Mycroft
31st March 2004, 11:00 PM
Jewish leaders accused the European Union yesterday of covering up the true scale of anti-Semitic violence carried out by Muslim youths, reigniting a controversy over Europe's failure to confront Islamic extremism at home.
A study released by the EU's racism and xenophobia monitoring centre astounded experts by concluding that the wave of anti-Jewish persecution over the last two years stemmed from neo-Nazi or other racist groups.
"The largest group of the perpetrators of anti-Semitic activities appears to be young, disaffected white Europeans," said a summary released to the European Parliament . "A further source of anti-Semitism in some countries was young Muslims of North African or Asian extraction.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/04/01/wsemit01.xml
The EU suppressed a report last year by German academics concluding that Arab gangs were largely responsible for a sudden surge in the anti-Jewish violence, allegedly because the findings were politically unpalatable.
Victor Weitzel, who wrote a large section of yesterday's far more detailed study, told The Telegraph that the latest findings had been consistently massaged by the EU watchdog to play down the role of North African youth. "The European Union seems incapable of facing up to the truth on this," he said. "Everything is being tilted to ensure nice soft conclusions.
So how are these findings politically unpalatable?
A study released by the EU's racism and xenophobia monitoring centre astounded experts by concluding that the wave of anti-Jewish persecution over the last two years stemmed from neo-Nazi or other racist groups.
"The largest group of the perpetrators of anti-Semitic activities appears to be young, disaffected white Europeans," said a summary released to the European Parliament . "A further source of anti-Semitism in some countries was young Muslims of North African or Asian extraction.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/04/01/wsemit01.xml
The EU suppressed a report last year by German academics concluding that Arab gangs were largely responsible for a sudden surge in the anti-Jewish violence, allegedly because the findings were politically unpalatable.
Victor Weitzel, who wrote a large section of yesterday's far more detailed study, told The Telegraph that the latest findings had been consistently massaged by the EU watchdog to play down the role of North African youth. "The European Union seems incapable of facing up to the truth on this," he said. "Everything is being tilted to ensure nice soft conclusions.
So how are these findings politically unpalatable?