New York, NY, May 11, 2015 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is sending a delegation of lay leaders and staff experts to the 5th Global Forum for Combating Anti-Semitism, which will convene May 12-14 in Jerusalem.
National Director Abraham H. Foxman, who is leading the ADL delegation, will be honored on Wednesday night at a dinner where he will be presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award for his 50-year career working to combat anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry and hatred. A Holocaust survivor, Mr. Foxman has been national director of ADL since 1987. He is retiring in July.
The conference is sponsored by the Israel Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs.
“Anti-Semitism is on the rise globally and particularly in Europe, where Jewish communities feel insecure after the latest series of attacks by extremists motivated by fundamentalist Islam,” Mr. Foxman said. “This conference presents an opportunity to gather data and to hear from some of the world’s foremost experts on anti-Semitism and to discuss what governments, civil society and Jewish communities can do to confront the problem. Awareness of the problem goes a long way to help countries respond more effectively to anti-Semitism and bigotry.
Several sessions at the conference will feature remarks from noted ADL experts, including:
- Art Reidel, a member of ADL’s National Executive Committee and Civil Rights Committee, who will participate in a plenary session panel discussion on “The Oldest Hatred in the Newest Vessels: Confronting Anti-Semitism and Hate Speech on the Internet and in Social Media.” Mr. Reidel is co-chair of ADL’s CyberHate Response Task Force and has served as Chair of the Anti-CyberHate Working Group.
- Michael A. Salberg, ADL Director of International Affairs, is co-chairing a working group with Professor Dina Porat of Tel Aviv University on “Law, Legislation and Enforcement in Combating Anti-Semitism.”
- Andrew Srulevitch, ADL Director of European Affairs, and Oren Segal, Director of ADL’s Center on Extremism, also will attend the conference.
Also representing ADL at the Jerusalem conference will be Barry Curtiss-Lusher, ADL National Chair, Marvin Nathan, ADL National Chair Designate, and Lawrence Rosenbloom, ADL International Affairs Committee Chair.
ADL’s polling in more than 100 countries around the world last year found that 26 percent of adults, amounting to at least one billion people, harbor anti-Semitic attitudes.