Opinion
OTHER VIEWS
Confronting Hate Crimes
Don't Delay from page A37
Tad Stahnke
Special Commentary
concerns.
Jordan's King Abdullah reaf-
firmed this in a recent interview
with the Spanish daily El Pais on
Oct. 18.
"We aren't saying take it or
leave it," Abdullah said. "There
are ideas that must be agreed
between the two parties. The pro-
posal is extremely flexible so as
not to isolate Israeli politicians."
The initiative does not rule
out the current negotiations
Israel is conducting with the
Palestinians and the Syrians, nor
does it resolve the outstanding
issues between Israel and the
Palestinians or Israel and Syria.
In essence, the initiative calls
on Israel to finalize agreements
on all final-status issues and, in
return, offers normalization with
the Arab states.
Some critics of the proposal say
Israel cannot manage two peace
tracks at once, especially if one
is Syrian. However, Israel already
has begun informal peace talks
with Syria while negotiating with
the Palestinians. In fact, Israel's
2009 intelligence assessment,
released last week, concluded that
Syria is sincere about its desire to
make peace once there is a U.S.
administration that will support
it.
If Israel's leadership is con-
vinced that it should work on
multiple fronts for peace, as it
is signaling, the Arab initiative
could provide Israel with the
international backing it craves.
Political transitions can push
peace initiatives to the back
burner, but they also can create
momentum for them.
Both candidates for the U.S.
presidency support Middle East
peace, the Arab states say they
are ready for it and Israel says it's
open to starting negotiations.
After Jan. 20, when the new U.S.
president takes office, there will
be no more excuse for delay. ❑
Sadie Goldman is senior policy asso-
ciate at the Israel Policy Forum.
A38
November 13 • 2008
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his month marks the 70th
anniversary of Kristallnacht,
the infamous night of hor-
ror on Germany's Jews. "The Night of
Broken Glass" served as a prelude to
the Holocaust, during which an array
of Europe's minorities — Jews primary
among them — were brutally slaugh-
tered en masse as a result of govern-
ment-led anti-Semitic, racist, xenopho-
bic, anti-religious and anti-gay policies.
Despite the notable improvements
in civil rights and race relations of the
past 70 years, we find ourselves today
facing the threat of personal violence
motivated by those same biases. Violent
hate crimes are on the rise, reflecting an
overall increase in xenophobic attitudes
across Europe and North America, a
revival of anti-Semitism and a con-
tinuation of prejudice against Muslims,
Roma, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and
transgender (LGBT) persons. Though
governments are not now the perpetra-
tors of the violence, they are failing to
do everything in their power to stop it.
Last year's disturbing developments
included record levels of anti-Semitic
violence in the United Kingdom, a
nearly one-fifth jump in racially moti-
vated attacks in Russia and a 24 percent
increase in violent incidents involving
sexual orientation bias in the United
States, according to a recent survey by
Human Rights First.
Grave Concern
The trend across Europe, the fomer
Soviet Union and North America is
alarming. One critical question is how
to get governments to acknowledge hate
crimes and take steps against them.
There is no easy answer. In many
countries, human rights organizations
that might document and calm tensions
simply do not exist. Many governments
lack the will or the ability to tackle
deeply rooted racial, ethnic, religious,
cultural and sexual hatreds. Some, it
must be said, simply turn a blind eye
toward hate crimes out of indifference
or for political considerations. Worse,
others may even stir hatreds out of
cynical self-interest.
Democratic nations, too, often have
failed to systematically address hate
crimes. The survey reveals that only
13 of the 56 countries that make up
the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the
world's largest regional security body,
have adequate hate-crime monitor-
ing and reporting systems in place.
More than 40 nations fail to collect and
publish complete information on hate
crimes and thus don't have a clear pic-
ture of the problem.
International nongovernmental
organizations such as Human Rights
First seek to overcome these roadblocks
by exposing the reality of hate crimes
through the gathering and publiciz-
ing of data from
nongovernmental
sources and the
media. This is criti-
cal work; demon-
strating the extent
of the problem
serves as a powerful
advocacy tool for
pushing recalcitrant
nations to take
responsibility for
crimes within their borders.
steps forward. Of course, much remains
to be done. Legal and administrative
directives are meaningless unless police
and other security forces are trained
and prodded to track hate crimes and
enforce provisions to investigate and
prosecute them as such. Additionally,
hate crime definitions must be broad-
ened to include all forms of bias that
might be the grounds for hate violence.
Fighting Back
Today, few governments systematically
collect information on anti-Semitic hate
crimes, even as NGOs have reported sig-
nificant increases
in such crimes.
This is the case in
some nations with
long histories of
anti-Semitism.
On the other
hand, France,
whose nearly half-
million-member
Jewish commu-
nity is one of the
world's largest, has achieved consider-
able success in its efforts to combat
anti-Semitism. The government has
ordered police to work with the Jewish
community in responding to anti-
Semitic violence. The number of crimes
has dropped significantly, although
more remains to be done.
Hate crimes committed against
Muslims in much of Europe and North
America also go largely undocumented.
Only five of the 56 OSCE member states
publicly report such incidents.
Nations are sensitive about their
image abroad — and much more so
in a world made smaller by globaliza-
tion. Even authoritarian regimes take
pains to burnish their image, if only to
encourage international investment.
Nothing diminishes a nation's luster as
does documenting and publicizing its
human rights failings.
This leverage must not be wasted. We
must continue to hold governments' feet
to the fire by revealing the failure to pay
attention to hate crimes.
The trend across
Europe, the fomer
Soviet Union and
North America is
alarming.
Moving Forward
This strategy has resulted in several
recent improvements:
• In Canada, the government for the
first time collected and released nation-
al hate crime statistics.
• In Croatia, authorities prosecuted
their first hate crime case, using a new
hate crime law to prosecute a man
who attempted to firebomb a gay pride
parade.
• In the Netherlands, where only
NGOs previously collected hate crime
statistics, authorities have undertaken
new measures to register and track
cases of hate crimes through the crimi-
nal justice system.
• In Norway, although official hate
crime statistics are not currently avail-
able, the justice minister has noted
that hate violence against gay men and
others is increasing and announced
that police have begun to register such
crimes.
• In the United Kingdom, the govern-
ment has taken a number of steps to
enhance its response by committing to
produce nationwide statistics on anti-
Semitic hate crime by 2009.
• In Ukraine, the government created
an interministerial commission to com-
bat racism and xenophobia.
These are tangible and important
❑
Tad Stahnke is director of Human Rights
First's Fighting Discrimination program and
a co-author of the group's recently released
2008 Hate Crimes Survey.
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