Three days after the antisemitic attack on Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, that cost fifteen people their lives and left more than forty wounded, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen put the fight against antisemitism at the heart of the speech she gave at the Euro-Hanukkah celebration on Wednesday, 17 December.
Mentioning that [things have] “grown dark” and that an “old evil” has returned, she denounced a climate in which too many Jews no longer dare to publicly display their identity or practise their religion.
As a reminder, the latest report by the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA)—which was published in July 2024 and was based on data that dated from before the terrorist attacks that took place in Israel on 7 October 2023—revealed that 96% of the Jews surveyed said that they had faced antisemitism. More than half were worried about their safety and the safety of their families at that time.
Ursula von der Leyen also announced that in 2026, the Simone Veil Prize for European Jewish Cultural Heritage would be awarded for the first time—a prize intended to celebrate “Jewish cultural heritage and its central role in shaping European identity”. (Original version in French by Nithya Paquiry)