Antisemitic events in Czech Republic doubled in 2019 - report

While no cases of physical aggression have taken place against the Jews of the area, there were still almost 700 incidents of antisemitism.

By OMRI RON
Ultra-Orthodox Jews in the Czech Republic praying (photo credit: PETR DAVID JOSEK/REUTERS)
Ultra-Orthodox Jews in the Czech Republic praying
(photo credit: PETR DAVID JOSEK/REUTERS)
According to a new report released by the Federation of Jewish Communities in the Czech Republic, the amount of antisemitic events recorded across the country was twice as high in 2019 compared to 2018, with the most common form of antisemitism reported to be online.
While no cases of physical aggression have taken place against the Jews of the area, there were still a total of 694 incidents of antisemitism, 95% of which took place online.
The number of online incidents defined as "Texts, depictions and audio-visual manifestations" was 685. The other types of incidents, significantly less common, were "Threats, offense, and Harassment" with six incidents, and "Attacks on Jewish property, desecration" with three incidents. No physical assaults took place in the Czech Republic during 2019.
659 of the 694 incidents took place on the Internet. Most are attributed to far-right extremism with 130 incidents. Far-left extremism was attributed to 39 of the cases and Islamism was associated with one case.
This is double the amount of incidents which took place in 2018, when the recorded number of antisemitic incidents was 347.
Over the course the coronavirus crisis, several Jewish communities across the world have noticed a rise in antisemitism as well as conspiracy theories blaming the Jewish community for either creating or spreading the virus.