[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 55 (Thursday, April 16, 2015)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E519-E520]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   AFTER PARIS AND COPENHAGEN: RESPONDING TO THE RISING TIDE OF ANTI-
                                SEMITISM

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 16, 2015

  Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, last month I chaired a 
Congressional hearing where we welcomed as witnesses Ambassador Ronald 
Lauder, the President of the World Jewish Congress; Mr. Roger 
Cukierman, President of the Representative Council of Jewish 
Institutions of France; and Mr. Dan Asmusssen, Chairperson of the 
Danish Jewish Community.
   In 1982, during my first term in Congress, I traveled with the 
National Conference on Soviet Jewry (NCSJ) to Moscow and Leningrad to 
meet Jewish refuseniks in their homes and to engage Soviet leaders.
   Mark Levin invited me to be on that trip and has been a friend and 
mentor ever since.
   For hours on end, Mark and I, and a delegation that included Sam 
Gejdenson, heard stories of Soviet physical and mental abuse, systemic 
harassment, gulags and psychiatric prisons and an array of seemingly 
wanton brutal acts of anti-Semitism.
   To apply for an exit visa--a universally recognized human right, 
which on paper at least, the Soviet Union had acceded to--was to invite 
the cruelty and wrath of the KGB and other small minded, morally-
stunted communist thugs.
   To courageously seek freedom rendered you ineligible for employment 
in Lenin's farcical ``workers paradise.''
   The Soviet system, militantly atheistic and morally incoherent, 
wouldn't let you leave, but didn't want you to stay either--a bizarre 
paradox.
   To a new 27 year old Congressman, it was bewildering and deeply 
troubling--why do they hate Jews? Why the anti-Semitic obsession?
   I have now chaired nine hearings on combatting anti-Semitism. Never 
in modern times however, has the need to defend Jews everywhere been 
greater. My next hearings will be on the explosion of anti-Semitic hate 
on the college campus and Jewish community security.
   For the first time since the Holocaust, the physical security of 
Jewish communities in Europe has become a top-level concern. The 
hearing I held last month examined the horrifying state of affairs 
facing Jewish communities in Europe at this time.
   At a Congressional hearing I chaired in 2002, Dr. Shimon Samuels of 
the Wiesenthal Center in Paris testified that, ``The Holocaust for 30 
years after the war acted as a protective teflon against blatant anti-
Semitic expression (especially in Europe). That teflon has eroded, and 
what was considered distasteful and politically incorrect is becoming 
simply an opinion. But cocktail chatter at fine English dinners can end 
as Molotov cocktails against synagogues.''
   That's exactly where we are now, thirteen years later--what was 
anti-Semitic ``cocktail chatter'' then has led us now to two people 
shot and killed at a synagogue and a Jewish cultural center in 
Copenhagen, and four killed in a terrorist attack on a kosher 
supermarket in Paris.
   These are only the most recent outrages in a terrifying increase in 
extreme anti-Semitic violence--let's not forget the May 2014 murder of 
four people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels, and the March 2012 murder 
of three Jewish children and a rabbi at a Jewish school in the French 
city of Toulouse.
   Each of these four attacks was perpetrated by a killer with links to 
the jihadist movement. For too long, far too government officials, many 
of them mired in what Natan Sharansky summarized as the application of 
double standards and demonization of Israel, have reacted weakly to 
this danger.
   Meanwhile, the threat has grown exponentially. Today, at least 3,000 
and perhaps more than 5,000 EU citizens, have left to join ISIS in 
Syria, Iraq and other conflict zones. This is the recent estimate of 
Europol, the EU's joint criminal intelligence body. It would be 
criminally irresponsible not to take this number as a warning of much 
worse to come, and to make every effort to prepare accordingly.
   In 2002, in response to what appeared to be a sudden, frightening 
spike in anti-Semitism in several countries, including here in the 
United States, I first proposed the idea for a conference on combating 
anti-Semitism under the auspices of the Organization for Security and 
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Convinced we had escalating crisis on our 
hands, I teamed with several OSCE partners to push for action and 
reform. Many of the people and NGOs present in this room played leading 
roles. Those efforts directly led to the creation of the OSCE's 
Personal Representative on Combating Anti-Semitism, which has been 
filled by Rabbi Andy Baker since 2009. Rabbi Baker has done outstanding 
work. Dogged and energetic, he has been the driver behind everything 
the OSCE has accomplished in fighting anti-Semitism in recent years.
   My efforts with partners to put anti-Semitism on the OSCE agenda 
also led to important OSCE conferences on combating anti-Semitism in 
Vienna, Berlin, Cordoba, Bucharest--and last fall in Berlin. In each of 
these, participating states have made solemn, tangible commitments to 
put our words into action. In some countries, progress has indeed been 
made--institutions to fight anti-Semitism have been created, and they 
have done excellent work.
   But it has not been enough to reverse the new anti-Semitism in 
Europe, and failed miserably to anticipate and prevent the arrival of 
jihadist anti-Semitism in Europe.
   That is why I convened the hearing, to review, re-commit, and re-
energize efforts to stop the evil anti-Semitic violence that is 
threatening the Jewish communities of Europe.

[[Page E520]]

   We need to learn more about what must be done to ensure community 
security--how the communities see the threats they face, what they are 
doing about them, what the European governments are doing about them--
and how everyone can and must do more.
   We also need to learn how the U.S. Government can be more effective 
especially in light of World Jewish Congress President Lauder's all 
important question: ``where is the United States?'' Ambassador Lauder 
testified: ``once again, like the 1930s, European Jews live in fear . . 
. In my travels to all of these communities, I am asked the same 
question around Europe and the world: `where is the United States? Why 
isn't the United States leading the world in this crisis?' ''

                          ____________________