BERLIN -- Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel warned European and North American countries Wednesday that anti-Semitism is on the rise and fervently urged them to keep "the poison from spreading."

The appeal by Wiesel, a survivor of the Auschwitz Nazi death camp, marked the start of a 55-nation conference of foreign ministers called to debate ways to fight anti-Semitism, including more education and stricter law enforcement.

"Stop! Stop a disease that has lasted so long. Stop the poison from spreading," Wiesel said.

Wiesel, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his writings on the Holocaust and campaigning against evil in the world, pointed to violence against Jews and desecration of cemeteries in many countries.

"The Jew I am belongs to a traumatized generation. We have antennas. Better yet, we are antennas," he said.

"If we tell you that the signals we receive are disturbing, that we are alarmed ... people had better listen."

Foreign ministers from Europe and Secretary of State Colin Powell were expected to address the two-day meeting, which follows a rise in anti-Semitic incidents and attacks last year in France, Britain and elsewhere in Europe.

Held amid extremely tight security, the gathering of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe is the third major conference in Europe to address anti-Semitism in the past year.

Wiesel said it was fitting that the conference was taking place in the German capital, where the Nazis developed their plans to destroy the world's Jews. The venue is the German Foreign Ministry, a huge building that once served as Nazi Germany's central bank.

"It is precisely because it takes place in Berlin that a powerful message ... should be composed here," Wiesel said, urging the leaders to send a manifesto against anti-Semitism in all languages to everyone in the world.

He said he found "particularly contemptuous" comparisons of Israel's policy toward the Palestinians to Nazi Germany's atrocities against the Jews.

Simone Veil, a Holocaust survivor who became a French Cabinet minister and president of the European Parliament, said anti-Semitism has grown in France but the government has taken commendable steps to protect Europe's largest Jewish community.

Still, Veil said, "It's less and less a good thing to be Jewish in France or have a Jewish name or even display a Hebrew letter."

An Israeli anti-Semitism watchdog group said last week that worldwide incidents of attacks on Jews and vandalism against Jewish sites increased 15 percent in 2003 from the previous year.

The Stephen Roth Institute of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism said France, Britain, Russia, Germany and Canada had the highest rates of anti-Semitic incidents.

The conference's timing has focused attention on eight former Soviet bloc countries joining the European Union on Sunday. Some say the eastern European nations have lagged in tackling anti-Semitism.

"The anti-Semitic potential in the EU is going to get bigger," Salomon Korn, the vice president of Germany's Central Council of Jews, said in the Berliner Zeitung daily newspaper.

Jewish organizations urged the OSCE governments to devote more resources to fighting anti-Semitism, strengthen law enforcement, promote education about the Holocaust and appoint a high-profile official to ensure countries are meeting their commitments.

Youths from large Arab communities in France, Belgium and other European countries have been blamed for attacks on Jewish property and individuals that have increased as violence surged in the Middle East.

German President Johannes Rau said it was important to distinguish between anti-Semitism and criticism of Israel, although he acknowledged that "massive anti-Semitism" is behind much of the opposition to Israeli policy.

"I know many friends of Israel who criticize Israeli policies toward the Palestinians because they are greatly concerned about the state of Israel and Israeli society," Rau said. "Friends have the right to be told openly what others think about what they are doing."

But he said critics of Israeli policy had to temper their views - and sometimes keep it private - with the understanding Israelis have lived since the founding of their state under a threat to their existence.

Nice to know that humanity seems to be devolving....... I wonder if we're ever going to outgrow all of this petty crap.

Everybody knows XXXXX is a Jewish plot for YYYYYY.

Bigot's footprint.

B

It's not particularly helpful when the ADL and AIPAC intentionally blur the lines between criticism of Israeli policy (very common) and outright anti-Semitic expressions (very rare), as a means of scoring rhetorical points. This ultimately dilutes (via the Chicken Little/Boy crying wolf syndrome) the much needed focus on the erradicating racist thinking and action.

BTW: Can someone please direct me to a source of information defending the creation and maintenance of a nation-state that holds the primacy of one ethnic/religious group over all others? I'm asking out of a real curiosity and not of animus or antagonism. I've always had an intellectual difficulty understanding the morality of how this could be objectively defended.

Not me, Z. I think its wrong. There is an awful lot of bad stuff created by this Zionism phenomenon. Its nice that they don't behave as badly as Hamas, but that's no great endorsement of human rights and political virtue. I don't see any fundamental difference between the zionists' two-teired system and Apartheid South Africa or that which governs most muslim arab countries.

Israel is far and away better than most of the countries on the planet, but they still don't get it: two-tiers with a de jure permanent underclass breeds revolution.

B

B, I'm glad it's not just me, and the fact that 'you' are also troubled provides some comfort. This has really been troubling me for some time now as I grapple with the complex issues we're faced with in the Middle East. I don't feel fully qualified to discuss matters of philosophy or religion, so I don't typically chime in when those are the topic of a thread, but I'm comfortable with issues relating to public policy. I really struggle to justify the social order implicit in Israel's fundamental domestic policies. I don't know how to explore this issue without breeching someone's anti-Semitism threshold--that's doubly troubling. I think the environment for objective intellectual discussion of these matters has been so poisoned that folks tend to self-censor to the point of supressing the exact issues and topics that require the most examination.

That's what they did it in the 19th and early 20th century and were treated as a military/political entity. After defeat, through negotiation, they were given a nationhood status and full American citizenship.

Tell me again how that compares to Israel's treatment of Palestinians?

B

I don't think it matters who started what in Israel any more. I find it difficult to condemn the Israelis for fighting for their right to exist. Unlike their opponents, they don't promote the complete elimination of a culture as their primary goal. And frankly, surrounding countries have little more regard for the Palestinians than they do. When you find yourself in a world where all of your neighbors want to strip you of your right to exist, wouldn't your natural tendency be to fight tooth and nail for that right?

Bot/Z,

Wholeheartedly agree with everything you guys said.

By the way, I was watching "World Wire" on Discovery Times the other day and they were interviewing "freedom fighters" from various factions. One of the folks they interviewed was an accomplice of Menachem Begin's (later PM of Israel) and he was telling the story about how they set the bomb off in the King David Hotel in order to force the British out of Palestine. It seems to me that neither side of this ongoing conflict has clean hands.

Z:
I'm really surprised you haven't read that work. Most people in the US call it the Old Testament.

Kerry

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

Not exactly. The Old Testament records a long and bitter struggle between the existing inhabitants of the lands (Philistines) and the Hebrews when they moved in.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

There is a substantial difference between the actions of those Jewish militants and the Palestinian terrorists. The difference is that the Jews primarily went after military targets with specific goals in mind (they also executed a couple of jail breaks). They never condoned or practiced random acts of violence against civilians in order to promote terror.

GS,

Really? From what I recall, the majority of those injured and killed in the King David Hotel explosion were civilian, although there were a number of British Soldiers being put up there. I'm not sure that a hotel qualifies as a military target.

Also, Sharon's past is equally questionable with the Lebanon incident in the 80's while he was commanding the Christian militias. From what I understand, there were only women and children there.

At a very minimum the line gets very blurry. I don't consider myself an authority on this at all, so I recognize that I may be in err or ill informed.

There may have been a few civilians that got caught in the crossfire -- I'm not sure -- but the target was the substantial British military force staying at the hotel.

You're jumping ahead quite a few years to Sharon -- and from what I recall, I agree the man did not exactly have clean hands...

There's no reason to think that criticism of Israel's policies is anti-semitic. Look at Chomsky. He's a strident critic of Israeli policies but he's Jewish himself. He points out that the first hijackers of an airplane for political purposes were Jewish (can't remember the details).

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13