About the Conference offered by Licra in Atid

About the conference offered by Licra in ATID on the Antisemitism in Catalunya: Two speakers of the highest intellectual level, gave us their point of view and illuminated us a little bit more about this subject. First of all, we would like to thank them for their generosity and altruism and insist on expressing our gratitude as a Jewish community for their unconditional support.

I would like to highlight from Vicenç Villatoro’s words when he said that racism is born from experience, but not antisemitism, that is born from imagination and ignorance, generating, in this way, a prefabricated stereotype. Today, antisemitism expands through the social networks and hides behind anonymity. Danger comes from the extreme right and the extreme left, that is to say totalitarianism. Another potential danger is the Islamic radical world, under control in Catalunya today, but still there. This should be fought, as Villatoro said, with words and ideas. According to Xavier Antich, antisemitism exists in Catalunya in the same way as everywhere. In fact, it is only the Jewish community that is having security in front of its doors in all the meetings, celebrations, school routines etc.

According to Antich, in Catalunya there are three types of antisemitism: 1. Jewish phobia 2. Antisemitism 3. Antisionism.

On the other hand, there is also banalization of Nazism: when the state of Israel is considered as Nazi, when any political opponent is considered Nazi, when Jewish particularity is erased and silenced: in 2015 took place an event against Nazism, in which all Jewish representatives were excluded, and the same happened, the other way around, a total absence of any political representatives when Jewish communities celebrated a ceremony in memory of the victims. For Xavier Antich, not only words and ideas are necessary to combat antisemitism, but also a lot of pedagogy.

An excellent evening, that we hope will be the beginning of many more.

Silvia Leida
President