Major increase recorded in Islamists’ threats against Swedish Jews

Cnaan Liphshiz

(JTA) – Sweden’s Jewish community reported a significant increase in threats following terrorist attacks by Islamists in France.

The increase, which has not yet been quantified, has been observed following the murder of four people on Jan. 9 at a kosher shop outside Paris and an attack that left 12 dead two days earlier on the offices of a satirical weekly that lampooned Islam, according to Lena Posner-Korosi, president of the Council of Swedish Jewish Communities.

“We estimate, with help from police, that it has doubled,” Posner-Korosi told JTA Thursday about the amount of threats received. She said the community does not have exact figures but that most of the threats have been identified as coming from islamists.

Sweden’s National Council for Crime Prevention recorded 190 anti-Semitic incidents in 2013, of which 61 were classified as threats or insults.

“We are under threat and we have not seen the end,” Posner-Korosi wrote in an email. “It seems to be the beginning of terror around Europe for the coming months.”

Swedish police have beefed up security around Jewish institutions and other potential targets, Posner-Korosi added.

Some 20,000 Jews live in Sweden.

Earlier this week, the Jewish community of neighboring Denmark demanded an increase in security around its institutions, along with several other Jewish communities in Europe.