The number of reported anti-Semitic incidents in the US, including assaults, vandalism and harassment, rose to a new high last year, according to data from the Anti-Defamation League.
There were more than 2700 reported anti-Semitic incidents in 2021, an increase of roughly 34 per cent from 2020 and the highest number on record since the ADL – a Jewish advocacy group that examines anti-Semitism in the US – began tracking these figures in 1979.
“When it comes to anti-Semitic activity in America, you cannot point to any single ideology or belief system, and in many cases we simply don’t know the motivation,” said Jonathan Greenblatt, chief executive of the ADL.
“But we do know that Jews are experiencing more anti-Semitic incidents than we have in this country in at least 40 years, and that’s a deeply troubling indicator of larger societal fissures.”
Most of the incidents occurred in New York, followed by New Jersey and California, according to the ADL.
The ADL said it tabulated anti-Semitic incidents through criminal and non-criminal incidents as reported to the organisation by victims, law enforcement and the media. The organisation says it does not conflate general criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism, but it does count disparaging Jewish people for their support of Israel and the picketing of religious or cultural institutions for supporting Israel as anti-Semitic.
Read the article by Omar Abdel-Baqui in The Australian (from The Wall Street Journal).