U.S. President Joe Biden in Washington, U.S. June 1, 2022. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

A leading American Jewish organization on Wednesday announced that it is teaming up with the Small Business Administration (SBA), a federal agency that offers loan programs and counsel to entrepreneurs, to help small business owners address rising antisemitism.

The American Jewish Committee (AJC), which promotes the well-being of the Jewish people, said it will help SBA in creating training and resource materials for employees of small businesses to help them “understand, respond to, and prevent antisemitism and other forms of hate” and report antisemitic incidents to law enforcement.

“We are excited to collaborate with SBA on this important project,” AJC CEO Ted Deutch said in a press release.  “We know far too many instances of vandalism, intimidation, and physical attacks take place at small businesses. This is an important moment as it will not only advance the White House strategy but provide a crucial pillar of the American economy with the tools to fight antisemitism and other forms of hate.”

The initiative comes out of the US National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism, a “whole of society” effort announced in May by the Biden administration to address an outbreak of antisemitic incidents and hate crimes in the US, which, according to the Anti-Defamation League, increased by 36 percent in 2022.

AJC has said the partnership with SBA is “the first major action” to implement the strategy.

“Hate and discrimination have no place on Main Street,” SBA administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman said. “We are proud to partner with AJC to combat antisemitism and other forms of hate as part of the President’s National Strategy. This first of its kind partnership will help us support small business owners and their employees with the tools necessary to identify, recover and prevent hate in their communities to help ensure Jewish Americans and all Americans feel safe going about their daily lives.”

Since taking office in 2021, the Biden administration has taken several steps to confront antisemitism throughout the US, including appropriating $305 million to the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which paid for upgrading security at synagogues, day schools, and other nonprofits. Additionally, in 2022, he appointed the first ever US special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, nominating Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt to fill the position.

In April, when the Biden administration became the first to apply Title VI of the Civil Rights Act to anti-Zionist discrimination, the President said in an op-ed for CNN that recent hate crimes against the Jewish people are “unconscionable and despicable.” In May, he declared May as Jewish Heritage Month, saying that “the story of the Jewish people has been woven into the fabric of our nation’s story.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.