Campaign Against Antisemitism

Campaign Against Antisemitism

Rally in Parliament Square in 2019
Formation	August 2014
Registration no.	1163790
Headquarters	London, UK
Region served	United Kingdom
Chairman	Gideon Falter
Website	antisemitism.uk

Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) is a British non-governmental organisation established in August 2014 by members of the Anglo-Jewish community.^[1][2][3]

It publishes research, organises rallies and petitions and conducts litigation.

History

The CAA was set up in early August 2014, after an increase in antisemitic incidents that accompanied the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict.^[4][5]

A grassroots campaign, it grew largely out of social media activity among those who felt more should be done to promote the Jewish community's concerns after a meeting to discuss responses where a campaigner had her concerns dismissed by Board of Deputies president Vivian Wineman.^[6]

In January 2015, the then UK Home Secretary, Theresa May, praised CAA for its work and undertook to ensure that the law against antisemitism is "robustly enforced".^[7]

It was registered as a charitable incorporated organisation (CIO) on 1 October 2015.^[8]

Its chair is Gideon Falter and its first director of communications was Jonathan Sacerdoti.^[9]

Publications

CAA publishes primary and secondary research based on polling and freedom of information requests.

CAA's National Antisemitic Crime Audit collects and analyses antisemitic crime data from all police forces in the UK. CAA uses the report to assess trends in antisemitic crime and to make recommendations to the British government.^[10][11]

Rallies and petitions

Their first demonstration was against the Tricycle Theatre in London which, in August 2014, had refused to participate in that November's UK Jewish Film Festival due to the contemporaneous conflict in Gaza, unless the festival rejected funding from parties involved, notably a £1400 sponsorship from the Israeli embassy, which the Tricycle Theatre offered to replace.^[12] Later in August, following discussions with the festival organizers, the Tricycle withdrew its condition.^[13]

In August 2018, CAA organised a demonstration outside Labour's headquarters to protest against the handling of antisemitism in the UK Labour Party, and to condemn Jeremy Corbyn.^[14]

Also in August 2018 the organisation launched a change.org petition titled "Jeremy Corbyn is an antisemite and must go",^[15] the petition featuring a Labour slogan modified to read "For the many not the Jew", was signed by over 30,000 by 30 August 2018.^[16] A counter petition against the CAA with the title "To Get the Charity Commission to Deregister the Zionist Campaign Against Anti-Semitism" was signed by almost 7,500 and sent to the Charity Commission, which said in response that it was "assessing concerns raised about the Campaign Against Antisemitism’s campaigning activities".^[17] In October 2018, the Charity Commission noted that charities must be independent of party politics and insisted that the CAA reword its petition.^[18]

In November 2018, the CAA asked the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) to investigate the Labour Party.^[19] In May 2019, following complaints submitted by the Jewish Labour Movement and the CAA, the EHRC launched a formal investigation into whether Labour had "unlawfully discriminated against, harassed or victimised people because they are Jewish".^[20]

Litigation

CAA has used the process of judicial review to scrutinise and reverse decisions made by the British government and authorities. In March 2017, CAA forced the CPS to quash a decision not to prosecute an alleged far-right leader over a speech in which he issued a call to "free England from Jewish control".^[21][22][23]

In December 2017 the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to prosecute an Islamic Human Rights Commission director who was one of the organisers of a Quds Day rally, who, during the rally, allegedly stated that Zionists were responsible for the Grenfell Tower fire, called for Israel's destruction, and that he was fed up with Zionists, their rabbis, synagogues, and supporters. The CAA attempted to begin a private prosecution for inciting racial or religious hatred, however this was blocked by the CPS, as they had determined there was no "realistic prospect of conviction".^[24][25][26]

In early 2018, CAA brought a successful^[27][28] private prosecution against Alison Chabloz, a holocaust denier who released three YouTube videos of self-written antisemitic songs characterising Auschwitz as a "theme park" and the Holocaust as the "Holohoax".^{[29][30][31][32]} Chabloz was subsequently imprisoned for breaking the conditions of her suspended sentence.^[33]

In July 2018, Gilad Atzmon was forced to apologise to CAA chairman Gideon Falter, and pay costs and damages, after being sued for libel. Atzmon acknowledged that he had falsely stated that Falter had personally profited from fabricating antisemitic incidents.^[34][35][36]

In 2019, the CAA was sued by Tony Greenstein for libel in relation to what is or is not antisemitism following five articles it had published about him. In 2017, Greenstein had launched a petition asking the Charity Commission to deregister the organisation, claiming its purpose was to limit freedom of speech by calling opponents of Israel antisemitic.^[37] Greenstein's libel claim was dismissed.^[38]

Opposition to events

In August 2019, the organisation asked Goldsmiths, University of London to cancel a booking made by the Communist Party of Great Britain because they objected to some of the speakers who, they said, "have a history of baiting Jews or outright antisemitism". The university in response referenced their commitment to free speech and that hiring event space to legal organisations was a common practice amongst universities.^[39]

In February 2017, a letter to The Guardian signed by 250 academics claimed that the CAA cites the Working Definition of Antisemitism in asking its supporters to "record, film, photograph and get witness evidence" about Israeli Apartheid Week events; and the CAA "will help you to take it up with the university, students' union or even the police." The signatories believe "These are outrageous interferences with free expression, and are direct attacks on academic freedom....It is with disbelief that we witness explicit political interference in university affairs in the interests of Israel under the thin disguise of concern about antisemitism".^{[40][non-primary source needed]}

Criticism

The All-Party Parliamentary Group against Antisemitism wrote in 2015 that

We were somewhat disappointed to note that not all of the messages from that group (the CAA) have been in line with CST’s stated approach of seeking to avoid undue panic and alarm. We encourage Jewish communal leaders and others when speaking on antisemitism to follow CST’s example and to be reassuring and responsible in their language, taking into account the activity which as we have outlined had been undertaken before the summer and during it. So too, it is important that the leadership do not conflate concerns about activity legitimately protesting Israel’s actions with antisemitism, as we have seen has been the case on some occasions.^[41]

In January 2015, the Institute for Jewish Policy Research said that a CAA survey about antisemitism was "littered with flaws", and "may even be rather irresponsible".^[42]

After criticism by the CAA of Shami Chakrabarti over her 2016 report into antisemitism within the Labour Party, a number of British Jews wrote to The Guardian newspaper dissociating themselves from "the pro-Israel lobbyists of the Campaign Against Antisemitism".^{[43][non-primary source needed]}

In July 2018, the Labour MP Margaret Hodge became one of a number of honorary patrons of CAA. In the run up to the 2019 United Kingdom general election, CAA asked her to resign as a patron because she was standing as a Labour Party candidate; she did so but described their request as "both astonishing and wounding", showing a lack of respect and impugning her integrity.^[44]

In February 2020, the Morning Star reported that Shahrar Ali, the Home Affairs spokesman of the Green Party of England and Wales, had made a formal complaint to the Charity Commission for England and Wales that the CAA had failed to be independent of party politics – a legal requirement for charities – which the commission was assessing.^[45] The CAA had previously described a 2009 speech by Ali^[46] as anti-semitic and an "offensive rant".^[47][48]

References

Further reading

• "JLC pulls video criticising Campaign Against Antisemitism figures". The Jewish Chronicle. 29 August 2017. Retrieved 14 November 2017.
• "Video criticising Campaign Against Antisemitism pulled by JLC". Jewish News.
• "Campaigners against anti-semitism have launched an official complaint against Jeremy Corbyn". The Independent. 23 September 2016.
• Pfeffer, Anshel (14 November 2017). "U.K. anti-Semitism Report Highlights Disturbing Trend – Among British Jews". Haaretz.
• "Analysis: British Jewry and a feeling of insecurity". The Jerusalem Post.
• "We must ensure that antisemitism gets no foothold in Britain – Left Foot Forward". Left Foot Forward. 2015-01-14.
• "The Jewish Leadership Council and the Board of Deputies of British Jews Response To 'Poll of Jewish Attitudes' – The Jewish Leadership Council". The Jewish Chronicle. Archived from the original on 2017-11-15. Retrieved 2017-11-14.
• "JC poll reveals 88 per cent of British Jews have not considered leaving UK". The Jewish Chronicle. 14 January 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2017.
• "A better way to report the views of British Jews". The Jewish Chronicle. 14 January 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2017.
• "Board of Deputies Community Briefing". us5.campaign-archive1.com. Board of Deputies of British Jews.

External links

• Official website