Chief European Rabbi Calls for Limiting Radicals’ Access to Social Networks

GENEVA (Sputnik) - Pinchas Goldschmidt, the president of the Conference of European Rabbis, advocated on Thursday for stepping up the fight against radicalism on the Internet, in particular, by limiting the radicals’ access to social networks.

"One of the main threats facing the European Jewry at the moment is social networks that provide radicals with the opportunity to influence people,” Goldschmidt said.

He noted that freedom of speech was the core of a free and democratic world. However, if the biggest social networks, such as Facebook, are unable to control their content, then governments of European countries and the EU will have to step in.

“This can be done either by means of adopting certain laws or through imposing fines. You know, if Facebook gets a fine of $20 million, the company will, I guess, act in a different way,” the chief European rabbi concluded.

During the three-day conference in Geneva, the heads of the conference discussed the problem of growing antisemitism in Europe and paid particular attention to the Halle shooting on October 9 in which two people were killed.

In recent years, some European countries, in particular, Germany and France, have experienced a surge in the amount of hate speech levelled at Jews.