Illustrative Sign held at demonstration against antisemitism. Photo Credit: Ms. Magazine.

Antisemitic incidents in the United States increased by six percent over the past year, according to a new report by the World Zionist Organization (WZO).

“The constant increase in antisemitic trends in the last decade is a matter of concern,” said Raheli Baratz Rix, who leads the Department for Combating Antisemitism at WZO. “Antisemitism is everywhere, at any point in time and space, and we must not be silent.”

In Europe, however, antisemitic incidents slightly decreased representing 46 percent of the total number of incidents, down one percent from 2021, according to the group’s data.

The report added that antisemitism in the US is being fueled by both the progressive left and far right, with each spreading conspiracies about Israel and the Jewish people. Far right antisemitism emerges in national elections and debates about vaccinations while left wing antisemitism is most common on college campuses, where it takes form as calls to boycott the Israel. In total, 39 percent of all antisemitic incidents assessed by the organization took place in the US.

46 percent of all incidents occurred in Europe. As previously reported by The Algemeiner, in the United Kingdom, for example, hate crimes against London’s Jewish community were a problem in all of 2022, peaking in October and November in what a local Jewish community watch group described as a “hate crimes pandemic.” In France, according to WZO, 74 percent of French Jews reported experiencing threats on social media and disparaging comments in person. 35 percent said “they avoided wearing a type of clothing identified as Jewish.”

Social media is also contributing to the problem, which, the report continued, is a trend reflected in increasing media coverage of hateful content on platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

“Antisemitism on social media is increasing at an alarming rate and, unfortunately, as history has taught us, it will lead to physical acts,” WZO chairman Ya’akov Hagoel said in a statement announcing the report’s release. “We raise a clear black flag in view of the increase in incitement on the networks and call on the heads of state to raise the fight against antisemitism to the top of the list of priorities.”

The unrelenting wave of street-level antisemitic attacks in cities across the United States and Europe is having a profoundly negative psychological effect on individual Jews, a leading clinical and forensic psychologist told The Algemeiner in January.

“You’re going to have emotional upheaval in people, which means that if a person is being maligned, humiliated, or shamed they are going to go back and forth between sadness and rage,” said Dr. Rabbi David Fox, director of Chai Lifeline Crisis Services, a New York based nonprofit providing mental health services to the Jewish community.