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Campaign Against Antisemitism

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

Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) is a British non-governmental organisation established in August 2014 by members of the Anglo-Jewish community. It conducts litigation, runs awareness-raising campaigns, organises rallies and petitions, provides education on antisemitism and publishes research.

History

CAA was set up in early August 2014, after an increase in antisemitic incidents that accompanied the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict. 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 of British Jews president Vivian Wineman.

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". On 1 October 2015, it was registered as a charitable incorporated organisation (CIO). Its chief executive is Gideon Falter and its first director of communications was Jonathan Sacerdoti.

Publications

CAA publishes primary and secondary research based on opinion polling and Freedom of Information Act 2000 requests. CAA's annual Barometer measures antisemitic sentiment in the UK and also surveys the effect of antisemitism on the Jewish community. Further, its National Antisemitic Crime Audit collects and analyses antisemitic crime data from all police forces in the United Kingdom. CAA uses the report to assess trends in antisemitic crime and to make recommendations to the British government. CAA also monitors antisemitism in political parties and the adoption of the IHRA definition by universities and local authorities in the UK.

Rallies and petitions

CAA's first demonstration was in 2014 against the Tricycle Theatre in London, which had cancelled its hosting of that November's UK Jewish Film Festival due to the contemporaneous conflict in Gaza, unless the festival rejected funding from parties involved in the conflict, specifically a £1,400 sponsorship from the Israeli embassy, which the Tricycle Theatre offered to replace. In August 2014, following discussions with the festival organizers, the Tricycle withdrew its condition.

Later that same summer, CAA led a demonstration outside the Royal Courts of Justice, attracting an estimated 5,000 people in the largest protest against antisemitism in a generation following a spike in antisemitic incidents. Attendees heard from Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, representatives from the Board of Deputies and others.

In August 2018, CAA organised a demonstration outside Labour Party's headquarters to protest against the handling of antisemitism in the Labour Party, and to condemn the-then party leader, Jeremy Corbyn. That same month, the organisation launched a Change.org petition titled "Jeremy Corbyn is an antisemite and must go"; it featured a Labour slogan modified to read "For the many not the Jew", which was signed by over 30,000 by 30 August 2018. A counter-petition against 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 for England and Wales, which said in response that it was "assessing concerns raised about the Campaign Against Antisemitism's campaigning activities". In October 2018, the Charity Commission said that charities must be independent of party politics and insisted that CAA reword its petition.

In November 2018, CAA asked the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) to investigate the Labour Party. In May 2019, following complaints submitted by CAA, the EHRC launched a formal investigation into whether Labour had "unlawfully discriminated against, harassed or victimised people because they are Jewish". Following the referral to the EHRC by CAA, the Jewish Labour Movement and Labour Against Antisemitism Ltd also made submissions in support of the referral. The investigation ultimately found that the Labour Party had committed unlawful acts of discrimination against Jews under Jeremy Corbyn. Keir Starmer, leader of the Labour Party, responded to the findings when they were published in October 2020, saying at a press conference that it was a “day of shame” for the Labour Party.

In December 2019, CAA held a demonstration outside Parliament under its subsidiary brand Together Against Antisemitism. 3,200 attendees heard from speakers such as Tom Holland and Robert Rinder.

On 26 November 2023, following several pro-Palestinian marches in London during the Israel–Hamas war, the CAA organised the March Against Antisemitism, starting at the Royal Courts of Justice. Estimates from police indicate that between 50,000 and 100,000 people attended the march; it was claimed by the organisation to be "the largest gathering of its kind since the Battle of Cable Street". One month prior, CAA held a smaller demonstration outside the Scotland Yard Headquarters, to protest against what they deemed police inaction in the face of an uptick in antisemitic hate crimes.

Polling

CAA regularly conducts polling on both the Jewish community and wider British population. They produce an annual Antisemitism Barometer surveying both, which has regularly produced notable findings including, for instance, that 84% of British Jews considered Jeremy Corbyn to be a threat to the Jewish community in 2019. The 2019 survey is believed to be the first survey ever to suggest that antisemitism on the far-left had overtaken that on the far-right.

Contributions to terrorist proscriptions

CAA were among those calling for organisations to be proscribed under the Terrorism Act 2000, including the neo-Nazi National Action and Islamist groups such as Hizb ut-Tahrir, which are both now proscribed.

Litigation

CAA has used the process of judicial review in English law to scrutinise and reverse decisions made by the government and authorities. For example, in March 2017, CAA forced the Crown Prosecution Service (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". Whereas the CPS was sceptical that a crime had been committed, once the case reached a jury the defendant was found guilty and given a one-year custodial sentence.

In 2021, Tahra Ahmed, a prominent Grenfell Tower volunteer aid worker, was exposed by The Times as having claimed that the victims of the Grenfell Tower fire were “burnt alive in a Jewish sacrifice” and that the inferno profited Goldman Sachs. Further investigations by CAA revealed that she was propagating a multitude of antisemitic conspiracy theories to her thousands of Facebook followers, and reported her to the police. In January 2022 she was found guilty on two counts of publishing written material in order to stir up racial hatred, and was sentenced to eleven months in prison.

In early 2018, CAA brought a successful 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". Chabloz was subsequently imprisoned for breaking the conditions of her suspended sentence.

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.

In 2019, the CAA was sued by Tony Greenstein for libel in relation to CAA having published articles about him calling him a "notorious antisemite". 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. Greenstein's libel claim was dismissed.

In 2022, the Charity Commission confirmed that it had opened an investigation into the National Union of Students’ (NUS) charitable arm, following a letter calling on the regulator to do so from Robert Halfon, then the Chair of the Education Select Committee, and CAA. CAA also contributed to a separate investigation into NUS that found that the union had tolerated a “hostile environment" for Jewish students.

Opposition to events

A February 2017 letter to The Guardian, which was signed by 250 academics, stated that 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 CAA "will help you to take it up with the university, students' union or even the police." The signatories said: "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."

In August 2019, CAA 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.

Criticism

In January 2015, the All-Party Parliamentary Group against Antisemitism wrote: "We were somewhat disappointed to note that not all of the messages from that group have been in line with CST's stated approach of seeking to avoid undue panic and alarm." They added "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." That same month, the Institute for Jewish Policy Research said that a CAA survey about antisemitism was "littered with flaws", and "may even be rather irresponsible". However, in years since, the surveys have not received public criticism.

After criticism by CAA of Shami Chakrabarti over her 2016 report into antisemitism in the UK Labour Party, a number of British Jews wrote to The Guardian dissociating themselves from the Chief Rabbi, the Board of Deputies, and what they described as "the pro-Israel lobbyists of the Campaign Against Antisemitism".

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. By contrast, several Labour MPs had resigned from the party during the Corbyn years during the Labour antisemitism crisis that had engulfed the party. 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 that the CAA had failed to be independent of party politics, which is a legal requirement for charities, and that the commission was assessing. CAA had previously described a 2009 speech by Ali, who described Tony Blair, George W. Bush, and Ehud Olmert, as "warmongers", as antisemitic and an "offensive rant".

In 2023, following the CAA-led March Against Antisemitism, the British Jewish organisation Na'amod released a statement about their decision not to attend the CAA-led demonstration, stating: "we know this march is not just about antisemitism. It’s clear from the event description that CAA has organised this march in response to huge weekly ceasefire demonstrations in London." Na'amod publicly denied CAA's characterisations of the prior ceasefire marches as antisemitic, saying "This could not be further from the truth. Pitting Jewish safety against Palestinian freedom doesn’t make Jews safer; it makes fighting antisemitism harder." The event was supported by mainstream Jewish organisations and figures, including the Chief Rabbi and the Jewish Leadership Council. It was later reported that some members of Naamod regretted boycotting the march.

References

1. Cardaun, Sarah K (19 June 2015). Countering Contemporary Antisemitism in Britain: Government and Civil Society Responses between Universalism and Particularism. Brill Publishers. p. 152. ISBN 9789004300880.
2. Winer, Stuart (1 May 2016). "Hate crimes against Jews up sharply in Britain, audit finds". The Times of Israel. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
3. "Researching antisemitism". Institute for Jewish Policy Research. 14 January 2015.
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5. Cardaun, Sarah K. (31 August 2015). Countering Contemporary Antisemitism in Britain. Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-30089-7.
6. Dysch, Marcus (4 September 2014). "How a small band of activists took the lead". The Jewish Chronicle . Retrieved 10 September 2018.
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17. Ferrer, Richard (31 August 2014). "Thousands rally to demand zero tolerance for anti-Semitism". Jewish News. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
18. Hundreds protest anti-Semitism outside Labour HQ, Jewish News, 8 August 2018
19. "Thousands sign petition seeking Corbyn's ouster over Labour anti-Semitism". Times of Israel. 26 August 2018. Retrieved 31 August 2018.
20. 30,000 sign petition calling for Jeremy Corbyn to quit over antisemitism, The Times, Dulcie Lee, 30 August 2018
21. Preston, Rob (30 August 2018). "Regulator assessing concerns over Campaign Against Antisemitism petition". Civil Society Media. London. Retrieved 4 August 2018.
22. Sugarman, Daniel (30 October 2018). "You can call Corbyn an antisemite but you can't call for him to resign, Charity Commission tells CAA". The Jewish Chronicle. Retrieved 18 April 2019.
23. "Anti-Semitism: Labour faces possible human rights probe". BBC News. 7 March 2019. Retrieved 7 March 2019.
24. "Equality watchdog launches Labour anti-Semitism probe". BBC News. 28 May 2019.
25. "Investigation into the Labour Party | EHRC". www.equalityhumanrights.com. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
26. "Keir Starmer: EHRC's stark antisemitism report a 'day of shame' for the Labour party – video". The Guardian. 29 October 2020. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
27. Antisemitism, Campaign Against (8 December 2019). "3,200 turn out in solidarity at star-studded #TogetherAgainstAntisemitism national rally". Campaign Against Antisemitism. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
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29. Thomas, Natalie; Schomberg, William (26 November 2023). Heavens, Louise (ed.). "March against antisemitism draws 50,000 in London". Reuters. Archived from the original on 27 November 2023. Retrieved 28 November 2023.
30. Pinkstone, Joe; Lampert, Nicole (26 November 2023). Smallman, Etan; Nicholls, Dominic (eds.). "Police estimate 100,000 people at March Against Antisemitism". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 26 November 2023. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
31. Reporters, Telegraph (25 October 2023). "Hundreds rally outside Scotland Yard as police accused of being 'invisible' at hate crime protest". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
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33. "Antisemitism Barometer". Campaign Against Antisemitism. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
34. "Home Office to ban Hizb ut-Tahrir as terror group". BBC News. 15 January 2024. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
35. "National Action becomes first extreme right-wing group to be banned in UK". GOV.UK. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
36. "Anti-Semites are becoming bolder in Britain, and that should worry us all". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 1 July 2017.
37. "CPS are going to re-examine the case of a prolific anti-Semite who claims the West are "slaves" to the "Zionist agenda"". The Independent. 7 March 2017. Retrieved 1 July 2017.
38. Ross, Alice (7 March 2017). "CPS weighs prosecution of far-right activist on eve of legal challenge". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 1 July 2017.
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42. "YouTuber Alison Chabloz guilty over anti-Semitic songs". BBC News. Retrieved 25 May 2018.
43. "Woman who posted Holocaust denial songs to YouTube convicted". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 May 2018.
44. Blogger claims "no proof" gas chambers killed Jewish people, BBC News, 7 March 2018
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49. Welch, Ben (2 July 2018). "Gilad Atzmon is forced to apologise to CAA's Gideon Falter over libel". The Jewish Chronicle. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
50. Frazer, Jenni (2 July 2020). "Gilad Atzmon says sorry for libelling Campaign Against Antisemitism's chairman". Jewish News.
51. Sugarman, Daniel (28 November 2018). "Gilad Atzmon forced to ask supporters for funds after Campaign Against Antisemitism libel lawsuit". Jewish Chronicle.
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63. "Shami Chakrabarti's honour under scrutiny". The Guardian. 8 August 2016. Retrieved 13 August 2022.
64. Margaret Hodge's Diary: Reselection triumphs, a shocking letter, and why women get more anti-Semitic abuse, New Statesman, 6 November 2019
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66. Sabbagh, Dan (22 February 2019). "Labour MP Ian Austin quits the party over 'culture of antisemitism'". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
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69. Webber, Esther (11 August 2018). "Greens drawn into antisemitism row". The Times. Retrieved 22 August 2018.
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72. ^ "Tens of thousands attend march against antisemitism in London". The Independent. 26 November 2023. Retrieved 4 December 2023.
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74. "March Against Antisemitism". The Jewish Leadership Council. Retrieved 27 June 2024.
75. Harpin, Lee (4 April 2024). "Na'amod founder says its main focus is to 'de-centre Israel from Judaism'". Jewish News. Retrieved 27 June 2024.

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. 14 January 2015.
• "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 15 November 2017. Retrieved 14 November 2017.
• "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

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