Worst Anti-Semites of 2020: Iran, Farrakhan, and BDS Spread Hate

From Louis Farrakhan’s July 4 tirade to far-right extremists’ blaming Jews for the coronavirus, anti-Semitism reached new lows in 2020.

By TPS

The Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC) published its annual list of the “Top Ten Worst Anti-Semitic and Anti-Israel Incidents,” which ranks the worst anti-Semitic and anti-Israel people, organizations, and incidents the Jewish world has encountered in the past year.

1. The anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on the Coronavirus (COVID-19) spread on social media topped the list for 2020.

From the earliest stages of the pandemic in February 2020, far-right extremists across social media platforms blamed Jews and Asian Americans for the virus, SWC noted

2. Telegram, a leading Social Media platform has emerged as the online weapon of choice for violent Jew-haters and racists and ranked second.

Hamas and other Islamist terrorists with hate and violent agendas also have active feeds targeting their enemies.

3. Louis Farrakhan came in third.

In his July 4th address, Nation of Islam leader Farrakhan continued his over 35-year-long hate campaign against Jews and Judaism alleging at one point that Jews tried to kill him with “radiated seeds” and referring to Jewish attorney Alan Dershowitz as Satan masquerading as a lawyer.

4. Targeting of Jewish houses of worship in the US also made the dubious list.

Last year, the FBI reported nearly 62% of all religious-based hate crimes in the US targeted Jews.

“Not even the forced closures of houses of worship and other stringent restrictions on everyday life in America brought respite from history’s oldest hate,” SWC said.

Synagogues in Los Angeles and Oakland, California and Kenosha, Wisconsin, were targeted in the aftermath of Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests.

Chabad Houses in Portland, Oregon, and Newark, Delaware were destroyed by arson. On the third night of Chanukah, a member of the Jewish community attending an outdoor menorah lighting ceremony in Kentucky was injured by an anti-Semite driving an SUV.

5. Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s invocation of Nazis’ “Final Solution” came in fifth.

In celebration of Al Quds (Jerusalem) Day, Khamenei’s website featured a poster depicting people celebrating on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem after apparently capturing it from Israel.

“Palestine Will Be Free. The final solution: Resistance until Referendum,” the poster’s text declared and was echoed on Twitter.

“Meanwhile, Germany and other major European countries with strong economic ties with Iran remain stoically silent in the wake of Khamenei’s Holocaust denial and continuing genocidal threats against Jewish people,” SWC noted.

6. The European Court’s ruling against Kosher slaughtering came in sixth.

The European Court of Justice set the stage for all Europeans to ban Shechita in it ruling.

Israel’s ambassador to Belgium, Emmanuel Nachson, said the ruling is “catastrophic and a blow to Jewish life in Europe.”

“Mainstream anti-Semitism is approaching levels not seen since before the Holocaust,” SWV warned, listing multiple anti-Semitic incidents in several European countries.

7. The German elite’s support for the anti-Israel BDS movement ranked seventh.

Key elites have been seeking to overturn the Bundestag’s vote that labeled BDS as anti-Semitic. Meeting secretly for a year, the so-called Union of Cultural Institutions comprising over two dozen of Germany’s Who’s Who-including the Goethe Institute, the Federal Cultural Foundation, and the Einstein Forum, attacked the Bundestag’s BDS vote as violating free speech.

The signees specifically thanked Andreas Görgen, Foreign Ministry Director-General for Cultural Affairs and Communication, “for advice and discussion contributions.”

The SWC criticized Görgen earlier for defending a leading proponent of BDS in South Africa. A similar call followed from nine hundred artists, academics, writers, and other cultural figures who called the anti-BDS resolution “dangerous” and “detrimental to the democratic public sphere.”

8. Anti-Semitic and anti-Israel attacks on Jewish students on US campuses came in eighth.

“There is no peace or even cease-fire on US campuses where Jewish students continue to be demonized and ostracized because of their support for the Jewish State. The extreme anti-peace and anti-Semitic BDS campaign is the main weapon,” SWC wrote in its report.

9. Democratic Socialist of America’s (DSA) anti-Semitic questionnaire came in ninth.

The New York City Democratic Socialist Party (DSA) submitted a questionnaire to all prospective candidates for Municipal offices, “certain to ignite more mainstream hate against democratic Israel and her Zionist supporters,” SWC charged.

“DSA expects its candidates to endorse BDS and to commit that they will not travel to Israel,” it added.

A growing political force in New York, DSA has already helped to defeat the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and numerous state-wide officeholders.

10. Finally, Chile made the notorious list.

Chile is home to the third-largest Jewish community on the continent and is also home to the largest Palestinian community outside the Arab world.

In recent years, its leadership has become radicalized and aligned with the ideology of Hamas.

Daniel Jadue the mayor of Recoleta, uses municipal funds to finance pro-BDS and anti-Israel activities, targets the Jewish community with smears echoing The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.