BBC and Jewish group ranked with Iran and Hamas on 2021 anti-Semitism top ten list

This year’s global anti-Semitism list published annually by the anti-Palestinian group, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre (SWC), has several surprising inclusions. The BBC, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), social media giants Facebook and TikTok, have been ranked inside the top ten, alongside Iran and Hamas.

The inclusion of Germany is also likely to be met with raised eyebrows, given that the list is meant to name and shame groups that pose an existential threat to Jews. Anti-vax conspiracy theorists, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), climate change protest group, Sunrise, the University of Southern California and Unilever, which owns the ice cream brand Ben & Jerry’s, complete this year’s list.

Predictably, Iran tops the list. “There is no greater existential threat to the Jewish people than the growing nuclear threat from the anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying, terrorist-sponsoring, human rights-abusing Iranian regime,” wrote the SWC about the Islamic Republic.

In its remarks about Hamas, ranked second, the SWC blamed the Palestinian group for anti-Semitic attacks in the UK and Europe and North America. “Hamas’ violent vitriol targeting Jews was exported to Germany, the UK and across the Atlantic, in the US and Canada,” SWC said.

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Continuing down the list, SWC described JVP as a “Jewish group Hamas can love,” saying that while the group “believes it is immune from being labelled and treated as anti-Semites,” they are wrong.

Concerning CAIR and the Sunrise movement, SWC pointed to anti-Israel comments and stances, including Sunrise’s decision to pull out of a rally due to the participation of “a number of Zionist organisations.” CAIR made the list also, because it took an anti-Zionist stance. Earlier this month, the CAIR uncovered and disrupted a hate group’s years-long effort to infiltrate and spy on mosques and Muslim-American organisations. The anti-Muslim hate group was working closely with Israel.

This year’s eyebrow-raising list will fuel further questions over the adoption of the highly controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism. Jewish groups have recently said that the “seriously flawed” definition of anti-Semitism must be dropped.

SWC, however, is a leading campaigner for the adoption of IHRA across the globe. Earlier this month, it joined the Organization of American States (OAS) to work on what will be a handbook applying the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism for Latin America.