European Jewish Association warns of surge in antisemitism ahead of Kristallnacht anniversary

A delegation from the European Jewish Association (EJA) arrived Monday in the Polish city of Krakow, where members were welcomed by Polish President Karol Nawrocki. Both the EJA and the president warned of rising antisemitism across Europe ahead of the 87th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the Nazi-led pogrom against Germany’s Jewish community on Nov. 9, 1938.

Rabbi Menachem Margolin, EJA’s general director, warned that the current Jew-hatred is fueled by the demonization of the Jewish state in the post-October 7 era.

“Today you can go to any Jew and scream 'genocide,'” Margolin said, referring to widespread accusations that equate Israel’s military actions against Hamas with genocide.

“Jews are afraid to live in Europe,” he warned.

“We need planned, funded, and state-provided security. The time is now. If we do it, we will not only save Jewish life in Europe, we will save a part of its soul,” he argued.

Krakow is located around 70 kilometers (43 miles) from the extermination camp Auschwitz, where the Nazi party murdered some 1.1 million people, the vast majority of them Jews.

Nawrocki invited the Jewish and non-Jewish delegates to become “contemporary witnesses to the Holocaust.” He said that visiting the Auschwitz Museum conveys the reality of the past without the need for explanation, noting that “we don’t need words; objects have replaced them.”

Rabbi Daniel Walker from the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation in Manchester warned that portraying Jews as “child murderers” is a dangerous form of demonization that has historically preceded violence against Jewish communities. He pointed to last month’s Yom Kippur attack, in which Jihad al-Shamie, an Islamist of Syrian origin, killed two Jews outside a Manchester synagogue. Shamie allegedly justified the attack by connecting it to the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson warned that a “false equivalence between Hamas and Israel” was permitted.

“Hate is based on lies, so it is important to speak out against these lies today,” Johnson stated, describing the current hatred against Jews as “a virus that came out of the floorboards of Europe’s Middle Ages.”

Prof. Christer Mattsson from the Swedish University of Gothenburg explained that terms like “globalist” and “Zionist” have become code words for Jews.

“The right might use terms like ‘Cultural Marxist’, some on the left and more people on the right would use ‘Globalist’, and ‘Zionist’ would be used on the left – all these words are code words for ‘Jew’,” Mattsson said in an interview with The Jerusalem Post.

“We measure the wrong antisemitism correctly and so misinform you, the public, as well as policy makers,” he added. More recently, the word “Israelis” has increasingly been used to refer to Jews everywhere, even though many people associate the term with the conflict.

The professor explained that some individuals who describe themselves as anti-racists and defenders of human rights may “hide their hostility toward Jews even from themselves.”

Rawan Osman, a former Hezbollah supporter who grew up in Lebanon, explained that she was taught to hate Jews and Israel.

“I hated Jews, Zionists, and Israelis – all interchangeable terms – and was one of the useful idiots who admired Hezbollah,” Osman said during a panel discussion that focused on Arabs and Muslims who support the Jewish people and Israel.

In March, Osman – now a vocal supporter of Israel and critic of radical Islam – converted to Judaism. She described her long and complex journey from once being a Jew-hating, pro-Hezbollah supporter to someone who now embraces the Jewish people and Israel.

"Slowly, after years of reading about Israel and Jewish history, I became a proud Zionist activist. And after October 7, that event changed my life," Osman said in an interview with Ynet News.

Amjad Taha, a pro-peace and pro-Israel political activist from the United Arab Emirates, stressed that his country rejects hatred of Jews.

“In my country, antisemitism is a crime,” Taha said. He recalled that Emirati security forces forcefully arrested and later executed the terrorists who murdered Rabbi Zvi Kogan in the UAE in November 2024.

“They were executed,” Taha said. “Why? Because we do not tolerate antisemitism,” he added. Taha also expressed strong support for the Abraham Accords between Israel and several Arab states, including the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan.