Anti-Jewish Incidents Rose in ’14

The number of anti-Semitic incidents in Georgia nearly doubled in 2014 from 2013, but the total remained within the normal range.

The Anti-Defamation League’s annual Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents counted 13 incidents classified as anti-Semitic across Georgia. One of the 13 was an act of vandalism — the painting of swastikas on the AEPi fraternity house during the High Holidays in October — and the rest involved harassment, threats or events, such as the hacking of a Reform institution’s website in May by a foreign group called the Moroccan Ghosts.

The ADL does not count anti-Israel events as anti-Semitic unless they bring out anti-Jewish stereotypes or invoke Nazi comparisons or imagery.

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Georgia experienced seven anti-Semitic incidents in 2013, according to the ADL: one act of vandalism and six acts of harassment, threats or events. But 2013 was a low year. Georgia had 11 incidents in 2012 and 16 in 2011.

Georgia is typical of the nation as a whole: years of declining numbers of anti-Semitic incidents, then a jump that still left 2014 below average. The ADL counted 912 incidents nationwide last year, up from 751 in 2013 but lower than the 927 of 2012, 1,080 in 2011 and 1,757 in 2005.

The Gaza war drove much of the U.S. increase in 2014, the ADL said in its audit, issued at the end of March. In past years, the summer has been quiet for anti-Semitism, but incidents spiked in July, August and September 2014 in response to the war and the resulting jump in anti-Israel demonstrations.

“The reported increase in U.S. anti-Semitic incidents coincided with a huge upsurge in anti-Semitic attacks in Europe and elsewhere around the globe,” said Barry Curtiss-Lusher, the ADL’s national chairman.