FLORENCE, Italy – With antisemitism on the rise across Europe, some say the continent is finished – or at best, running out of time. At a recent summit in Italy, faith leaders, activists, and academics gathered to strategize.
From Italy to England to Australia, violent and sometimes deadly anti-Semitic attacks and hate speech have flooded the web. The outbreak prompted Giovanni Melchionda of the National Pro-Israel Network in Italy to put together a summit just outside of Florence.
Melchionda brought together experts, including professors, European pastors, and the Rabbi of Florence. Jews, religious and secular, also joined to fight antisemitism.
“We are in the time of strong antisemitism,” Melchionda told CBN News. “Europe is in a huge spiritual and idealistic crisis because of politics, because of wrong teaching, because of the young revolts.”
Dr. Jonathan Curci, an international law specialist from Switzerland, lays the blame at the feet of a lukewarm Church that he believes has failed to support traditional values and its European identity. He sees the result as a vacuum, creating a friendly climate for hatred.
“Where are our churches?” Curci asked. “Where are the young people in the churches? What do they believe?”
He added, “It’s normal that a strong identity like Islam comes to substitute the lack of identity to this Europe that has totally lost the Judeo-Christian values, principles, history. And the Jews are fleeing from this place.”
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Belgian Pastor Luc Henrist contends that rejecting the Jewish people’s role in God’s plan is driving others to take a strong stand against Israel and the Jews.
“It’s a spiritual problem,” Henrist told us. “And we see from the beginning of time that God has chosen the people of Israel, but most people reject the idea of God … And therefore, by rejecting God, they have also rejected His word and His people. And that is why we have now reached this situation where there is so much antisemitism in our Western countries because of this rebellion against God.”
Because of social media, anti-Semitic incidents, such as a recent riot in Italy, are now highly visible, appearing in places considered unlikely, such as our educational systems or among the youth.
“Now, in the schools in Italy, the teachers, the professors, they influence a lot, especially the young students. A very manipulating situation,” Melchiondi asserted.
Dr. Curci believes governments have been too passive in implementing measures or responding to specific incidents. That has allowed antisemitism to spread.
He explained, “The politicians have not yet understood that without a fight to suppress the causes of this problem: this obsession with Israel and the word Zionism, which is a biblical word for a movement of liberation of the Jewish people so suppressed, condemned and persecuted in Europe.”
Melchionda insists, “The problem of the government is that they don’t speak loudly. Of course, the people protesting in the street are the minority, but the riots are very violent and very problematic.”
While many are asking if it’s too late for Europe and the world, Canadian Bible teacher Paul Scafer still has hope.
He told CBN News, “It’s not too late if we can get the people to wake up, to understand, and to start acting in the right direction, but we don’t have a whole lot of time. And it’s getting more and more intense every day.”
Melchionda concluded, “It’s time that the Lord will raise up the people, wake up the people, because this situation is very risky.”
