8 No. 59 JUSTICE that member states improve their understanding of contemporary antisemitism and enhance the security of their Jewish communities.4 In recalling these new initiatives, I shall proceed chronologically before making an assessment of their potential effectiveness. Other proposals focus on the wider range of racism and hate crimes, but they clearly also benefit Jewish communities. Chronology of Initiatives In November 2014, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) convened a conference to review progress ten years after the Berlin High Level Conference on Antisemitism. Participants noted the continuing high levels of antisemitism and growing Jewish concerns.5 The conference recommendations were referred to the OSCE Ministerial Council meeting in Basel in December 2014, which proposed to offer member states a set of best practices to combat antisemitism.6 A series of consultative meetings was then held in Warsaw at ODIHR, and at the European Parliament in Brussels, which ultimately led to the creation of the "Words into Action" program. Preliminary consultations were held with European police representatives during 2016 to test the strategies and objectives of the program, which is being finalized as this article is being written. These will be presented in mid-2017 in the German parliament in Berlin, because the program is funded by the German government, as well as in Vienna, where the OSCE is headquartered, to diplomatic delegations representing their governments. It is expected that the two-year program will constitute an effective and focused response to antisemitism by proposing practical security, educational and other measures for governments and their law enforcement and security services to adopt. In March 2015, the newly formed European Parliament Working Group on Antisemitism held a meeting for Members of the European Parliament and European Commission (EC) staff, at which high priority was accorded to the enforcement of existing European mechanisms, and the strengthening of cultural and educational programs that are designed to reduce racism. A second meeting held a month later focussed on the rise in antisemitism within Muslim communities. At the meeting, prominent moderate Muslim campaigners against Islamist extremism noted that they were also engaged in combating antisemitism within their own communities.7 The adoption of the Working Definition of Antisemitism by the 31 member states of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) in Bucharest in March 2016 will help governments, their law enforcement agencies and civil society to understand contemporary antisemitism.8 The Working Definition was first formulated in 2005 at the request of the European Union Monitoring Centre (EUMC), when some of its monitoring agents indicated that they did not see antisemitism, because it was no longer expressed in medieval-era or Nazi-like tropes. The Working Definition is not a legal definition and it is not designed to replace domestic laws. Rather, it provides guidance on the contemporary nature of antisemitism for police officers and criminal justice agencies, as well as for the human rights community. However, the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), the EUMC successor agency, removed the Working Definition from their website in November 2013, despite protests from Jewish bodies, insisting that it provided an agreed upon and authoritative explanation for antisemitism in the current era. IHRA has since adopted it and now recommends its use alongside its definition of Holocaust denial. These two definitions now provide a set of tools by which to measure contemporary antisemitism and aid analysis and policy formulation. This becomes ever more important as the EC and other European IGOs seek to approximate laws and judicial responses to hate crime. Annual reports and surveys by FRA indicate that Jewish experiences of antisemitism are substantially under4. Reactions to the Paris attacks in the EU: fundamental rights considerations, FRA-European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, Jan. 2015, available at http://fra. europa.eu/en/publication/2015/reactions-paris-attackseu-fundamental-rights-considerations (last visited April 19, 2017). 5. 10th Anniversary of the OSCE’s Berlin Conference on AntiSemitism, Final Report, OSCE, 12-13 Nov. 2014, available at http://www.osce.org/odihr/136561?download=true (last visited April 19, 2017). 6. Declaration on Enhancing Efforts to Combat Anti-Semitism, OSCE, Ministerial Council, 2014, MC.DOC/8/14, Dec. 5, 2014, available at http://www.osce.org/cio/130556?download=true. (last visited April 19, 2017). 7. Antisemitism in Europe, European Parliament Working Group on Antisemitism, 14 April 2015 Statement, available at http://www.antisem.eu/antisemitism-in-europe/(last visited April 19, 2017). 8. Working Definition of Antisemitism, International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, June 26, 2016, available at https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/media-room/ stories/working-definition-antisemitism (last visited April 19, 2017).
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