When Dr. Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress, and a stalwart advocate of tolerance and reconciliation, addressed the European Mayors Summit in Paris on 20 November, he did not deliver another lament about rising Antisemitism, racism and xenophobia. He presented a diagnosis and a strategy.
Europe, he argued, no longer faces episodic surges of hate but a structural, technologically accelerated threat that strikes at the continent’s democratic foundations. His message was stark, yet constructive: Europe needs an integrated plan, anchored locally, technologically sophisticated, and focused above all on the next generation.
At a moment when Antisemitism has not only returned but reached levels embedded in political discourse and social behaviour, Kantor’s intervention felt both urgent and unusually concrete. His central proposal, the creation of an International Forum on Youth Reconciliation (IFYR), deserves particular attention. It represents a shift from reactive crisis management to proactive, holistic and long-term prevention.
Antisemitism’s new architecture
Kantor framed his speech around a truth often avoided for fear of political discomfort: the primary driver of contemporary Antisemitism, in Europe and globally, is anti-Zionism, which is simply an attack on the right of Jewish self-determination.
The demonisation of Israel has become a socially acceptable gateway, he warned, for wider attacks on Jewish identity. For mayors gathered from across Europe, many struggling to respond to mass protests denying Israel’s right to exist, this was not theory but lived reality.
He stressed that the old sources of Antisemitism have not disappeared, but new ones have overtaken them. Social media, he noted, has transformed hatred into a viral commodity. Its architecture rewards outrage, conspiracy and dehumanisation. The result is not simply exposure to harmful ideas; it is the creation of digital ecosystems where Antisemitism becomes a form of belonging.
Kantor’s second observation, the rise of “technological Antisemitism”, pushed the discussion deeper. Gaming chat rooms, deepfakes, artificial intelligence and algorithmic manipulation are now vectors of radicalisation.
In these “ironic” digital subcultures, hatred is normalised. This form of online Antisemitism feeds directly into offline violence, as Europe saw after the Hamas massacres of 7th October.
His blunt conclusion was one that policymakers too often skirt around: hatred spreads faster than our current systems can contain. If Europe is serious about reversing the tide, it must build new tools that match the speed and scale of the digital age.
Empowering cities: The new front line
One of the most important shifts in Kantor’s argument was institutional. For decades, combating Antisemitism was considered a national responsibility, an issue for government ministries, parliaments and national agencies. However, today, he said, “the real battle… is being waged not only at the national level, but also on the streets, within municipalities.”
This was not rhetorical praise for the mayors in attendance. It was an acknowledgment of a structural change. Antisemitism increasingly manifests in local spaces, in schools, transport networks, neighbourhoods, universities and public squares. Local authorities see emerging tensions faster than national governments and increasingly bear responsibility for community protection.
Kantor’s praise for the European Jewish Congress’s Security and Crisis Centre (SACC) was not merely institutional pride. It was evidence that local-level training, local-level cooperation, and local-level early warning systems work.
For more than 15 years, the SACC model has helped municipalities identify extremists, prevent incitement and build trusted ties between Jewish communities and local police. Scaling this model would not only increase safety but also reinforce the authority of local governments at a moment when many citizens feel detached from national institutions.
IFYR: A new framework for Europe’s youth
Where Kantor’s speech broke new ground was in his focus on young people. Citing research showing that the average age of aggressive extremists is about 14, he argued that any serious strategy must target youth radicalisation directly, and early.
The platforms teenagers use are not newspapers or television but TikTok, Instagram and gaming servers, each with its own attention-driven dynamics. The Wall Street Journal experiment he cited, in which journalists posing as 13-year-olds were inundated with apocalyptic propaganda and even advice to acquire weapons, illustrates how rapidly online spaces can shape identities.
His solution is bold: create a global umbrella organisation, the International Forum on Youth Reconciliation (IFYR), to coordinate and elevate existing deradicalisation institutions while bringing new technological capability to the fight.
The IFYR would be more than a think tank. It would mobilise scientific, financial and political resources to intervene at scale on the very platforms where radicalisation takes root.
Central to this vision is a simple but powerful counter-narrative: HEJ – Housing, Education, Jobs. Kantor’s argument is that extremist ideologies thrive where hope decays.
Offer young people the building blocks of a stable future, and the allure of toxic narratives diminishes. The success of countries like the UAE and Singapore, which combine economic inclusion with firm legal frameworks, demonstrates that extremism is not an unavoidable phenomenon but the result of neglect.
Th IFYR’s mission, as Kantor outlined it, is to combine this social strategy with technological intervention, deploying AI-driven tools to detect radicalisation patterns, amplifying positive content, and supporting local authorities in reaching at-risk youth. It would operate simultaneously as a coordinator, a research hub and an implementer.
A European responsibility
Kantor’s speech comes at a difficult moment for Europe. Massive protests, intimidation of Jewish communities, and the re-legitimisation of violent rhetoric have exposed vulnerabilities in Europe’s democratic immune system. His reminder that “anti-Zionism is Antisemitism” was not a theoretical claim but a warning that attempts to mask hatred in political language do not make societies safer.
Europe has the tools and institutions to confront this challenge. What it has lacked is coherence, a unifying framework that connects local action, technological innovation and youth engagement. Kantor’s proposals offer exactly that.
His invocation of Napoleon, that the treatment of Jews is a “barometer of the health of society”, was not nostalgic. It was diagnostic. Europe’s barometer is flashing red. The question now is whether its political leaders, especially its mayors, will build the structures needed to reverse the trend.
Kantor’s speech was a call not for symbolic declarations but for a new architecture: institutions, networks, strategies and partnerships equal to the threat.
If Europe adopts the vision he laid out, it will not only protect its Jewish citizens. It will strengthen its democracies, rebuild trust across communities, and equip its youngest generation with the resilience needed to resist the siren call of extremism and hate.
In the end, his message was simple: hatred is organized; therefore, reconciliation and tolerance must be organized too. Europe now has a pathway and a road map, the question is whether it has the will.
