A group of French students has launched a petition to declare October 7 ‘World Day Against Antisemitism,’ after the Hamas massacre of over 1,400 people in southern Israel that day led to a worldwide outbreak of antisemitism.
Marek Halter, one of France's leading Jewish intellectuals, promoted the campaign over New Year's weekend, Valeurs Actuelles reported.
“I was contacted by a few young people, mostly from immigrant backgrounds. Upset by the events of Oct. 7 on the Gaza border, they wished to launch an appeal for this date to become a world day against antisemitism,” Halter wrote, adding that he was "embarrassed" not to have thought of the idea himself.
Several Muslim students were involved in the petition, including the one who originally thought of the idea, Hichem Mouttaki, a 23-year-old student who warned that young people are uninformed of Hamas' nature as a brutal terrorist organization.
The petition states “The hatred of the other, the hatred of the Jew, is again at work,” and calls on “all international organizations to declare Oct. 7 ‘World Day Against Antisemitism.'”
“In the absence of a collective dream capable of mobilizing our hopes, the rejection of the Jew again becomes, as before World War II, the only answer to the political and social frustrations that confront our societies,” the petitioners wrote.
Antisemitic incidents have surged in France and around the world in the aftermath of the October 7 massacre, the worst massacre of the Jewish people since the Nazi Holocaust. In the first three weeks of the war between Israel and Hamas, France saw more antisemitic incidents than in the entire previous year.
In London, antisemitic incidents rose 1,350% following October 7, according to the Metropolitan Police, while in the US, antisemitic incidents have risen by 337% since October 7, according to data from the Anti-Defamation League.