A 50-member Jewish group in Sweden has been forced to disband after relentless Neo-Nazi threats and attacks. The police, who claim they can’t find the culprits—perhaps they don’t want to?—have offered little help, despite four years of constant abuse. Offenses include swastika graffiti, broken windows, trespassing at the homes of members, and a picture of Adolf Hitler hung in the building where the group worshipped. 

Chairwoman Carinne Sjoberg said that everyone in the community, who are mostly Israelis connected to the university, is terrified, adding: “My mother and father are Holocaust survivors…it was like stepping into their shoes in the 1930’s.”

Think about how surreal it must be for that poor lady! The child of survivors, literally in fear for her life, that it could happen all over again. Just sickening and so unjust!

This is part of a troubling pattern of anti-Semitism in Scandinavia. In 2015, there was a shooting at the Copenhagen synagogue and Norway has the dubious distinction of being known as the most anti-Semitic country in the West. Iceland’s shameful ban on circumcision, coupled with Sweden’s indifference to hate crimes, demonstrates an on-going effort to humiliate and hurt the Jewish community—on purpose.  

Even the famous and influential are not exempt. Actor Kim Bodnia, who starred on “The Bridge” TV show, was driven out of Malmo, Sweden. If he feels unsafe, to the point of leaving a hit role, how could the average citizen not be afraid? 

The rest of the world, particularly America and Israel, needs to put serious pressure on these governments to take action now. Victims are being blamed instead of criminals, told that they should just move away. That is not the answer! Let the ones responsible go to jail, rather than telling good citizens to leave their own country. We are supposed to be a society of human rights, a fair legal system, and protection from discrimination. In Scandinavia, none of those basic freedoms exist anymore, and that is a crying shame.