Volume 4 No 1 - Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

20 JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF ANTISEMITISM [ VOL. 4:9
group walked up to the hotel doors, Young started yelling antisemitic epithets.
Police say it’s not clear who he was yelling at, but he got into a tussle with one of
the Chicago group, who sustained scratches to his elbows. Police were called, and
Young was arrested. He was first hospitalized because he was believed to be
intoxicated.
Tunis, April 28: Tunisian president Al-Muncef Al-Marzouki was to attend this
year’s conference for Palestinians in Europe, held in Denmark. Adel Abdullah, the
secretary general of the Palestinians in Europe conference, told Quds Press on Saturday
after meeting with the Tunisian president that he experienced absolute solidarity
with the oppressed Palestinian people. He said that Marzouki’s stand was not
a surprise, as he is well known for his human rights activity and constant support
for the Palestine cause.
MAY
Montreal/Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, May 1: A few weeks after thugs vandalized
several Jewish-owned summer cottages in the Laurentians, a human rights
organization says antisemitic incidents were on the rise in Montreal last year. There
were 303 incidents reported in Montreal, a 9.4 percent increase from the 277 cases
documented in 2010, according to the League for Human Rights of B’nai Brith
Canada, which released its annual audit of antisemitic incidents across Canada.
Vandalism against Montreal’s Jewish community jumped from 51 cases in 2010 to
75 in 2011. A third of all hate crimes reported to Montreal police in 2011 were
against Jews, Montreal lawyer Steven Slimovitch noted. In Manitoba, there were
three separate cases, including an incident at Oak Park High School, where a Jewish
student’s hair was set on fire with a lighter. In the same month, the second case
of antisemitic violence in Manitoba involved a male student at the University of
Winnipeg. According to the student’s report to B’nai Brith Canada, he was
“accosted by another male student and told to ‘get that disgusting Zionist star [Star
of David necklace] off.’ Then he flipped out and came to me and basically
threatened to kill me, calling me ‘a dirty Zionist fascist.’ Then he grabbed the
necklace and pulled it.” In the third case, a 70-year-old man in Gimli was targeted
for repeated harassment by a condo neighbor, said Alan Yusim, Midwest regional
director of B’nai Brith Canada. “The neighbor got drunk one night . . . and grabbed
the elderly man and pushed him,” Yusim said. Police were called and a restraining
order was placed against the neighbor. Nationally, there were 1,297 reports to B’nai
Brith Canada of acts motivated by hate, including harassment, vandalism, and violence.
In Manitoba, there were 78 such cases last year, compared to 60 in 2010.
London, May 2: Is it possible to measure antisemitism and to influence its spread in
society? Two German researchers who specialize in cultural economics claim that
it can. Nico Voigtländer and Hans-Joachim Voth combined historical data with
current statistics. The results of their research, entitled “Hatred Transformed: How
Germans Changed Their Minds about Jews 1890-2006,” were published this week
on the research portal of the Centre for Economic Policy Research, based in
London. A significant finding: Your place of birth has a great influence on your
level of hatred toward Jews (and foreigners in general). In some areas, for example,
87 percent of the respondents were convinced that the Jews brought persecution