Shame: Hungary has the strongest antisemitism in Europe

antisemitism holocaust 1944
Hungarian and German soldiers herd arrested Jews into the municipal theatre, 20/22 October 1944. Source: Wikimedia Commons/German Federal Archive

Bad news came out about Poland and Hungary’s antisemite sentiments. According to a recent survey of ten European countries, more than a third of the population in Hungary and Poland hold explicitly anti-Jewish views.

According to a survey by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in ten European countries, a significant percentage of the population agrees with certain anti-Semitic views and stereotypes, The Jerusalem Post reports. The ADL poll ran from November last year to January this year. It covered Belgium, the UK, France, the Netherlands, Poland, Hungary, Germany, Russia, Spain and Ukraine, rtl.hu writes.

The questions that helped determine the populations’ antisemitism

The questions covered eleven commonly held anti-Jewish views, such as the following:

  • Jews have too much power in business.
  • Jews are the cause of most wars in the world.
  • Jews are more loyal to Israel than to their homeland.

Respondents were asked to indicate their level of agreement with statements such as the above. If someone agreed to some extent with at least six of the 11 statements, they were classified as holding antisemitic views.

According to the survey, 37 percent of the population in Hungary hold anti-Semitic views.

What about the rest of the countries examined?

This figure is 35 percent in Poland, 29 percent in Ukraine, 26 percent in Russia and Spain. It is 24 percent in Belgium, 17 percent in France, 12 percent in Germany and 10 percent in the UK. According to the ADL, the Netherlands has the lowest level of antisemitism at just 8 percent.

The survey data show that while the proportion of people who hold antisemitic views is relatively high in Poland and Ukraine, around one third, the situation has improved since the last survey in 2019. Antisemitism fell from 48 to 35 percent in Poland and from 46 to 29 percent in Ukraine. In Hungary, antisemitism has fallen by a smaller amount, from 42 to 37 percent. Thus, the five-percent drop has seen Hungary jump to the top.

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