A German official said in an interview Saturday that Jews should avoid wearing traditional religious caps known as kippahs “everywhere, all the time” in public in the country due to the rising antisemitism.
Yahoo News reported that Felix Klein, the country’s commissioner on anti-Semitism, made the comments in an interview published Saturday by the Funke regional press association.
{mosads}”I cannot advise Jews to wear the Kippah everywhere all the time in Germany,” Klein said, pointing to a “lifting of inhibitions and the uncouthness which is on the rise in society” as contributing factors to a rise in anti-Semitic offenses in the country.
Crime data reported earlier this year by the BBC indicated that anti-Semitic incidents reported to police had risen by 10 percent across Germany in 2018, including a 60 percent rise in physical attacks.
“The internet and social media have largely contributed to this…but so have constant attacks against our culture of remembrance,” Klein said in the interview.
The head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany said earlier this year that Germany’s government needed to do more to protect Jews in the country, calling federal action “urgently needed.”
“What had already solidified as a subjective impression among Jews is now confirmed in the statistics,” said Josef Shcuster, according to the BBC. “Considering that acts below the threshold for criminal liability are not covered, the picture becomes even darker.”