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Watchdog calls on Prince Charles to repudiate anti-Semitic letter

 Campaign Against Anti-Semitism (CAA): “In order to reassure the worldwide Jewish community that the British heir to the throne has changed his views, these historic remarks must urgently be repudiated by Prince Charles.” 

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

A British anti-Semitism watchdog has called on Prince Charles to rescind a letter in which he made deeply troubling comments about Jewish refugees being a source of Mideastern turmoil and remarks about the power of the “Jewish lobby” in the US.

The Campaign Against Anti-Semitism (CAA) stated on Sunday, after the letter was exposed by the UK’s Daily Mail, that they view the letter’s contents as  “disturbing.”

The CAA wrote that “it appears that our future king believed in 1986 that the ‘influx’ of Holocaust survivors to Israel were not ‘Semitic,’ ‘[the] cause [of] great problems’ including terrorism, and should be ‘eliminated,’ presumably through their removal.”

“The letter also appears to endorse the view that Israel is not simply the result of Jewish self-determination in the historic Jewish homeland, but the result of bullying by an all-powerful ‘Jewish lobby’ which holds US presidents in its clutches. We view these comments as unmistakably anti-Semitic,” the CAA wrote.

The CAA noted that since the letter was written three decades ago, the Prince of Wales appears to have “warmed to the Jewish community,” and pointed to his friendship with the former Chief Rabbi, Lord Jonathan Sacks, as well as his attendance at the inauguration of the present Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis.

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“In order to reassure the worldwide Jewish community, including Jews living in Israel, that the heir to the throne has changed his views, these historic remarks must urgently be repudiated by Prince Charles,” the CAA stated.

The exposure of Prince Charles’ contentious letter comes as the UK’s Jewish community is experiencing a surge in anti-Semitic attacks.

A report published by the Community Security Trust (CST) on anti-Semitic occurrences in the UK in 2016 shows an alarming record number of hate incidents.

In the report, published in February, CST recorded 1,309 anti-Semitic incidents nationwide during 2016, a 36-percent increase from the 960 recorded in 2015.

One-third of British Jews has become fearful of mounting anti-Semitic crime and the failure to remove anti-Semites from politics. Many have been considering leaving Britain altogether within the past two years, according to data published by the CAA in August.

A survey of 2,025 British Jews shows that only 59 percent feel welcome in the UK; 17 percent feel unwelcome. Over the past two years, 37 percent of British Jews have concealed any Jewish symbols in public.