Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.
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Notes -
Jews have been attacked by Arabs in Europe for decades, there were the Ilan and Sarah Halimi killings, the Toulouse school attack, various firebombing attempts on synagogues. Nothing much changed. The only difference is that the antisemitic motive is (usually) acknowledged, but this doesn’t actually change policy.
The other difference is before it could be - and usually were - dismissed as random one-off event, that just happened to be against Jews, but does not represent any systemic problem. This event is much bigger and very hard to dismiss as an "action of a lone-wolf crazed individual" - it's clear there is a strong, massive, violent anti-Semitic movement in Europe, and it's ready to roll out Kristallnachts on demand. They will try to dismiss it anyway, but I think they are starting to realize how big of a problem they have got, and that's it is not a Jewish problem but their problem.
If they do try to dismiss it, I think they will go with the “this is just standard football hooliganism, which often has an ethnic tinge and involves physical assaults and rioting” excuse.
I'm sure they'd try that but I hope somebody there is still sane enough to realize a violent coordinated movement of this size which is controlled by somebody other than the government is kinda problem for them. Before it's too late.
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