Joel Finkelstein, Chief Science Officer and Co-founder at Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI), an organization that identifies cyber threats and trains university students, many of whom go on to work for the FBI and CIA, and Adam Sohn, Chief Executive Officer at NCRI discussed ways of battling antisemitism in a two-man panel at the Arutz Sheva - INN Jerusalem Conference in New York on Sunday.
Joel pointed out that antisemitism permeated Biblical Egypt, where the Egyptians were afraid that, "Hebrew immigrants would replace the native population." "Our research shows a grotesque mischaracterization of this story," he pointed out.
He then went on to discuss modern-day antisemitism on both the conservative and liberal ends of the political spectrum, and how Jews, themselves, play a central role in strengthening the feelings of enmity toward themselves.
"On the far right, you have people saying that elite networks of Jews are taking in immigrants to replace ethnic nations. They're trying to replace white people in the West with people of color. On the left, they're saying that Jews are colonial oppressors who are replacing dark-skinned people in their homeland."
"Those are one and the same and it turns out that both are strongly indicative of where and when acts of antisemitism are going to take place in the real world," he continued. "You can use the heat on social media to predict where these acts are going to happen."
"People believe that white supremacy is the real problem. Our data suggests that when people talk about Apartheid, you can predict attacks against Jews. [These individuals] are turning global wars in Israel into global wars on Jews and when it comes to Jewish unity, Jews are using those myths against one another. That's has got to stop," he urged.
Sohn, meantime, called on lawmakers from both sides of the political isle to take a stand against Jew hatred. "We're releasing major research in two to three weeks that points out how lawmakers pick on their favorite brand of antisemitism depending on which side they agree with," he said. "The antisemitism [on both sides of the political spectrum] is reaching a point where it has a common denominator and that's when it becomes dangerous to the Jewish community."