US 'epidemic of hate' needs to be tackled, says Doug Emhoff

The husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris pledges to fight anti-Semitism

US Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff. AP

The husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris, Doug Emhoff, on Thursday called for the international community to help battle an "epidemic of hate" — anti-Semitism.

“We all know that anti-Semitism has been around for thousands of years," Mr Emhoff said. "In fact, it's one of the oldest forms of hatred.

"But in recent years, there has been a dramatic spike in anti-Semitism in the United States, in Europe and all around the world."

Mr Emhoff, who is the first Jewish spouse of a sitting US vice president, was at the UN on Thursday to speak at an event on Globalising Efforts to Combat anti-Semitism.

He has been taking the lead in efforts by the White House to combat anti-Semitism.

Mr Emhoff urged the building of coalitions to tackle this “epidemic of hate”, adding “we must bring together people from all backgrounds, all faiths, all ethnicities because hate is interconnected".

Above all, he said, education must be at the core of all efforts to combat anti-Semitism.

According to the Anti-Defamation League, anti-Semitic attacks reached an all-time high in the US in 2021.

There were 2,717 incidents in 2021, representing an increase of 34 per cent over 2020 and the highest on record since the watchdog started tracking such cases in 1979.

Also speaking at the event, Canada’s UN ambassador Bob Rae said history is repeating itself, with “increased targeted attacks on Jewish communities, and the same hate speech and the same terrible conspiracy theories from the past, being used once again".

Mr Rae warned that social media and internet technologies that were “heralded as instruments of enlightenment” had become “terrible amplifiers of hatred”.

Mr Emhoff took his message abroad last month. He visited Poland, and Germany to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day and to hold meetings aimed at battling rising anti-Semitism in the US and around the world.

He has also spoken publicly about his great-grandparents fleeing persecution in what is now Poland.

US President Joe Biden in December formed a new inter-agency group to develop a national strategy to combat anti-Semitism, and set aside $250 million to protect places of worship such as synagogues, which have been the target of anti-Semitic attacks.