European Jews call on Croatia to crack down on anti-Semitism

[Behind the Aegis]

The head of the European Jewish Congress called on Croatia on Wednesday to adopt severe laws to crack down on anti-Semitism after recent incidents in which local Jews were targeted.

Pierre Besnainou said that in the European Union, which Croatia hopes to join by 2009, "we have ever more harsh (anti-Semitism) laws and we hope that Croatia ... will adopt very harsh laws so that the incidents like the recent ones can be adequately punished."

Besnainou, who came to Croatia to visit the local Jewish community, said he told President Stipe Mesic that the country should adopt a strong law condemning any anti-Semitic act.

The Croatian Jewish community has reported receiving two letters within the past week at its headquarters, one threatening to "pay Palestinians to destroy Jews," and another denying the Holocaust and offending Jews.


more...

[PsychoDad]

1. Hope no one minds me asking this....

I understand the uproar, but doesn't this sort of thing also happen throughout the rest of Europe? Has anti-jewish hate and hate crimes been eradicated elsewhere, leaving only Croatia?

Unfortunately, this bigotry seems spread far too wide, not just in Croatia.

Peace.

[Behind the Aegis]

2. Salaam...

The reason for this request is because in the past week there have been for cases of severe antisemitism, including an attack on a Rabbi the other day. It is interesting you ask this because there are some severe problems in France right now, as well. I believe with the election of the new Jewish leader in Germany, there are issues in that country that are now being addressed.

[PsychoDad]

3. Shalom

I had read of the attack upon the Rabbi by the neo-nazis and of the two letters that had been written. Considering past attacks upon Jewish people, desecration of Jewish graveyards, demonstrations by skinheads and neo-nazi's in Russia and vandalism of Synagogues throughout the rest of Europe, I thought that the attack and letters, while deplorable and heinous, were singular in that country and relatively minor problems which might be solved with greater police diligence.

What I wonder now, is this attack upon the Rabbi just a recent symptom of an ongoing problem in Croatia, or is it a new phenomena?

Unfortunately, as you suggested with France and Germany, among others, there is a strong and ancient undercurrent of antisemitism that percolates it's filth to the surface from time to time.

Shalom and Kol Tuv

P.S. I like your new Star of David. :)

[Kagemusha]

4. Severe laws as opposed to simply punishing the current cases...

Just wondering, how severe are we talking about here?... when I hear the word "severe", I think of things that the EU would blanch at.

[iverglas]

5. "things that the EU would blanch at"

Not to mention things that all the free-speechers here at DU would go nuts over.

I guess BehindTheAegis missed the things I posted in the other thread on the subject yesterday (there being little need for a new thread to report something that hardly qualifies as new "news" ...):

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2325641&mesg_id=2327371

In particular:

http://www.ejpress.org/article/news/eastern_europe/8899

ZAGREB (EJP) --- A Croatian
student was arrested last week after
sending an e-mail to a Jewish
Community in Zagreb indicating his
support for Hamas.

In an message sent from his university
computer on Friday, Ivan Kesic wrote
that he had entered the controversial
Iranian Holocaust caricature
competition and if he won would donate
a portion of his prize money to Hamas.

The 21-year-old was charged with
racist discrimination and spent a night in
a Zagreb prison police from Zagreb.

I was kinda expecting a hue and cry about charging someone with "racial discrimination" for sending an email stating an opinion sort of thing ...

The Jewish Community received his letter on Friday morning and reported it to a police and Croatian Counter Intelligence agency (POA). The student was arrested on Friday in the afternoon.

Jakov Binenfeld, an influential member of the local Jewish Community said he was pleased with the police's speedy reaction. "We are satisfied with a happy end. The young man was arrested and that's it," he told EJP.

That's it indeed -- particularly for anyone who might want to express an anti-Israel opinion in Croatia in future?

Granted, such opinions should really be e-mailed to the embassy of Israel, not a Jewish community organization. And indeed, doing the latter is an indication of anti-Semitism rather than of political disagreement. But criminalizing it does seem a tad, er, "severe".

And I do hope no one will take this the wrong way ... but when someone is assaulted on a Saturday and doesn't report the assault to police until the following Monday (as was the case with the rabbi assaulted by skinheads), s/he, and others, might not be in the best position to be criticizing police response. It is entirely up to the individual to choose when to report an assault to the police, and what considerations to take into account in making that choice, but it is still his/her own choice and if it has consequences in terms of the effectiveness of the police response, which it may well have, those consequences are not anyone else's fault.

[Kagemusha]

6. I was thinking more along the lines of

chopping hands off, myself.

To me, that's being severe.

[Behind the Aegis]

7. it fit the guidelines...

why do you feel it is non-news? if you feel it is non-news, why bother to comment?

[iverglas]

8. heheheh

why bother to comment?

If you had nothing to say about anything I actually said on the subject of this thread ... may I ask you the same thing?

[Behind the Aegis]

10. i did

you said: "...there being little need for a new thread to report something that hardly qualifies as new "news" ...):" I commented in the form of a question. I chose the part on which I wanted to comment.

As for the rest of your post, I had read parts of it yesterday. I didn't comment then, either; thus leading to your false conclusion.

[iverglas]

9. where are the freedom riders of DU??

From the article:

Croatian police detained the writer of the first letter - a 21-year-old student - and said it was investigating other incidents. But Alonie told Croatian media his attackers would have been arrested in his home country of Germany already just because they carried Nazi symbols.

... Croatia has laws punishing glorification of Nazism or fascism, but it does not have a separate law dealing with anti-Semitism.

"Glorification" is an act. "Anti-Semitism" is an idea. What exactly do these folks want the law to "deal with"?

The wearing of Nazi symbols, for one thing, it seems.

Now, my own ideas on this point may be well known. I'm just curious why I'm not seeing any of the usual outcry about free speech blah blah blah.

And I'm curious about what the original poster might think about it all. No indication so far.