria “Shalom” and others.

The program of the event is divided into three thematic panels:

“Countering Crimes Against Religions” with moderator Alexander Benjamin from the European Jewish Association; “Protecting the citizens’- rule of law – way to guarantee the fundamental human rights” with moderator Vladimir Nikolov – Chairman of the Association of Prosecutors in Bulgaria; “Crimes with a discriminatory motive – the needs of measures guaranteeing the rights of minority groups” with moderator Liliya Dragoeva, BILITIS FOUNDATION.

Nearly 70 media representatives are accredited for the event.

AHEAD OF MUNICH AUCTION TOMORROW, EUROPEAN JEWISH CHIEF CALLS ON GERMAN POLITICAL LEADERS TO BAN SALE OF NAZI MEMORABILIA
AND PUT BUYERS ON WATCH LIST
“You all say ‘Never Again’, make it so”, urges Rabbi Menachem Margolin .
At 10am today morning (CET) a major Munich based auction house Hermann Historica is conducting an online sale of personal items such as cutlery sets, jewellery and signed letters and photographs belonging to the leadership of the Nazi Party – Himmler, Goring and Hitler himself among them.
European Jewish Association (EJA) Chairman Rabbi Menachem has written to the leadership of all of Germany’s mainstream political parties to put in place legislation that will ban the public sale of such items and – in the meantime – compel sellers to divulge the names of buyers so that they can be kept on government watch lists in the interests of public safety.
In his letter to all the political leaders, the EJA Chief suggested that the authorities would want to know who was buying the personal items of Osama Bin Laden, Anders Breivik or Stephan Ernst for public safety reasons, and those glorifying, sentimentalising or adulating the Nazis are every bit as dangerous.
Rabbi Margolin wrote,
“Almost every week we at the European Jewish Association are having to respond to attacks on community buildings and more worryingly still, physical or verbal attacks on Jews themselves. Alarmingly, it is Germany that leads Europe in the sheer volume of reported anti-Semitic incidents.
“Selling such items should be no different to selling the personal items belonging to Osama Bin Laden, or Anders Breivik. The argument of historical interest is pure semantics. As political representatives concerned with the wellbeing and safety of your citizens, we cannot help wonder if you would not want to know who was buying Bin Laden’s fruit bowl or Stephan Ernst’s photographs and why they would even want them.
“In waiting for a ban to be put in place, we urge the German authorities to compel auction houses to divulge the names of those who are buying such material, in order to know whose hands they have fallen into. The names should then be put on a government ‘watch’ list, for public safety.
“Six Million Jewish lives were lost during the Nazi regime. Today an increasing number of Jewish lives are being lost and more are threatened because of the “oldest hatred”.
“Politicians are wont to say ‘never again’. We urge you to make it so.”

The European Jewish Association and the Rabbinical Centre of Europe are delighted to announce a brand new project that we are rolling out across Europe, directly helping the sick and needy with the often expensive costs associated with securing much needed medical equipment.
Our brand new medical equipment lending centre means that the sick and immobile needn’t worry about buying wheelchairs, or expensive crutches walkers and the like.
We will provide them to communities on a need-by-need basis at no cost. When recuperation is over, the items simply get returned to the local community lending branch centre and passed to the next person that needs them.
This simple, effective project overseen by us but run at branch level by communities is open to everyone, but supplies are limited.
For more information on setting up a branch, or to apply for help. Please contact us at Rkaplan@rce.eu.com