The Jewish Community of Prague documented a tripling of online instances of anti-Semitic hate speech last year.

The increase, which the community links to a Jewish politician’s presidential bid, among other factors, was documented in an annual report on anti-Semitism published Tuesday.

Advertisement




The community documented 82 instances of online hate speech on Czech websites in the last year, compared to only 26 the previous year.

According to idnes.cz, a news site, the report attributes the increase to the presidential campaign ahead of elections last January. Jan Fischer, a Jewish politician, was considered a leading candidate but did not make it past the first round.

“The presidential elections have revealed a degree of latent anti-Semitism in some groups, but certainly did not indicate anti-Semitism in the majority or mainstream political speech,” the authors of the report wrote.

Other causes listed were a strategic shift in extreme-right circles to online activity; escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; and warm relations between the Czech government and Israel, idnes.cz reported.

The authors recorded no physical assault or threats due to anti-Semitism in 2012 but registered six attacks on property and ten instances of harassment, mainly via email. The report further states that the overall prevalence of anti-Semitism is lower in the Czech Republic than in other European countries.

Advertisement

SHARE
Previous articleGeller Raps Toronto Rabbis for ‘Loshon HaRa’
Next articleArabs ‘Celebrate’ Nakba with Kassam on Negev and Mortars on Golan