Volume 4 No 1 - Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

2012] INTERNATIONAL LAW AND ANTISEMITISM 67
have arisen from modern technology development. 60 In 2001, COE took the
first steps to take up the challenge of harmful and illegal cyber content. Its
attempt to establish an international standard of prohibition of computerbased
racial hatred, including the use of computer systems to deny or justify
genocide, resumed in 2003 with the “Convention on Cybercrime: Concerning
the Criminalization of Acts of a Racist and Xenophobic Nature Committed
through Computer Systems” and its “Additional Protocol,” both of
which have been signed, the Convention by at least 43 states, including the
United States, and some 21 have ratified it, the Protocol by at least 20 and
ratified by at least 11 of the 47 member states plus six observer countries.
To be enforceable and attain the goal of an internationally consistent level
of prohibition of race hatred, it remains essential to limit member reservations
on the Protocol and conclude international agreements bringing
national legislation into line with definitions of criminal Internet hate
speech. OSCE first took up the issue of combating hate speech on the
Internet at its meeting at Athens in 2009 and again at Prague in 2011, but
was unable to go much beyond spelling out the scale and difficulties in
creating a workable balance of free speech and freedom of the press with
the necessity to curb whatever incites and foments group hatred but stopping
short of criminalizing hate speech.
The London Conference and Summit of the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition
for Combating Antisemitism (ICCA) of February 2009 was the founding
meeting of this group, in what may prove to be a historic landmark. It
brought together about 125 parliamentarians from 40 countries and 75 or
more nongovernmental experts and academics, and was the first such conference
to assemble legislators. Its “Declaration on Combating Antisemitism”
is promulgated in 35 resolutions. Emphasizing their responsibility as
parliamentarians, the authors of the declaration forcefully draw attention to
the dangerous resurgence of antisemitism: “We call upon national governments,
parliaments, international institutions, political and civic leaders,
NGOs, and civil society to affirm democratic and human values, build societies
based on respect and citizenship, and combat any manifestations of
antisemitism and discrimination.” They required governments to use, or
expand their use, of the EU’s Monitoring Centre’s “Working Definition of
Antisemitism” as a standard instrument to identify, denounce, and prosecute
manifestations of antisemitism and hate, whether in word or deed. The declaration
asks legislators to work against antisemitism by word and act; to
urge action by their governments, international bodies, or the UN; and to
enact appropriate hate crime legislation. It urges governments to take action
60. LaShel Shaw, “Note: Hate Speech in Cyberspace: Bitterness without
Boundaries,” Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy, 25 (2011): 281.