Europe’s Jews are in “emergency mode” and are poised to leave the continent en masse, according to the chairman of the European Jewish Association.
Speaking as Jewish leaders from across Europe gathered for the annual conference of the European Jewish Association (EJA), Rabbi Menachem Margolin opened the summit with a stark warning: “The situation facing our communities is the worst it has been since World War Two.”
“My message to the Israeli prime minister today is not as sure as it used to be,” Rabbi Margolin said.
If European governments “carry on as they have so far, if they continue to tolerate this flood of Jew hate, they can expect hundreds and thousands of us to leave.”
The prominent rabbi, who once criticised Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for calling on European Jews to move to Israel, has now said Israel should prepare for a wave of Jewish emigration due to rising levels of European antisemitism.
“Today, I say to Israel: We are not there yet, but be ready, get your government agencies ready,” Rabbi Margolin said.
Israel “can expect many thousands of Jews to arrive. Be ready to provide housing, jobs, and education for a large aliyah.” .
“For millennia, Europe has been a safe haven for Jews,” Rabbi Margolin said, but after October 7 “antisemitism has been normalised.”
“If you are visibly Jewish, you most probably will have been insulted on the street, or at the very least had someone shout ‘Free Palestine’ at you,” he went on.
Rabbi Margolin said the conference would be a place for “ideas and vision”.
European Jewish Association chairman Rabbi Menachem Margolin pictured meeting Elon Musk in Krakow in January (Photo: Getty)
Titled “Fighting back for our future,” the Amsterdam summit includes a session on providing solutions for Jewish and Zionist students and a workshop on practical self-defence. One session on the safety of Jewish institutions was closed to the media, such is the tension around the topic.
During the conference, a set of recommendations will be established to be distributed to every government in Europe.
Eddo Verdoner, the Dutch government’s co-ordinator for fighting antisemitism, said Jewish communities are experiencing “the largest rise in antisemitism since the Shoah”.
Verdoner said that changing the law in the Netherlands to “explicitly make Holocaust denial illegal has given us one more tool in our kit [to fight antisemitism]”.
He called for strict enforcement against antisemitic hate crimes, advocating for European communities to “monitor, identify, prosecute and punish” antisemitism. He also advocated for education, “so that the past remains the past,” adding: “we must celebrate Jewish life, enabling it to thrive.”
During a panel entitled “Demanding action not sympathy”, Ruth Daskalopoulou-Isaac, head of EU relations at EJA, said that 70 per cent of antisemitic hate crimes in Europe are not reported.
Meanwhile, the Hamburg Antisemitism Commissioner, Stefan Hansel, advocated for a universal implementation of the Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism.
“People on the ground need clarity,” he said, and IHRA offers it.
“Under IHRA, a janitor understands that ‘From the river to the sea’ on a campus has to be removed because in Germany it has been banned and sanctioned,” Hansel said.
“Legislation is not enough, there has to be enforcement; leaders of different communities must take action... We must make it a topic in society that people cannot avoid.”
Delegates at the conference in Amsterdam
Hansel noted how German sports teams have programmes to combat antisemitism and “they understand that you don’t need a Jew to be harmed in your sports club for this to be implemented, they understand that antisemitism is much broader.”
He continued: "The biggest sports club in my city, Hamburg, has implemented IRHA into its legal system. This means if one of the fans is posting something antisemitic online, we can call him in and sanction him within their system before we go to the law.”
Ultimately, he said: “The biggest threat to Jewish life in Germany is assimilation because people will not identify as Jewish if they feel threatened.”
During a session on ensuring the safety of Jewish people on the streets, Daniel Sherman, director of operations at the UK security group CST, spoke about the 2,500 CST volunteers who keep the Jewish community safe, along with a growing cadre of volunteers.
Sherman said there had been a shift in attitude among British Jews over the past eight months: “In the beginning there was shock... The change I have noticed is that – the Jewish community in the UK is stubborn in the sense that it is now more determined than ever to do Jewish things, to be Jewish, to hold more rallies and demonstrations.
“We are not known for coming out and rallying and demonstrating, but that is happening time and time again. Yes, there is still fear... but the overriding sentiment is the desire to fight back in whatever way they can.
“A lot of that is down to institutions in the UK which have been set up to deal with this scenario. When it happened, we knew what to do to ensure the community feels able to go about their lives and live Jewish lives.”
Panel chair, Rabbi Avi Lazarus, director of the UK Federation of Synagogues, added: “We are privileged enough to have government funding for human security personnel.”
Addressing news reports about anti-Israel rallies in London, Sherman told the summit: “There is a little bit of myth-busting I need to do because a lot has been said but we have to look at the truth.
"Every Shabbat there have been protests. Some of them huge in numbers and some of them less so. The truth of the matter is it has not been the case that everyone who is joining the march is antisemitic.
“There is a small element within the organisers that are obsessed with Israel and do fit that mould, they are antisemitic... but the majority are joining [the march] because they feel it is their duty to make a humanitarian plea.
“When we see things that break the law, they are getting arrested... maybe it’s not at the march, maybe its afterwards... Anyone at any of these marches who has been seen supporting Hamas or calling for the death of Jews has been arrested. When you look at the whole of the protests, it has been good.”
Sherman added: “CST has had very frank conversations with police leaders when mistakes have happened, and they have genuinely reflected and learned lessons. A lot of mistakes are made but they are not the same mistakes. The police are learning.”
He also noted that police had ploughed a huge number of resources into protecting Jewish areas. and insisted that, despite some high-profile controversies at the rallies, the CST’s relationship with both policing and the government had not suffered.
“We create the space so that the leaders of policing can hear from the community. Police officers from the most local levels understand who the Jewish community is, what they look like and what the threats are that they face.”
Chair of the Central Jewish Committee in the Netherlands, Chanan Hertzberger said: “It is our duty to make sure the Jewish community does not feel afraid” but noted that some Dutch Jews had removed their mezuzot.
And the police chief of Middle-Hessen Germany, Torsten Krückemeier spoke about the Islamist violence in Germany.
“I’m very sad today because this weekend a police officer in Germany was killed by a Muslim and yesterday an officer died,” he said.
“We have to be present to protect ourselves from extremism. Sometimes we never know the people who will stand up and do such a thing… It is very important that we trust each other and share information,” Krückemeier said.
EJA legal forum member and attorney, Pascal Markowicz, told the summit: “It is time to lobby… We must stop giving money to organisations financing arms, bombs, school books with hate, it is impossible. We must act by [enacting] new laws [that are] more definitive in sentencing antisemitism.”
The conference ends tomorrow.
