A/74/358 caricature of a hook-nosed Jew, was recently beaten, beheaded, burned and drowned as part of a revived Easter holiday ritual. 24 20. Experts and monitors have reported that the proliferation and gains in political prominence made by neo-Nazi, right-wing political parties are the source of a preponderance of antisemitic incidents in that part of the world. 25 Political parties, including Jobbik in Hungary, they report, offer hate-filled antisemitic discourses varnished over with appeals to “nationalism”. 26 Such appeals offer their audiences classic narratives and tropes that characterize Jews as “powerful conspirators” in order to scapegoat them, immigrants, Muslims or Roma – depending on the context – for the economic insecurities being experienced in those countries. 21. Jews in Poland are subject to narratives meant to humiliate and demean them, along with institutional measures reportedly meant to disavow aspects of the country’s Holocaust history and to limit expression. In 2018, for example, an amendment to the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance was signed into law by the President of Poland, Andrzej Duda. It criminalized false public statements that ascribe collective responsibility to the Polish nation in Holocaust-related crimes, crimes against peace, crimes against humanity or war crimes, or that “grossly reduce the responsibility of the actual perpetrators”. The legislation was amended four months later, and a joint Israel-Poland statement condemning both antisemitism and anti-Polish sentiment was issued. 27 Ukraine also adopted a legal prohibition on criticism of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, a group that collaborated with the Nazis and took part in ethnic cleansing, including in the Lviv pogroms and the Volyn massacre. 28 22. Media reports suggest that links between American and European neo -Nazis are strong and growing stronger (A/HRC/38/53, para. 10). Sources in some countries have also raised concerns about the increasing prevalence of antisemitic rhetoric that appears to be pervading evermore febrile political climates. In this regard, monitors, academics and researchers spoke about the challenges presented by what appears to be a resurgence of classic antisemitism in online communication and offline political activity being advanced by right-wing supremacist groups. They also expressed alarm about what appears to be an increasing use of antisemitic tropes by prominent political figures, along with the politicization of those incidents, which only serves to inflame tensions. In the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Equality and Human Rights Commission launched in 2019 an investigation into allegations of antisemitism within the Labour Party. 29 23. The Special Rapporteur also received reports that Jewish university students in the United States, Canada and Western Europe have been experiencing increased expressions of antipathy and hostility, in particular directed towards members of Jewish student organizations and participants in related activities, that seriously affect their right to the freedoms of association and peaceful assembly and their right to manifest their religious beliefs. In some instances, Jewish students reported being __________________ 24 25 26 27 28 29 8/23 May Bulman, “Jewish effigy hanged and burned in ‘disturbing’ Easter ritual in Poland”, Independent, 22 April 2019; and Ben Cohen, “Polish Catholic Church leader condemns shocking Easter ritual involving antisemitic ‘Judas’ effigy”, Algemeiner, 22 April 2019. While antisemitism is central to the ideology, neo-Nazism also embraces Islamophobia, xenophobia, racism, homophobia and discrimination against people with disabilities. See e.g. www.humanrightsfirst.org/sites/default/files/Jobbik-Party-Fact-Sheet-final.pdf. Brigit Katz, “Poland’s President signs highly controversial Holocaust bill into law”, Smithsonian, 29 January 2018. See www.osce.org/odihr/395318. See www.equalityhumanrights.com/en/inquiries-and-investigations/investigation-labour-party. 19-16257