Dutch Jews on Thursday said they had documented 421 antisemitic incidents last year, a record tally that surpassed by 11% the previous all-time high, reported in 2023.
The data reflect “an antisemitism crisis, which requires crisis management measures,” wrote the Center for Information and Documentation on Israel, or CIDI, the Jewish community watchdog that published the report.
The Dutch government’s National Coordinator for Combating Antisemitism, Eddo Verdoner, called the reality reflected in the data “shameful,” but added that antisemitism is becoming more openly tolerated because perpetrators are no longer ashamed.
“I hear heartbreaking stories from children, students and adults who are harassed and mocked because of their Jewish identity. They hide a Star of David necklace, don’t dare to wear a kippah, or conceal their Jewish background out of fear,” Verdoner wrote in reaction to the CIDI report.
Several violent incidents included in the annual report happened on Nov. 7-8, 2024.
On those dates, hundreds of Muslim men participated in a series of attacks on Israelis who were in Amsterdam for a soccer match between Maccabi Tel Aviv and a local team. In coordinating the attacks on instant messaging platforms and online, several perpetrators referred to the action as a “Jew hunt” and used antisemitic rhetoric.
Europe’s largest coordinated pogrom against Jews since the Holocaust, the incident shocked Dutch Jews and others.
The assaults underlined for many both the level of hostility toward Jews within Muslim immigrant populations, and perpetrators’ ability to use technology to coordinate attacks in real time while bypassing authorities.
“The most dramatic increases were seen in public spaces, where antisemitic incidents surged by 45%,” CIDI said in a statement about its report, published on Israel’s national Holocaust commemoration day. “Visibly Jewish individuals were increasingly subjected to verbal abuse, threats and harassment,” according to the report.
Vandalism targeting Jewish property rose by 44%, including the tearing down of mezuzahs from doorposts and the desecration of Jewish cemeteries and memorials. Meanwhile, some Jewish students are reportedly avoiding university lectures out of fear of hostility.
From 2012 to 2022, the annual average tally of antisemitic incidents documented by CIDI was 138. In the last two years, reports have spiked by 305%.
CIDI urged the Dutch government to adopt a more forceful and consistent approach to combating antisemitism.
“We must not normalize this surge,” a spokesperson for the organization said in a statement about the report, warning against relying solely on Holocaust education.
Instead, what is needed is a comprehensive strategy, according to CIDI, that includes greater enforcement in schools and online platforms; cutting funding to institutions that discriminate against Jewish artists; banning extremist groups that incite hate; a zero-tolerance approach to antisemitic speech and violence and mandatory transparency about online offenders.
Preliminary data from the first quarter of 2025 “suggests that the trend is continuing,” according to CIDI.
The Netherlands, where the Nazis and their collaborators murdered at least 75% of the Jewish population of about 140,000 people during the Holocaust, is now home to about 40,000 Jews.
