Originally posted in Spanish by Visigodo:
"España Es La Fuente De Incitación Europea Contra Los Judios"
Notice too the comment (note) after the article by the publishing site, es-israel.org.
Spain is the source of European incitement against Jews
The European Parliament has pointed to Spain as the main source of incitement against Jews in Europe.
The report was presented in Strasbourg by Beate Winkler, Director of the EUMC, and Pat Cox, President of the European Parliament. According to the rumours, Winkler's institution would be finding great difficulties to get the Spanish media to comply with her guidelines, since they seem to be boycotting the acts related to the Jews.
The European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC), which is the European Union watchdog on racism, points once again to Spain as the main source for anti-semitism in its last (and second) report
"Manifestations of Antisemitism in the EU 2002-2003", presented two weeks ago.
The report was presented in Strasbourg by Beate Winkler, Director of EUMC, and Pat Cox, Presiden of the European Parliament, on Tuesday 31st of March 2004, at 14.30. But it is news again as the Spanish Government has done nothing about it, and the Spanish media has even rejected it. According to rumours, the institution of Winkler would be finding huge difficulties to get the Spanish media follow her guidelines, as they seem to be boycotting the acts related to Jews. The report from the EUMC highlights the role of the media in inciting against the Jews, attacking the covering of the so called Middle East conflict. The institution understands that since the stereotypes found in such covering are the same that the stereotypes against the Jews in the 30s (killing children, controlling the world, relation to money, hidden intentions ...), it is impossible to assert that the anti-Israel wave that exists in Spain is independent of an anti-semitic content in the news.
In contrast with the Arab countries --which even after 11-M are not the target of the critique in Spain--, the newspaper La Vanguardia has criticised Prime Minister Ariel Sharon but has also postulated, for example, how is the nose, the height, the aspec or the intentions of the Jews.
A poll by the Antidefamation League in collaboration with Gallup says that in Spain around 72% of the population understands that the only solution to the conflict is to deport the Jews from Israel, although only 12% of those asked would accept to have "Jewish or Israelite" neighbours. 68% supports the rights of the Palestine refugees, although only 4% knew about the Jewish refugees from 1948. 69% of the Spaniards say that the Jews had "too much power", although they can't determine which power. 62% believes that Jews have "a special relationship with money". More than 55% believes that Jews have "hidden intentions and interests".
By zones, the most dangerous areas correspond to the regions with a regional-nationalist tendency (mainly Catalonia and Basque Country) and Aragon, Andalusia and Murcia. Catalonia is a region specially problematic, which is a risk since Barcelona is a prefered destiny for Israelites as well as for North American, German and British Jews.
The report also explains that after the attacks of 11-M, as well as it happened after the 11-S, there is an absence of Islamophoby in Spain, in part blamed to the interest of the Spanish media to blame Israel for the massacre. From the state national TV to the Socialist newspaper El País, there are many news media that have issued accounts of diverse conspiration theories (like saying that the author of the attack is Mossad), after the News Services of the TV channel Tele 5 assured before the war on Iraq of 2003 in a TV programme that "Aznar was travelling to Washington to get a prize by the Jewish lobby for involving Spain in the war". Officially, the former Prime Minister José María Aznar travelled to Washington to open an exposition to promote tourism in Spain.
Just as it happened with the previous report by the Polytechnic of Berlin, the new report by the EUMC mentions specifically that the social victims of terrorism are still the Jews, and that unlike others the Spanish media incite against Israel and the Jews on a daily basis.
It is expected a reaction by the Jewish communities worldwide, since Spain not only has relevant Jewish communities but also gets many numbers of Israeli and Jewish tourists every year. For example, in the year 2004 Catalonia presents the Forum of the Cultures. Until this moment the Spanish government has not made a move yet in any direction. Various synagogues have even had to hire private security, given the lack of interest in the office of Rodríguez Zapatero.
Although according to the police there are no physical attacks against the Jews in Spain, it looks more probable that they are not being reported, or that they are not made public, ........
The destruction of trees of the Jewish Fund in memory of the victims of ETA, the repeated attempts to burn synagogues, or Nazi theories made in public are other sympthoms that the Spain of the presumed multiculturality shows today.
As a measure of security, numerous organisations, businesses, travel agencies and NGOs inside and outside Spain have started to recommend to the citizens of the United States, Israel, Germany, Russia and United Kingdom to avoid visiting Spain.