Antisemitism expert calls IHRA definition ‘essential’

Dr Dave Rich – a leading British academic and expert on antisemitism and director of policy at the Community Security Trust – provided in depth analysis via video link at the Royal Commission hearing on May 14 about the history of hatred against Jews, contemporary idealogical drivers and forms, and the serious threat posed not only to Jewish people, but to society as a whole.

The Associate Research Fellow at the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism at Birkbeck (University of London), drew a direct parallel between the ancient yet still present blood libel that Jews murdered non-Jewish children for ritual purposes, and contemporary discourse.

He pointed to allegations that the Jewish State deliberately targets Palestinian children, and widely circulated cartoons depicting Israeli leaders drinking children’s blood.

He emphasised that conspiracy theory is the defining feature that distinguishes antisemitism – the idea that that Jews collectively conspire to control governments, economies, media, and culture for malign ends.

And he stressed that comparisons of Jews to Nazis, or Israel’s actions as replications of the crimes of Nazi Germany, are adaptations of antisemitism to a post-Holocaust world, and are deeply harmful on multiple levels, taking “the most painful Jewish sensitivities of all” and “weaponising” them.