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Pro-Russian Parties Stoking Antisemitism in Bulgaria, Jewish Leaders Warn
Supporters of Hamas demonstrating in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. Photo: Screenshot
The tiny Jewish community in Bulgaria is facing a wave of antisemitism stoked by pro-Russian parties, two of its leaders have said.
In the wake of the Hamas pogrom in southern Israel on Oct. 7, there had been “an explosion of left-wing antisemitism, in which anti-Zionism and anti-imperialism are layered, mixed with hatred for western Europe,” Solomon Bali, a vice-president of the B’nai B’rith organization, told the Euractiv news outlet.
Bali identified Russia as the key source of the hostile propaganda targeting Jews in the formerly communist Balkan state. “Memes, videos, and propaganda flood social media, and much of it comes from pro-Russian sources,” he noted.
Maxim Delchev — executive director of the Bulgarian Jewish organization Shalom — echoed Bali’s analysis, adding that Bulgarian far right parties, which have posed a threat to the country’s Jews in the recent past, were less visible in the current antisemitic campaign.
“They express support for Hamas and Palestine, which goes beyond what is permissible,” Delchev remarked, observing that the antisemitic propaganda “comes from left and far left groups and related social media profiles, who fiercely support Russia in the war in Ukraine.” Bali separately commented that the left-wing parties had shown a disturbing lack of sympathy for the Israeli victims of the Hamas onslaught.
Both Bali and Delchev pointed out that the two pro-Russian parties in the Bulgarian parliament — the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), a successor to the Communist Party, and the hardline nationalist Varazhdane (“Revival”) Party — had boycotted a vote last month that resulted in the passage of a statement of support for Israel. The statement asserted that Israel’s military response to the Oct. 7 atrocities “is an inevitable and necessary reciprocal response — an act to protect the life and dignity of the Israelis and the right of existence of the State of Israel itself.” It was passed by 124 votes with no opposition.
Delchev characterized Bulgarian laws on hate speech as weak, arguing that the “legislative gap” needed to be closed. The Jewish community of approximately 1,100 is currently awaiting the outcome of a legal complaint filed with the public prosecutor by Shalom concerning an antisemitic image that went viral on Bulgarian internet channels over the summer.
The image showed Bulgaria’s Jewish former foreign minister, Solomon Passy, wearing a striped concentration camp uniform while being manhandled by four Nazi German soldiers. The accompanying text quipped, “If you don’t want Russian gas, let us supply you with ours.”
Concern among Bulgarian Jews over growing antisemitism predates the Hamas pogrom. Throughout the year, Jewish leaders have protested the inflammatory statements of supporters of Varazhdane — which emerged as the third largest party in parliament following April’s general election — including placards on display at a demonstration backing Russia’s aggression against Ukraine that equated Zionism with Nazism.
The post Pro-Russian Parties Stoking Antisemitism in Bulgaria, Jewish Leaders Warn first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
i24 News – Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday that the government would establish an administration to encourage the voluntary migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” he said at a Land of Israel Caucus at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. “The budget will not be an obstacle.”
Referring to the plan championed by US President Donald Trump, Smotrich noted the “profound and deep hatred towards Israel” in Gaza, adding that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it’s impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone’s throw from the border.”
The administration would be under the Defense Ministry, with the goal of facilitating Trump’s plan to build a “Riviera of the Middle East” and the relocation of hundreds of thousands of Gazans for rebuilding efforts.
“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “The logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.”
The post Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30
A general view shows the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – The Knesset’s (Israeli parliament’s) Special Committee for Foreign Workers held a discussion on Sunday to examine the needs of wounded and disabled IDF soldiers and the response foreign caregivers could provide.
During the discussion, data from the Defense Minister revealed that the number of registered IDF wounded and disabled veterans rose from 62,000 to 78,000 since the war began on October 7, 2023. “Most of them are reservists and 51 percent of the wounded are up to 30 years old,” the ministry’s report said. The number will increase, the ministry assesses, as post-trauma cases emerge.
The committee chairwoman, Knesset member Etty Atiya (Likud), emphasized the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy for the wounded and to remove obstacles. “There is no dispute that the IDF disabled have sacrificed their bodies and souls for the people of Israel, for the state of Israel,” she said. Addressing the veterans, she continued: “And we, as public representatives and public servants alike, must do everything, but everything, to improve your lives in any way possible, to alleviate your pain and the distress of your family members who are no less affected than you.”
Currently, extensions are being given to the IDF veterans on a three-month basis, which Atiya said creates uncertainty and fear among the patients.
“The committee calls on the Interior Minister [Moshe Arbel] to approve as soon as possible the temporary order on our table, so that it will reach the approval of the Knesset,” she said, adding that she “intends to personally approach the Director General of the Population Authority [Shlomo Mor-Yosef] on the matter in order to promote a quick and stable solution.”
The post Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during an interview with Sky News Arabia in Damascus, Syria in this handout picture released by the Syrian Presidency on August 8, 2023. Syrian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Over 1,300 people were killed in two days of fighting in Syria between security forces under the new Syrian Islamist leaders and fighters from ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect on the other hand, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Sunday.
Since Thursday, 1,311 people had been killed, according to the Observatory, including 830 civilians, mainly Alawites, 231 Syrian government security personnel, and 250 Assad loyalists.
The intense fighting broke out late last week as the Alawite militias launched an offensive against the new government’s fighters in the coastal region of the country, prompting a massive deployment ordered by new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace as much as possible and… we will be able to live together in this country,” al-Sharaa said, as quoted in the BBC.
The death toll represents the most severe escalations since Assad was ousted late last year, and is one of the most costly in terms of human lives since the civil war began in 2011.
The counter-offensive launched by al-Sharaa’s forces was marked by reported revenge killings and atrocities in the Latakia region, a stronghold of the Alawite minority in the country.
The post Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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