KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Jews are the most likely religious group to be targets of hate and the KCMO City Council took action Thursday to help stem those incidents.
The council unanimously approved the resolution sponsored by Mayor Quinton Lucas and Councilmember Andrea Bough to "adopt a working definition of antisemitism as an important educational tool to address it."
Among the items in the resolution to help identify antisemitism are "hate expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action and employs sinister stereotypes to to encourage hatred against the Jews," according to the resolution.
Among the powerful and tragic ways that breed antisemitism is the denial of the Jewish Holocaust in World War II in which six million Jews were murdered by Nazis.
In a crime this week in the Kansas City area, vandals wrote antisemitic graffiti on the press box at Blue Valley High School in Johnson County.
The council approved the following definition that follows the non-legally binding definition from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of Antisemitism:
- Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews
- Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities
- Antisemitic acts are criminal when they are so defined by law
- Criminal acts are antisemitic hen the targets of attacks, whether they are people or property - such as buildings, schools, places of worship and cemeteries - are selected because they are, or are perceived to be, Jewish or linked to Jews
- Antisemitic discrimination is the denial of opportunities or services available to others on the basis of a person’s link to or identification as a Jew
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