[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 114 Congress] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office] ANTICIPATING AND PREVENTING DEADLY ATTACKS ON EUROPEAN JEWISH COMMUNITIES ======================================================================= HEARING before the COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION __________ APRIL 19, 2016 __________ Printed for the use of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe [CSCE 114-2-3] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] Available via http://www.csce.gov _________ U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 99-941 PDF WASHINGTON : 2016 _________________________________________________________________________________ For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Publishing Office, Internet:bookstore.gpo.gov. Phone:toll free (866)512-1800;DC area (202)512-1800 Fax:(202) 512-2104 Mail:Stop IDCC,Washington,DC 20402-001 COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS HOUSE SENATE CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi, Chairman Co-Chairman ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas RICHARD BURR, North Carolina STEVE COHEN, Tennessee JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire ALAN GRAYSON, Florida TOM UDALL, New Mexico RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania LOUISE McINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New York EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS Vacant, Department of State Vacant, Department of Commerce Vacant, Department of Defense [ii] ANTICIPATING AND PREVENTING DEADLY ATTACKS ON EUROPEAN JEWISH COMMUNITIES ---------- December 16, 2015 COMMISSIONERS Page Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 1 Hon. Roger Wicker, Co-Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 3 Hon. Steve Cohen, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 4 Hon. Alan Grayson, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 11 Hon. Randy Hultgren, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 21 MEMBER Hon. David Schweikert, Representative from the State of Arizona.. 10 WITNESSES Rabbi Andrew Baker, Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman- in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism, and Director of International Jewish Affairs, American Jewish Committee........ 5 Jonathan Biermann, Executive Director, Crisis Cell for the Belgian Jewish Community (via videoconference from Brussels, Belgium)....................................................... 8 John J. Farmer, Jr., Director, Faith-Based Communities Security Program, Rutgers University.................................... 12 Paul Goldenberg, National Director, Secure Community Network..... 17 [iii] APPENDICES Prepared statement of Hon. Christopher H. Smith.................. 38 Prepared statement of Hon. Roger Wicker.......................... 40 Prepared statement of Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin.................... 41 Prepared statement of Rabbi Andrew Baker......................... 42 Prepared statement of Jonathan Biermann.......................... 46 Prepared statement of John J. Farmer, Jr......................... 48 Prepared statement of Paul Goldenberg............................ 52 ANTICIPATING AND PREVENTING DEADLY ATTACKS ON EUROPEAN JEWISH COMMUNITIES ---------- April 19, 2016 Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe Washington, DC The hearing was held at 1 p.m. in room 210, Cannon House Office Building, Washington, DC, Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, presiding. Commissioners present: Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe; Hon. Roger Wicker, Co-Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe; Hon. Steve Cohen, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe; Hon. Alan Grayson, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe; and Hon. Randy Hultgren, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. Member present: Hon. David Schweikert, Representative from the State of Arizona. Witnesses present: Rabbi Andrew Baker, Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism, and Director of International Jewish Affairs, American Jewish Committee; Jonathan Biermann, Executive Director, Crisis Cell for the Belgian Jewish Community (via videoconference from Brussels, Belgium); John J. Farmer, Jr., Director, Faith-Based Communities Security Program, Rutgers University; and Paul Goldenberg, National Director, Secure Community Network. HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, CHAIRMAN, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE Mr. Smith. The Commission will come to order. And good afternoon to everyone. Thank you for being here this afternoon. I'd especially like to thank our witnesses: Rabbi Andy Baker, Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism and the director of international Jewish affairs for the American Jewish Committee; Jonathan Biermann, who will join us shortly, executive director of the Crisis Cell for the Belgian Jewish community, who will testify by way of video link. And then we will also hear from Attorney General John Farmer, who currently serves as director of the Faith-Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers, and much more; and Paul Goldenberg, director of the Secure Community Network. So four outstanding experts to provide insights and counsel to the Commission. Today we will discuss how to anticipate and prevent deadly attacks on European Jewish communities. The recent terrorist attacks in Brussels were reminders that Europeans of all religions and ethnicities are at risk from ISIS. But there can be no European security without Jewish security. As we have seen so many times in so many places, violence against Jewish communities often foreshadows violence against other religious, ethnic, and national communities. ISIS especially hates the Jewish people, and has instructed its followers to prioritize killing Jewish men and women. The group's cronies targeted the Jewish Museum of Belgium in May of 2014, the Paris kosher supermarket in January of 2015, and the Great Synagogue in Copenhagen in February of 2015, and murdered people in all of those vicious attacks. Some thwarted plots have revealed plans to target even more Jewish community places and kill even more Jewish people. Other Islamist terrorist groups share its hatred and its intent. However, terrorists and terrorism only account for some of the annual increases in violent anti-Semitic attacks in Europe. And over the past few years, surveys and crime data show that anti- Semitic attitudes and violence in Europe are most rife in Muslim communities. Anti-Semitic attitudes and non-terroristic anti- Semitic violence have also risen across the religious, political and ideological spectrum. There are many different aspects of combating anti-Semitic violence. For example, European Jewish and Muslim civil society groups are collaborating with each other to counter violent extremism and hatred that impacts their respective communities. Today's hearing will zero in on the role of law enforcement agencies and especially on their relationship with Jewish community groups. These partnerships are essential, according to Jewish communities and experts on both sides of the Atlantic. That is why I authored House Resolution 354 as a blueprint for action and why the House passed it unanimously last November. Our witnesses will testify today about what European law enforcement agencies, their governments, and Jewish community groups need to do to ensure these partnerships are formalized and are effective. They will discuss the ideal roles for the OSCE, the United States, and other civil society groups in supporting these initiatives. The witnesses will also share what can be learned from the experiences of law enforcement agencies and Jewish communities to counter terrorism and strengthen public safety more broadly. Their insights will help guide the efforts of the U.S. Government, the Congress, and my fellow Helsinki commissioners, especially Commission Co- Chairman Roger Wicker and Ranking Member Senator Ben Cardin, who has been the Special Representative on Anti-Semitism, Racism and Intolerance for the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly since last March. I'd like to now yield to our distinguished chairman, Roger Wicker. HON. ROGER WICKER, CO-CHAIRMAN, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE Mr. Wicker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for calling this very important and timely hearing. The Holocaust ended nearly 71 years ago. In his important book ``1944,'' author Jay Winik once again recently reminded readers of the horror of the Holocaust, and I think made a great contribution to the historical perspective on the issue of anti-Semitism and all of its extremely, extremely horrific ramifications. It's appalling that today people are still being attacked and murdered because they're Jewish. Anti-Semitism is part of the Islamic State's brutal ideology. It's an official part of their thought. The terrorist organization's followers have already shown their willingness and ability to target and kill members of European Jewish communities. They join other jihadi groups, like al-Qaida, who kill innocent people because of their religion, ethnicity or race. But terrorists are not the only violent threats to European Jewish communities. Others also contributing to anti-Semitic violence include neo-Nazis, nationalist political forces that exploit historical anti-Semitism, ideologues who invoke the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to justify anti-Semitic action, and other disaffected individuals. I must also point out that the Russian Federation continues to fund extremists and anti-Semitic parties, like the National Front in France. At the same time, some of my Russian friends and some of our Russian colleagues in the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly come to official meetings and time and again falsely accuse some of their Baltic neighbors and our NATO allies of being part of fascist or anti-Semite regime. And so I'd only point out that not every accusation of anti-Semitism and fascism is well-founded. We must be careful in listening actually to the facts in regard to these charges. I've been honored to collaborate on these issues with my longtime colleague and friend Senator Ben Cardin, ranking member of this Commission and special representative on anti- Semitism, racism and intolerance for the OSCE's Parliamentary Assembly. We led Resolution 290, entitled ``Commemorating the 75th Anniversary of Kristallnacht, or the Night of the Broken Glass,'' which the Senate passed unanimously. The resolution reaffirms America's steadfast commitment to remembering the Holocaust and eliminating the evil of anti-Semitism. As chairman of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's Committee on Political Affairs and Security, I will do my part to help ensure that combating anti-Semitism is integrated into OSCE initiatives against terrorism, as well as against violent extremism. I will also continue to monitor Russia's outrageous exploitation of the issue of anti-Semitism. So, Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for convening this important hearing, and I look forward to hearing from our witnesses. Mr. Smith. Chairman Wicker, thank you very much. Commissioner Cohen. HON. STEVE COHEN, COMMISSIONER, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just appreciate your having the hearing. I'm always in favor of the hearings that the chairman chooses to have testimony on, and this is an important one. And to serve--to be here with Roger Wicker, one of the really good guys in the Congress. But I appreciate--I've read your bios. You all have all done a great deal in your professional lives. I thank you for committing your experience and your knowledge to this issue, and I look forward to hearing your recommendations and some reportage of things maybe I didn't know that have occurred. I know that it's--ISIS can target Jewish people, but there's the neo-Nazis and all that. And Jews have always been a prime target, maybe for the longest time ever of any group that's been a target of terrorism and hate and prejudice. And so I want to lend my voice when I can to this effort. Thank you. Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Commissioner Cohen. I'd like to introduce to the Commission people who need no introduction, who have done so much for so long on combating anti-Semitism, beginning first with Rabbi Baker, Andy Baker, who has been one of the most important figures in combating anti-Semitism and addressing Holocaust-era issues over the past few decades. He was first appointed as Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism in 2009, and every subsequent chair-in-office has reappointed him. He has been the director of international Jewish affairs for the American Jewish Committee since 2001 and with the organization since 1979. He has served in senior leadership roles in many initiatives, and has been publicly commended many times, including by heads of state in countries like Germany, for his efforts. I would note parenthetically that when the OSCE put together the all-important meetings on combating anti-Semitism, probably one of the most important ones of all was the Berlin Conference. And one of the co-authors of the Berlin Declaration, especially when we ran into some snags and some member states that were recalcitrant about what should be included, Andy Baker was the wordsmith who found the right wording that advanced that all- important declaration. And so all of us deeply appreciate his leadership there as well. We also will be hearing from Jonathan Biermann, who is the executive director of the Crisis Cell of the Belgian Jewish community and was in charge of the Cell at the time of the attack on the Jewish Museum in 2014. A lawyer by profession, he has been a member of the City Council in a municipality in Brussels since 2012 and is currently an alderman on the Council. Mr. Biermann is a former political adviser to the president of the Belgian Senate, the minister of development cooperation, and the minister of foreign affairs. He brings the perspective of a Brussels native and resident born into a family very involved in the Jewish community. We'll then hear from Attorney General John Farmer, who is currently the director of the Faith-Based Communities Security Program, part of the Institute for Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security at Rutgers University, our state university. The program spearheaded a major conference last July on ``Developing Community-Based Strategies to Prevent Targeted Violence and Mass Casualty Attacks'' in collaboration with the FBI, Department of Justice and others. He was the attorney general of New Jersey from 1999 to 2002, and one of the most effective attorney generals the state has ever had, and senior counsel to the 9/11 Commission. Attorney General Farmer was later the dean of the Rutgers Law School. So thank you, Dean, Attorney General, and all the other very important titles you have borne and done so with such dignity. Then we'll hear from Paul Goldenberg, who is the national director of the Secure Community Network, a national homeland security initiative of the American Jewish community. And he's also the CEO of Cardinal Point Strategies. A New Jersey native, for decades he was part of the law enforcement community, starting as a cop--including years of undercover work--and eventually as the first chief of the Office of Bias Crimes and Community Relations for the State of New Jersey. Paul Goldenberg has relevant experience with the OSCE as the former program manager and special advisor for the OSCE/ODIHR Law Enforcement Officer Training Program for Combating Hate Crimes. He is currently co-chair of the Department of Homeland Security's Foreign Fighter Task Force, vice chair of the DHS Faith Based Advisory Security Council, and special advisor and member of the Secretary of Homeland Security's Combating Violent Extremism Working Group. Finally, I am pleased to recognize the presence here today of Paul Miller, a member of the Board of Overseers of Rutgers University. Throughout his law career, he was involved in public safety and security initiatives, including for the Jewish community, and continues that important work now through the Miller Family International Initiative at the Rutgers School of Law. So I'd like to now yield the floor to Rabbi Baker for his opening comments. RABBI ANDREW BAKER, PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE OSCE CHAIRMAN-IN-OFFICE ON COMBATING ANTI-SEMITISM, AND DIRECTOR OF INTERNATIONAL JEWISH AFFAIRS, AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE Rabbi Baker. Congressman Smith, thank you. Senator Wicker, Congressman Cohen, it's a pleasure to be here, even if the topic itself hardly brings pleasure. I have to say at the outset your involvement and your role, and going back really now years and years, have really been critical to identifying this issue, and in particular to really elevating it to the level of concern that it demands on the part of European political leadership. In my written testimony, which I am not going to read here, I've tried to lay out somewhat over the last 15 years sort of the history of essentially what has been first a problem in recognizing that anti-Semitism had really returned in different ways to the European continent--first, the problem being faced of the return of anti-Semitism to Europe; then, really being able to acknowledge the seriousness and then the source of this problem; and ultimately, how to address it--how to deal with it, it is still very much something with which we must wrestle and, in dealing with European governments, still to convince them of the seriousness of this and of the steps that should be taken to address it. The fact is that, early on, as we saw a spike--a real surge in anti-Semitic incidents, there were those who were dismissing it as not really being anti-Semitic, or being related to the politics of the Middle East, and therefore somehow explained away for that. It took a while before people realized this had become a new normal: physical attacks, verbal harassment. Day- to-day life of many Jews in Europe had changed. No longer did they feel the normal comfort and security that had been part of their life. Further, we came to see that there were lethal attacks on Jewish targets and, even here, a reluctance at first to acknowledge what they were. We can go back to 2006 with the torture and murder of Ilan Halimi, a Jew in Paris, that initially even the government refused to consider to be anti- Semitic. We can jump to 2012, when young students and a father were murdered at the Jewish school in Toulouse. And the perpetrator, who turned out to be a radical Islamist extremist, was at first thought to be a right-wing neo-Nazi figure, which immediately generated broad popular opprobrium for this. And yet, when the true source of his character emerged, the response was more ambivalent--a difficulty in France, but also in other countries to recognize that this had become now a new source, a new threat, certainly to the Jews of Europe, but ultimately, as we came to see, to Europe more generally. We then had and still have to confront a reality that you have growing minority populations in Europe, themselves victims of prejudice and discrimination, but who happen to harbor not just negative views regarding politics in the Middle East and Israel, but more negative views when it comes to Jews. It's an environment that in many cases European governments have not figured out how to deal with, how to confront. But as I said, it has eroded the day-to-day sense of comfort and security for many European Jews. Now, we have on top of this, as we've come to see, the lethal threats from radical Islamist terrorists. We saw this in Paris at the attack on the kosher market year before last, this one just past. We saw it following that in Copenhagen. We saw it at the Jewish Museum in Brussels. And again, time after time, governments have been slow to recognize the special threat--not sole threat, but the special threat--that Jews face from this new source of violence and terror. Only as short as three years ago, when I in my OSCE role visited various European capitals, there was a certain element of denial. In The Hague, talking to Dutch officials, asking about support for protection of Jewish communities, I was told, well, we can't do this for Jews without doing this for Christians and doing this for Muslims, and in the end we don't have the resources. I know Jonathan will speak more about Brussels, but I met with Belgian officials also that same year. They said, yes, we recognize the threat level to Jewish institutions is high; in fact, it's as high as the threat level to the U.S. embassies in Brussels or the Israeli embassy. But, they said frankly, they don't have the resources to give to provide protection. In Denmark, reflecting a concern that the Jewish community, when they had asked for police to be positioned in front of the synagogue and the school when they were in use, and the government said to them, sorry, but in Denmark--as they then told to me--we have a relaxed approach to security. We're not going to position guards in front of these buildings because it would make our citizens uncomfortable. And so it ultimately took the tragedy of the death--the murder of Dan Uzan, an unarmed Jewish volunteer security guard, to finally galvanize some response. Governments have responded by stepping up the physical security. There are police in front of these buildings today. But each government is doing it differently than another. We really need to look now and say: What works? What's most efficient? What could be carried on beyond the immediate crisis moment? Because clearly the resources that are needed are not going to be there indefinitely. Mobilizing the military, as has taken place in France and in Belgium, is not something that can be sustained indefinitely. So this is something that now must be addressed. And we have today a huge influx of refugees and migrants from the Middle East. Doors have been opened. It is admirable. And Chancellor Merkel and others who've done this should be praised for their openness to accepting refugees who have truly suffered, and suffered grievously. But we know and they know that many of these people that are coming in bring with them attitudes--there was an environment in which they lived where anti-Jewish, anti- Semitic, anti-Israel sentiments were commonplace. Western values, for that matter, are often lacking. So there's an enormous challenge that these governments face if they're going to absorb these new refugees. And we know there's also a concern for what this might contribute to the problems we see of radical terrorists and an inability of European governments to really get their handle on this and figure out how to control it. I met only last week--last Thursday--in Vienna with the Austrian minister of justice, Wolfgang Brandstetter. He shared with me the reality that in Austria there are now 38 terrorists--38 returning ISIS fighters who are in Austrian prisons. Two of those imprisoned came in with refugees that surged into Austria, and those two have ties, he said, with the bombers of the recent attacks in Brussels. So this is simply an anecdotal aside that demonstrates the very real practical problem European governments face. Jews are not the only target. Clearly, European leaders need to figure out how to deal with all of this, how to mobilize the public to be part of the process. And I know that my friends John and Paul will speak more to what role the public can play and what can be learned from the American experience in this regard. And finally, Jewish community leaders, which have stepped forward, which are training their own communities to have professionals knowledgeable about how to address security, need to be working cooperatively and on an equal level with law enforcement and intelligence agencies in their respective governments so there can be truly two-way communication and involvement. As has been pointed out, the reality is that the problem exists, if only in different forms, throughout the European continent. And an environment with a lot of economic uncertainty, with problems of refugees and migration--an environment that has clearly bolstered right-wing nationalist populist parties--that also adds to the uncertainty that Jews-- although not Jews alone--that Jews in Europe face when they look and think about their future. And as we know and as we've heard, today in a way this is something new from all of the decades since the end of the war. Today, European Jews themselves truly do wonder about their future. Therefore, it's all the more incumbent on us and on the role particularly that the Helsinki Commission has always played in elevating knowledge and understanding of these concerns and issues, and pushing for very practical steps such as physical security, which you've taken up in your resolution, to push for governments truly to address them. Thank you for this opportunity to share my thoughts with you. Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Rabbi Baker. I would like to recognize--and again, thank you for your extraordinary leadership for decades. Ira Forman is among us. Thank you for gracing us with your presence, the special envoy to monitor and combat anti- Semitism. He's been in that position since 2013. He is a former political director and legislative liaison for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. And thank you, again, Ira, for being here. I'd like to now yield to Mr. Biermann, who comes across, or comes to us, from Brussels. JONATHAN BIERMANN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CRISIS CELL FOR THE BELGIAN JEWISH COMMUNITY (via videoconference from Brussels, Belgium) Mr. Biermann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify, and thanks to the American embassy for the logistic support. Born and raised in a typical Jewish family in Brussels, I've always been used to security measures. Being a child, I wasn't surprised to see the police and security at the door of the Jewish day school, just as my almost two-year-old waves every day to the soldiers serving at the very same gate. And it is somehow a relief to the members of my community to know that the threat targeting Jews is taken seriously. Since World War II, Belgium has known multiple episodes of terrorist waves perpetrated in the name of different causes, like the Communist Combatant Cells in the 1970s. Other acts have targeted more specifically the Jewish community, like in the 1980s, when the Great Synagogue of Brussels was attacked by a man with a machine gun, when a school bus was targeted in Antwerp with grenades, and when the president of the Jewish Organizations Coordination Committee, Dr. Wybran, was murdered. In parallel, anti-Semitism has increased, and it worries the Brussels Jewish community, counting a little less than 20,000 members. The reports of the Brussels-based NGO Antisemitisme.be show that the level of hatred has not been so high since 1945, with a rise of 70 percent in 2014 compared to 2013, and with a new phenomenon against Jews, which is discrimination. Violence has reached an unprecedented level of horror, as four people were killed in the terrorist attack of the Brussels Jewish Museum in May 2014. Jewish life in Europe is part of its diversity. As we also know from the Fundamental Rights Agency survey, an increasing number of Jews feel less and less comfortable attending Jewish events and institutions. As a result, despite the strong statements and actions taken by the Belgian Government, including public funding for the physical protection of Jewish buildings and institutions, many community members feel uncertain about their safety and even their future in Belgium. ISIS strategy and operational processes are unprecedented, as the broader community is generally targeted and then is the Jewish community as well. In a way, the Jewish citizens are confronted to double risk in a time when security agencies and resources are over-solicited. Since January 2015, the army has deployed to protect the public institutions at risk, including Jewish institutions, in the limits of existing capacities, which will probably not be permanent. Is it enough, especially from a Jewish community perspective? I would not be able to answer the question. As you know, that in a community of two Jews you would find at least three different opinions. But the worst situation would be if the government--the law enforcement and security agencies--had no opinion at all. And this is why the implementation of House Resolution 354 would make a significant difference. No need to reinvent the wheel, especially as this is not a time for testing, but for implementing improved methods. The knowledge and expertise exists. The Institute for Emergency Preparedness in the Homeland Security, the Faith-Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers University, John Farmer, Paul Goldenberg, and their international partners have built an impressive network with a unique capacity to share best practices in the implementation of the ``see something, say something'' strategy. Such a project would result on reaffirming and redefining the fundamentals of what we call in Belgium ``le vivre- ensemble,'' living together. Obviously, this concept was not ambitious enough and has failed. We should have been able to create a model in which everyone feels he's part not only of his faith-based or cultural community, but also of a broader community, which implies rights, duties and responsibilities. ``See something, say something'' aims to empower community leadership to take their part in establishing a common project based on respect and mutual understanding. It is not an incitement to denounce members of the community, but to go beyond your own community, building fraternity. In such a context, relations established with local authorities and police are based on trust and confidence. On a practical level, communication channels, types of intelligence collected by each actor must be clearly defined. The protocols existing in the U.S., the U.K. and France should be a reference for local police and national law enforcement agencies, empowering local communities. The situation of local communities and their relationship with the authorities should be regularly assessed. Confidence and collaboration should guide community leadership, law enforcement agencies, and political leaders in the decisionmaking process. The Belgian government has decided to invest resources into security policies. It should include developing a new intelligence strategy in which communities should play a valuable role with respect for fundamental rights, civil liberties and privacy. As a conclusion, I would underline the necessity of establishing the terms of reference that European governments should use. International organizations and agencies are a key player in that matter. I personally believe that the OSCE could develop a platform to exchange good practices, and confront the approaches and strategies in fighting an external threat with domestic impacts and supports. I would, finally, formulate the following recommendations. First, implement ``if you see something, say something'' with Jewish communities as pilots. Second, empower Jewish communities by establishing a memorandum of understanding defining the collaboration between law enforcement agencies and Jewish communities. And third, never banalize anti-Semitism. Thank you very much. Mr. Smith. Thank you so very much, Mr. Biermann, for your testimony, and for your recommendations, for your leadership. I think the MoU is an outstanding issue, and during questions I would certainly ask you how well that is proceeding. We are joined by Mr. Schweikert and Mr. Grayson, and they're free, if they'd like, to say a word. We do have votes-- four five-minute votes--three five-minute, one 15-minute. We'll probably take about a 20-minute recess, and I apologize to our distinguished witnesses for that. David? HON. DAVID SCHWEIKERT, REPRESENTATIVE FROM THE STATE OF ARIZONA Mr. Schweikert. Forgive me, but this is--just because we're all going to be running out the door on you to go vote--and how many minutes do we have right now on the votes? Mr. Smith. Thirteen, plenty of time. Mr. Schweikert. Thirteen. If I wanted to grab a publication that did sort of real- time data collection of saying here's the number of incidents in Europe over the last year, and so I wanted to actually know more than discussion or anecdotal, but the curiosity of threats both to the Jewish community but maybe other minority communities, and see if it's a common front, it's--because, for many of us, we're trying to understand is this a cultural change that--is the mix changing attitudinally or demographically? Is that overvalued, undervalued? Where do I go to actually be able to keep track of here's reality? Because that reality should be building our policy. Mr. Goldenberg. From the standpoint of the Jewish communities--that's almost unfortunate, but it's a reality--the law enforcement communities of Europe are very much like the law enforcement communities were here in the United States 25 years ago. When we first started to engage in what was called bias crimes or hate crimes, if a state did not keep good records and the police did not have good indicators as to what a hate crime was, or an attack against an institution based on race, color, et cetera, the records were not going to be well- kept. So the NGOs stepped in here in the United States and did a remarkable job, and actually built the criteria or the framework that's now become almost a part of all 50 states, including the U.S. Government, on how to identify a hate crime and how to capture the data as it relates to the hate crime. So we're in the same place in Europe as we were decades ago. There are a couple of Jewish organizations, as well as some international human rights organizations, that keep what I think are extraordinary records. Because unfortunately, in some countries, people don't go the police. They'll go to their own NGOs within their own communities. So those organizations, or examples thereof, are the CST, which is the Community Security Trust of the United Kingdom. It's a Jewish security organization that works hand in hand with the Met Police and Scotland Yard. You have what's called the SPCJ in France, which is a similar organization. And you have organizations like Jonathan's and others. So there is an infrastructure for this. Mr. Schweikert. But is there a--sort of an abstract where we could keep in our office and say, look, here's the best data we have? Mr. Goldenberg. Andy, do you want---- Rabbi Baker. Yes. Where you can go is--this is really after that conference in Berlin and the Berlin Declaration tasking governments within the OSCE to monitor and collect data on hate crimes. So that is---- Mr. Schweikert. Well, I remember the discussion about it. I just---- Rabbi Baker. No, but it's now collected by ODIHR. Mr. Schweikert. OK. Rabbi Baker. And, of course, it's based on what governments report, although they supplement it with, as Paul indicated, where you do have community monitors. And it's--now they even have a kind of interactive map on their website, so you can literally click on country by country and you can see what data they've received. So that--and we're talking about hate crimes generally. Mr. Schweikert. All right. I'm going to go now, look for it on the floor because we'll have wi-fi. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you, Chairman. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Mr. Grayson, the gentleman from Florida. HON. ALAN GRAYSON, COMMISSIONER, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE Mr. Grayson. Briefly, is it better to think of fighting anti-Semitic attacks as a police function or a military function? Rabbi? Rabbi Baker. Well, the military has been brought in only in these extreme situations where they needed protection and the police themselves didn't have the resources. That certainly is not a long-term solution, and it's an imperfect short-term solution. I would say the issue ultimately is police need to be engaged, but even there the issue of security goes beyond just police. It goes to the larger environment and how can you make for a situation where you're literally not putting up a barrier to someone about--to a terrorist or other about to storm, but really to change the atmosphere more generally and to get people aware--again, as people have said, whether it's modeled after the ``see something, say something'' program that is being proposed here or something similar, where people are engaged so you don't get to that point. The reality is, most of the synagogues/schools throughout Europe, Jewish schools, require some protection. It's clearly a role of police. But a police that needs to be really on the ground and engaged with the Jewish community, not the idea that we have to bring in the military to provide that security. Mr. Grayson. Mr. Farmer? Mr. Farmer. Yes, I would just echo Rabbi Baker's comments and point out that the structure in terms of the relationship between the police and the military differs from country to country. And so that kind of structure, that kind of approach simply can't do the job of anticipating and preventing these attacks. By the time you call the military in, it's too late; the attacks have already happened. So what our work in Europe has demonstrated to us--and I think it's applicable across the ocean, too--is that you have to engage the community at every level in order to deal with the threat as it's evolved. Mr. Grayson. Mr. Goldenberg? Mr. Goldenberg. Yes, I can only echo what my fine gentlemen have stated here. Exactly as John indicated, once the military is there, it's too late. It has to be a police function. And that's really been--the greatest, I think, concern is building capacity between the European policing agencies and the Jewish--the Jewish groups and the security apparatus within those groups that protect them. So that's an issue. Mr. Smith. And, Paul, I know you can elaborate on it momentarily, when we're done with the votes, but Paul actually headed up an effort of training the trainers--of having police who will listen to other police on best practices. And he did that throughout Europe for years, and it made a significant difference. And I thank you, Mr. Grayson. Mr. Grayson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, witnesses. [Whereupon, at 1:39 p.m., the Commission stood in recess until 2:18 p.m.] Mr. Smith. [Sounds gavel.] The hearing will resume. And again, I want to apologize profusely to our distinguished witnesses for that long delay. We did have four votes, but they took longer than they should have. I'd like to now recognize Attorney General Farmer for such time as he may consume. JOHN J. FARMER, JR., DIRECTOR, FAITH-BASED COMMUNITIES SECURITY PROGRAM, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY Mr. Farmer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to testify on the subject of ``Anticipating and Preventing Attacks on the European Jewish Communities in Europe.'' Today's hearing comes at a critical juncture in the struggle against transnational terrorism, in the history of the Jewish communities in Europe, and in the progress of civilization in securing the safety of vulnerable communities worldwide. You were kind enough to give a sense of what my background is, so I won't belabor that. But of most relevance to today's hearing, I was the chief law enforcement officer in New Jersey on 9/11, a day when our state, as you know, Mr. Chairman, lost some 700 of its citizens. I can never forget that day, or the sense of failure and disbelief I felt that such an attack could have succeeded. Understanding exactly what went wrong and how public safety can be protected during a terrorist attack or other crisis has been a focus of my work in the years since. As senior counsel to the 9/11 Commission, I had the opportunity to study the crisis as it was experienced in real time by everyone from the President to the evacuating civilians in New York's Twin Towers. I subsequently wrote a book, ``The Ground Truth,'' that compared the response of the government on 9/11 to the response to Hurricane Katrina, and found disturbing parallels between the way the government reacted to a complete surprise attack and the way it reacted to a storm that had been anticipated for years and for which detailed plans were in place. The responses to both events, I found, failed to take account of the fact that, as stated in The 9/11 Commission Report, ``the `first' first responders on 9/11, as in most catastrophes, were private- sector civilians. . . Private-sector civilians are likely to be the first responders in any future catastrophes.'' Among trained emergency personnel like police, fire and EMTs, moreover, both crises demonstrated that ``critical early decisions will have to be made by responders who are not the top officials. . . Planning for a crisis should accept that reality and empower and train people on the ground to make critical decisions.'' The truth of those observations has been borne out in subsequent attacks ranging from the London subway bombing to the murders at the Jewish Museum in Brussels to the murders at the kosher grocery store in Paris to the most recent attacks at the Paris cafes, stadium, and concert hall, and at the Brussels airport. As the threat has become more diffuse and the attacks less predictable, I believe the following conclusion has become inescapable: Anticipating and preventing attacks on European Jewish communities--or, for that matter, on any vulnerable communities--will be impossible without a dramatically greater engagement of law enforcement with the affected communities and people, and of the affected communities and people with each other. For the past nearly two years, I've had the privilege of leading, along with Rutgers Professor of Criminal Justice John Cohen, an initiative at Rutgers University designed to identify the best ways to protect vulnerable communities in light of the evolving threat. Funded generously by Rutgers alumnus Paul Miller, former general counsel of Pfizer, and his family, Rutgers began what we have called the Faith-Based Communities Security Program two years ago by taking a close look at the evolving threat, and by taking an equally close look at the security situations of several European Jewish communities. I'm going to talk about that work now. The reasons for our initial focus on the European Jewish communities are twofold. First, because the European Jewish communities are the original diaspora communities, and have survived in parts of Europe despite attempts to eliminate them for over 2,000 years, we believe that these communities have much to teach other vulnerable communities about security and resilience. These lessons are particularly important, in our view, because the demographics of our world have been transformed within our lifetimes. According to estimates that predate the recent Syrian refugee crisis, over 20 percent of the world's population now live in a nation other than where they were born. That amounts to well over a billion people trying to adapt to foreign cultures. The world of the future is therefore a diaspora world, a world of vulnerable communities. Second, we thought it would be instructive to look at European Jewish communities now because, as Jonathan Biermann, Paul Goldenberg and Rabbi Baker have outlined, they have been under renewed stress in Europe as a consequence of Islamist radicalization and, to a lesser but persistent extent, age-old European anti-Semitism. The occurrence of anti-Semitic incidents has spiked dramatically, culminating in the murders at the Jewish Museum in Brussels shortly before we began our study. The threat evolved and became more deadly even as we undertook our work. Indeed, the urgency of our work has escalated with each new attack. A team from Rutgers was on the ground in Paris during the Paris attacks in 2015 and in the aftermath of December's attack, in the aftermath of Copenhagen's attack, in the weeks preceding the Brussels attacks last month, and also in sensitive locations such as Malmo, Stockholm, Amsterdam, London, Prague, Vienna and Budapest. In those locations and others, we have met and consulted with Jewish community security leaders and representatives of law enforcement, the governments, and civil society. At the same time, we have worked with U.S. communities and law enforcement partners to develop what FBI officials have called an off-ramp from radicalization: an adaptable, multidisciplinary intervention strategy to attempt to identify precursor conduct and enable communities to protect themselves and each other. The development of such strategies is impossible without a high level of public, community and civil society engagement with law enforcement. We did a readout of preliminary findings at a conference last year in Washington co-sponsored by the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the Bipartisan Policy Center, and Rutgers, and hosted by the FBI at its headquarters. We also had the opportunity to describe our work at The Hague to an audience of European police chiefs last September. As a consequence of that meeting, we had planned to conduct a follow-up summit at Europol headquarters this summer. But, Mr. Chairman, the time for conference-level discussions, we believe, is over. The recent attacks in Paris and Brussels have made more urgent the need to take action now to protect vulnerable communities. The situation on the ground has become dire. As you have heard, the challenge to the Jewish communities has become nothing less than existential. Many stalwart leaders have become ambivalent about remaining in Europe at all. The communities have become caught in a double- helix of hate, in which terrorist attacks energize the forces of xenophobia and nationalism, which have tended historically to turn eventually on the Jewish communities. The only thing the Islamist terrorists have in common with such forces is that both hate the Jews. In short, this is a time of particular peril for the Jewish future in Europe, and it is incumbent upon us to do what we can to assure that future. Why? Well, in addition to the fact that assisting these communities is simply the right thing to do, in my view the future of our world of vulnerable communities is at stake. If the oldest diaspora community in the world cannot survive in a place where it has lived for longer than 2,000 years, in a place where it outlasted the Nazis, the future of other vulnerable communities can only be described as bleak. The wholesale slaughter of Christians and nonconforming Muslims in Syria and Iraq and elsewhere begins to look less like isolated atrocities and more like a harrowing vision of our children's future. So, after consulting with our European partners in Brussels, Copenhagen, London, The Hague and elsewhere, we have decided to take action now in the following ways that are a direct outgrowth of our work. First, with the encouragement of law enforcement and the affected communities, we will be traveling back to Brussels and Copenhagen in the coming weeks to explore concrete ways in which we might assist the Jewish and other vulnerable communities and law enforcement in working together to enhance public safety. At a meeting of the OSCE last spring in Vienna, many joined the representative of France in calling for some variation of ``if you see something, say something'' training and public engagement as an essential step in improving public safety. The need for a similar kind of civil defense approach has grown with each attack since then. We are working on refining that approach to meet the needs of individual communities, but our assistance extends beyond that program. Second, with a view to their application to all vulnerable communities, we are writing and plan to publish online this summer the Rutgers Guide to Protecting Vulnerable Communities. This work will provide a distillation of best practices that we have identified in the course of our work. These practices are adaptable to other vulnerable communities and to various law enforcement structures around the world. They will represent our assessment of the most effective ways in which governments and communities can work together to provide safety for vulnerable populations. They range from relatively obvious and easily adaptable ways--the creation of crisis management teams within communities, as we saw in Copenhagen; regular exercising in crisis management, as we saw in Great Britain; facilities audits to ensure that potential soft targets are hardened, as we saw in Amsterdam--to more challenging but essential steps, such as regular communication with law enforcement, training of individuals to identify potential threats, and outreach to other vulnerable communities and elements of civil society in order to develop effective approaches to intervention. The guide will be available to all, and we plan to offer on-the- ground assistance to those who request it, within our means of course. Third, we plan to focus our efforts on filling a need that has been highlighted in the United States and in every country we have visited, and echoed by communities, government officials and members of the private sector alike: improved information sharing of open-source and social media information. After having consulted with current and former law enforcement officials, as well as having heard the concerns of the faith community, NGOs and private-sector entities, I believe that a lasting contribution of our project to public safety may well lie in its facilitating the more efficient sharing of critical open-source information with faith-based communities, NGOs, human rights organizations and the private sector. This effort would not be meant to replace, but rather to complement government information-sharing efforts, which, while admirable, have a necessarily different and primarily law enforcement focus. Such an effort will be fundamental to promoting the enhanced level of public engagement that I believe is required in order to protect public safety. Mr. Chairman, our work in Europe and the recent attacks in Paris and Brussels has underscored the ground truth of every attack and natural catastrophe since 9/11: it is more essential now than ever that the public be engaged at every level in its own protection. As FBI Director Comey and other law enforcement leaders have recognized for over a year now, the threat to public safety is evolving. Law enforcement can no longer act alone--if it ever truly could--in combating it. A better- informed, -trained and -engaged community is a safer community. I will close with this illustration. Over the past year, I've taken the Thalys train between Paris and Brussels numerous times--probably a dozen times. I've been fortunate that no one on any of my trips emerged from the restroom in my car with an AK-47 and opened fire. When that did occur on the train last year, the passengers on board that day were fortunate that two trained American military personnel happened to be sitting near the restroom and knew how to subdue the attacker. The people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels, however, or sitting in the Paris cafes, or attending the concert or the soccer match, or waiting at the Brussels airport, weren't so lucky. We can no longer rely on dumb luck to thwart future attacks. Put simply, we need to empower vulnerable people and vulnerable communities to protect themselves and others. The Jewish communities in Europe are the best place to start. We are committed to providing the education, information and training that will enable the Jewish and other vulnerable communities of other cultures and beliefs, wherever they are threatened and whenever they ask, not just to survive but to flourish. The stakes for the Jewish and other vulnerable communities today cannot be higher. If done right, however, the rewards from these efforts will be reflected in a safer and more peaceful future for us all. Thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity. Mr. Smith. Mr. Attorney General, thank you very much for your very incisive testimony filled with very important recommendations. And I do thank you for your leadership. And now we're joined by Commissioner Hultgren. Randy, thank you for being here. And I'd like to now go to Paul Goldenberg. PAUL GOLDENBERG, NATIONAL DIRECTOR, SECURE COMMUNITY NETWORK Mr. Goldenberg. Thank you, Chairman Smith. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Again, my name is Paul Goldenberg. And although I do currently serve as an adviser to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, particularly with regard to their Foreign Fighter Task Force, the CVE and other initiatives, it's really been a privilege for me to participate in the program of which we're going to talk to you a little bit more about today. I've been working very closely with the Faith-Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers University for--it's nearly two years. And as a part of this new initiative, and working under the leadership of former New Jersey Attorney General John Farmer, we have made, as you have heard from John and Rabbi Baker, countless trips in recent months overseas, traveling to multiple European cities. And it's through these trips that we've been able to gain a firsthand understanding of the current climate, hearing the concerns of communities who really are under threat, and assessing what can do to best assist them. And I think it's really a very unique group of individuals because we all have a very distinctive set of lens. Coming from the law enforcement community and not necessarily from the human rights communities or the faith-based communities directly, our message is one that I think is quite unique. What we have seen, heard and learned has confirmed our initial hypothesis that while the levels of cooperation and partnerships between the Jewish and other minority religious communities with their respective policing services--in many parts of Europe--is as diverse as the communities themselves, more work needs to be accomplished to move closer to a medium and a standard of safety and security within these communities. While this presents distinct challenges, there is, unequivocally, hope, for much of what we have learned, innovated, tested and improved upon here in the United States, as well as other progressive nations, can be imparted to and replicated by our European partners. I do want to say and go on record that the United States Department of Homeland Security has done an exemplary job working here in this country with the Jewish communities and other faith-based communities, building resources, building programs. There are many unsung heroes across the 50 states that are doing remarkable work, working with these communities each and every day. Mr. Chairman, I do want to thank you for the opportunity to testify today, because it was nearly 10 years ago that I heard your speech in Berlin, which compelled me to approach you and ask you how do I become more engaged and involved. And from that conversation and from the tremendous, thought-provocative recommendations that you provided, I was able to spend nearly four years working across Europe with these disparate communities. And I think some good works came from that, and I want to thank you personally for allowing me and giving me that opportunity to do so. So in Europe now, we have heard many times that there are alarming levels of anti-Semitism impacting Jewish communities, but more broadly acts of targeted violence, extremism and terrorism impacting many vulnerable communities as well as the broader public. As I stated, I'm both proud to be here with such a distinguished group of colleagues, and I really do applaud the entire Commission. So what I stated before is I speak to you today not as an academic, but really as a practitioner--as a former law enforcement executive who has personally seen the impact of hate crimes, acts of targeted violence, extremism and terrorism. Jewish communities in Europe have been long targeted. But much more than simply the target of hate; they represent now something else. They have often acted as the proverbial canaries in a coal mine, forecasting much larger problems and issues, foreshadowing broader concerns for the other communities around them. In this, recent events--from the attacks in Paris against the Jewish targets to the targeting of Jewish people in Brussels--are not a new phenomenon to the Jewish communities across Europe. Rather, the most recent attacks merely represent the continuation of targeted violence that has changed the way as a community they function, from the way religious institutions and schools now approach gatherings to what community members may wear in public--in 2016, which is unimaginable. In the span of just two decades, we've moved from swastikas and vandalism, the desecrations of graveyards and simple assaults, as well, to longstanding institutionalized anti- Semitism, which now includes brutal violence, commando-style shooting attacks, and even suicide bombings on the streets of Europe by battlefield-trained, -tried, and -tested cells and organizations. From the 2006 torture and killing of Ilan Halimi, to the schoolyard slaughter of Jewish children in Toulouse, France in 2012, to the attack against the Brussels Jewish Museum, largely viewed as the first ISIS-related attack in Europe, and nearly two years before many European countries even recognized ISIS- trained operatives and the fact that they were immersed in the continent, the list goes on and on and on. Unfortunately, some communities have imported the Middle Eastern conflict into their host countries, and in some cases into their living rooms, with attending acts of violence and unbridled anti-Semitism toward local Jewish communities which had otherwise lived peacefully, except during the Holocaust years. While these events are not without precedent, the pace, frequency and scale should be setting off alarms not just here in Europe, but in the United States as well. And even here in the U.S., according to the FBI's 2014 hate crime report and statistics, Jewish communities have suffered an extraordinary amount of hate crimes and incidents against their institutions and people. In the past few years, we have watched as a storm has brewed: growing anti-Semitism, xenophobia, attacks against religious institutions by those inspired by jihad, and now ultranationalists. It is growing unlike anything we have seen since the 1930s. This vortex has spawned not just a threat to select vulnerable communities and populations in Europe, but poses an overreaching threat to the human security and safety, and security of free and open societies where citizens enjoy the right to worship and gather freely without intimidation, fear and harm. When citizens of free countries, including our own, no longer feel safe in their houses of worship, this is a direct threat to a nation's democracy and freedom. But as many have watched the storm brew, unfortunately, there are still too many doing very little, if anything, to prepare. For some, it now appears that we have little more at our disposal than in some cases an umbrella during that next hurricane. What is at risk fROM this threat? What is the new reality? In a sense, it is the very fabric and spirit of these democratic societies and the collaborative, cooperative and trusting relationships between authorities and the communities that are sworn to protect them. That is the core. The passage, Mr. Chairman, of House Resolution 354, ``Expressing the Sense of the House of Representatives Regarding the Safety and Security of Jewish Institutions in Europe,'' is a watershed moment that has reinvigorated and will provide much-needed support to enable much-needed collaboration amongst and between European partners. It is the formalization of this resolution, Mr. Chairman, and years of tireless work leading up to it, which has provided us with the impetus and roadmap to truly operationalize these public-private capacity building and community engagement efforts across the EU, and transnational for that matter. As an epidemic that now plagues Europe requires a transnational approach and commitment to working across borders and jurisdictions to effectively combat this threat, our effort intends to develop operational recommendations. And I probably have said that too many times, but operational recommendations--for partnership-building, exchanging good practices, providing critical security awareness training, based on strategies that have been developed over time in Europe, in Israel, in the United States and elsewhere, that can be effective in confronting the identified challenges. One of the most critical outcomes of the effort would be a formalized recognition and relationship between those responsible for communal security and the policing agencies that vow to protect them. Despite religious, ethnic and cultural differences, we have succeeded in rallying around the common shared values of protecting our houses of worship and safeguarding our most precious natural resources, our children, both from becoming victims of violence and being lured, inspired and radicalized to become perpetrators of that same violence. While law enforcement and police services taking on the roles of agents of social change are literally the visible extension of their governments and do represent the interests in protecting their people, they are an integral part of this process and, quite frankly, more a part of the solution. As we've experienced here at home with our own diffuse and evolving terrorism threat, law enforcement cannot take the burden alone. I just do want to mention some tangibles that we think we should be discussing over the months ahead and hopefully consider operationalizing. Educating and empowering communities to become more active participants and stakeholders in their own safety and security will pay immeasurable dividends in contributing to the safety and security of whole neighborhoods. We have seen that work here in the United States. Treating the public as a key partner in counterterrorism will promote greater engagement and reduce public apathy and believe counterterrorism is a responsibility--where they will believe that counterterrorism is a holistic responsibility. You've heard from John and Rabbi Baker--increasing information-sharing efforts between law enforcement and community leaders, building communities of trust, and, more important, engaging citizens and communities through trainings and exercises which will teach people to know what to look for, how to behave, and how to respond to emergencies. In closing, I'd like you to consider the following. In January 2015, the Grand Synagogue of Paris shuttered for Shabbat services on a Friday night following the terrorist attacks against Charlie Hebdo and Hyper Cacher, marking the first time since World War II that the synagogue was closed on the Sabbath. Following the attacks, 10,000 police and soldiers were deployed across France to guard Jewish institutions against follow-on attacks, an effort that in many places continues today. In December 2015, New Year's Eve fireworks and festivities in Brussels were canceled following a terror-alert warning of an imminent attack against the city a month after the November terrorist attacks in Paris which killed over 130 people. These are not the kinds of firsts we wish to celebrate, nor should we tolerate. We cannot be plagued and paralyzed by the violent will of hate and extremism. Time is not on our side. We're past the time for more summits, conferences and meetings. The pace and tempo of attacks requires swift yet informed conviction and actions. We've experienced hard lessons. We must learn from them. We've developed excellent best practices collaboratively with our European partners, and we must share them. Gandhi once said the true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable. I'd like to personally thank you, Mr. Chairman, your staff, Nathaniel, for your continued leadership with the Commission in ensuring that the United States of America will forever fight for the protection and preservation of human rights, safety and security of all global citizens. Thank you very much, sir. Mr. Smith. Mr. Goldenberg, thank you so much for your testimony, for your very solid recommendations. And past is prologue. I believe that we need to be doubling down on what was done in the past and then some with those best practices. Operationalize surely is the key word. So thank you for that. I'd like to yield to Commissioner Hultgren. HON. RANDY HULTGREN, COMMISSIONER, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE Mr. Hultgren. Thank you, Chairman Smith. Thank you so much, all of you, for being here; grateful for your work. And I'm very concerned of what we see happening. And so I really do feel like this is so important. And it does feel like history repeats itself if we are not ever vigilant, if we are not ever aware of the capability of humans to do really horrible things to each other if we're not looking out and shining light on what's happening. So I want to thank you all for being part of this. I want to address my first question to Rabbi Baker. I wonder what suggestions you might have of how should the OSCE and the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly support efforts to strengthen the formal partnerships and communications between European law enforcement agencies and Jewish community groups? Rabbi Baker. Thank you for your support, and thank you for that question. First, to take the Parliamentary Assembly--in a way the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly has been at the vanguard of pushing that organization, which moves somewhat cumbersomely as a consensus body, to really take some action, take some steps. Really the first resolutions dealing with anti-Semitism in the OSCE came at that Parliamentary Assembly. So I think it could be a vehicle, whether through resolution, through discussion with delegations, to push--which I think now there's a more open door--push governments to recognize they've had a problem with policing. They've had a problem with intelligence. The attitude has largely been leave it to us. And people day to day, there really isn't a role for them. I think now we know and we've experienced in the U.S. that's precisely what can't be the approach. So perhaps it can be through the drafting of resolution. Perhaps it can be through discussions within the Parliamentary Assembly. But hopefully that would be a way at least to alert and raise awareness. Now, within the OSCE itself, under the current German chairmanship, Foreign Minister Steinmeier, who was here in February, he said they want to make combating anti-Semitism one of their priorities. They are supporting, with a substantial financial contribution, efforts within ODIHR to develop a multiyear plan to combat anti-Semitism in different targeted ways. But security of the Jewish community is one of them. So I think what really is important is to push for an examination of best practices to deal with this. You heard from Paul and from John, and particularly from Jonathan in Brussels, the goal of getting governments to work even formally with Jewish communities. And memoranda of understanding is clearly one approach. I think our experience in some of this has come during visits we've taken, is to see that it's often a one-way street when it comes to communication. Jewish communities share with police and authorities what they've seen, what makes them nervous, but they don't really hear back from governments. We've seen now more governments stepping up on physical security, but they're doing it in very different ways. So in some places, in Belgium and France, the military has rolled out. In Denmark and Sweden, there are heavily armed police that are patrolling in front of buildings. In the Netherlands, they've erected these mobile police trailers in front of every synagogue and Jewish community building. But I have to say the police have to stay inside. They can be alert to something and then they can call for reinforcements, but they're not allowed to leave. In every case, the communities, at least today, are saying they appreciate the attention. But I don't think anyone has really said what works best, what makes the most sense. And it seems to me the OSCE is precisely positioned to be able to take stock of that. Also I think if you push to say this is a priority issue, so do something this year--we have a chairmanship that has the resources and I think the ability to do something. Mr. Hultgren. Thank you, Rabbi. That's very helpful. I'm going to address my next question across the ocean over to Mr. Biermann, if I may. You've testified that strengthening security for the Belgian Jewish community must include the Belgian Government formally recognizing and partnering with Jewish community groups on security and public awareness and action campaigns. I wonder if there's examples that you can cite in other European countries that are especially good models in considering for these kinds of initiatives, and maybe some that are struggling a little bit more than others. Mr. Biermann. Yes, thank you. I believe that in the U.K., as mentioned earlier, and in France, governments have established a memorandum of understanding about exchange of information. This is probably the first step of building a relationship of trust and confidence between the authorities, law enforcement community, and the Jewish community. And again, Jewish community should be considered as pilots, because those relationships of trust and confidence established with the Jewish community should expand and be established with other vulnerable communities also. And I do believe and I do hope that by implementing the see-something-say-something policy with the Muslim community will be also an opportunity to build a broader community where each faith-based or cultural- based community would share together the--will establish together the priority of the defense of common values, democracy and human rights. To come back to the question of the memorandum of understanding and the example of U.K. and France, I do believe that it is of great importance to establish what kind of information is relevant to collect, who is the proper body to collect that information, and what are the efficient channels to pass this information to make sure that it will be treated by intelligence and law enforcement agencies and that the necessary treatment will be provided and information will be shared later on an operational basis with the communities themselves. If communities have to share the responsibility of protecting themselves with the governments and with the authorities, then we have to empower them and give them the means; for instance, by sharing relevant information in the field with those communities. Mr. Hultgren. Thank you. I'm going to ask one last question, and this one we probably could spend the whole afternoon talking about. So I don't necessarily expect a complete answer, but maybe if one of you could speak briefly of what is being done or what can be done, especially for school-age children, younger children, to change this, what I see as kind of a--certainly a culture of hate and a fostering of this, especially in certain communities. Is there anything that we can do, again, to push education, early learning, in some of the communities that we've seen this grow, to put some pressure there? I just don't know if any of you have any thoughts or if we could maybe follow up after this of what we can be doing as members of Congress, especially for young people at an early age, to not learn to hate or not learn anti-Semitic views. Mr. Farmer. If I can jump in on this--of course, we have come across a couple of what I would consider best practices to try to address the cultural issue you're talking about. In the one visit we made, a synagogue in Amsterdam, in particular they have a day where they invite in to their school other schools, public schools, and school children of all faiths. And they basically spend a day learning about the history of Judaism and learning about, you know, sort of lowering those barriers that are erected when you live in isolation from one another. And that seems to have yielded some dividends. In France they have a similar Holocaust education initiative, which they believe has yielded some great results. I think exposing young people to the opposite of hate is really important, because actually the solution to all these problems is really--and we hope for it anyway--is with the young people. And so the better educated they are about each other's backgrounds, the less mystified they are by people who are different from them and the less likely they are to become haters as they get older. I don't know if anyone else wants to---- Rabbi Baker. I think you've identified what the real challenge is. And on the one hand, one of the dilemmas is the Jewish community in Europe is a rather small community. And France is the largest, half a million. But again, it's maybe 1 percent, less than 1 percent of the population. I think in America we're so sort of used to the fact that people interact directly, and the best thing to shatter stereotypes is to know someone. So on the one hand, you have that barrier. There simply aren't the opportunities to, on a day-to-day level, just meet with, come to know people. But conversely, the fact that today so much can be done with Internet connections, with social media and so on--and we know all the problems that come through that of spreading hate--it's also a vehicle to introduce people. There are some wonderful programs, educationally focused programs, one based in Vienna, I think the chairman knows, called Centropa; Ed Serotta, an American who's lived in Europe for 30 years, is responsible for it. It's been linking school kids in Europe, in Israel, in different parts of the United States. And they share kind of common stories. They do sort of common research remotely in their own communities, but then they can interconnect. I think some of these programs--admittedly there are so few of them--but they may hold some hope to do exactly what you're saying. And what obviously we need to do--the solution is not barbed wire and military deployment in front of schools. Mr. Hultgren. Well, again, I want to thank you all for being here. These are really big subjects, very important. For me the key is let us know suggestions you have, ideas, things that we can do to help to turn the tide back to, again, a positive direction. I'm very concerned, but also appreciate the work you are doing and bringing some hope that we can definitely make a difference on this very, very important issue. So thank you. I'll yield back to the chairman. Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Commissioner Hultgren. Let me just ask a few questions. And again, I thank you for not only your time, but your expertise, which helps us to do a better job as the Commission. Let me ask you, Rabbi Baker, you talked about how--I believe it was the Dutch who suggested they don't have the resources. And there are other nations, of course, that act as if they're cash poor. It is a matter of priorities. We're talking about mature democracies with very mature economies that seem to have far in excess what would be needed. But it all starts with the political will to do so. And I would ask you to address that. As you pointed out-- and we've been pushing this for years from our side--ODIHR's director, Michael Link, testified before our Commission in February. He pointed out, when it comes to providing official documentation as to what a country is doing, that only 10 of the 57 participating States have submitted official information on anti-Semitic hate crimes for the latest reporting period. And he pointed out that civil-society information covered some 29 countries. Thankfully, you have been a prod to those 10, I'm sure, through your visits and your advocacy. And you also provide information on others that are not part of this systemized reporting. It was Sharansky who here, right here in this building, told us--we had him twice, Natan Sharansky, as our witness--that if you don't chronicle something, you can't fight it. You have to have the parameters of how many, where, what and who in order to effectively combat it. He was also the one--and I would ask you to speak to this as well, Rabbi--you pointed out that there's a problem with the definition, obviously with the working definition and its implementation and the integration of that. And there's a section that you note describing how anti-Semitism manifests itself with regards to Israel. And not to belabor the point, but it was Sharansky who told two hearings that I chaired, and then he told the entire Berlin conference that Paul and I, all of us were at back in 2004, that there is a way of deciphering when it's not just disagreements with the Knesset and with the Israeli policies. He called it the three Ds--demonization, delegitimization and double standard. As soon as one or all three of those manifest, you can be pretty darn sure you're talking about an underlying anti-Semitic motive behind the criticism of Israel. And as you point out, there was a section of that in that report you referenced. But this idea of chronicling--and maybe you might want to speak to, again, since Israel is in the news so often, I've actually chaired hearings about how the Human Rights Council absolutely disproportionately focuses on Israel and gives a pass to China, North Korea, Sudan, Iran and many other countries that have committed heinous human-rights abuses, and large magnitude of those abuses at that. Israel is always in the cross-hairs, which suggests to me that the Human Rights Council itself violates the three Ds as articulated by Sharansky. But if you could speak to that. Rabbi Baker. Well, first, to the point you make, absolutely correct that we used to confront--in some ways we still do--the reality that incidents aren't recorded, aren't reported, and therefore it's as though they didn't happen. And I have a very vivid memory of discussing the problem of anti-Semitism here in Washington in 2002 with Javier Solana, then the sort of foreign-policy czar of the EU, who said to me--when I described the problem, he said, well, I don't see it. And it was not a criticism of me. It was essentially to say, OK, help me see it. But at that point nobody was recording these incidents of hate crimes; in many cases not recording hate crimes in general, let alone explaining or disaggregating them so they would describe the anti-Semitic crimes. So in a way he was correct. I think we've come a distance, although, as you point out, there's commitments that are made by governments to the OSCE and then there are commitments that are fulfilled by governments. And unfortunately, not many are reporting data on hate crimes. And those that do, it's only a small number that really indicate anti-Semitic hate crimes. But it has been pushed a bit. And as you pointed out, there are more and more communal organizations working with professional standards now that are also collecting data. So we're getting better at it, although I would reference that EU fundamental rights agency survey that indicated how so many incidents were unrecorded. And that is surely the case still. My reference to meeting with governments and being told they don't have the resources or the interest to step up with security, I'm not sure it was really an issue of money; maybe in some places. In some cases, I think it was probably a mask for saying we don't see it as serious a problem back then as I did or Jewish community leaders did. Or they had other issues in front of them and they wanted to push it off. The good thing about the terrible things that have happened is today most governments recognize they have to do something. So they have stepped forward. What I would say, though, today is, as I illustrated, they're all doing it in different ways. And it really is, I think, useful and timely to try and say what really works. What's going to be helpful and efficient and cost-efficient going forward? Because this isn't a problem that's going to end in a matter of months. And then, finally, to the issue of the working definition, which, in my testimony, written testimony, I did speak to at length. Look, we recognize, as Natan Sharansky demonstrated before you, that we've seen a form of anti-Semitism that relates to the State of Israel. It was referenced even in that Berlin declaration, although implicitly, when it spoke of anti- Semitism taking on new forms and manifestations. When Israel is demonized, as you said, when it's declared a racist state, when analogies are drawn to the Nazis, it's not criticism. And the value of that EUMC working definition, which was developed in 2004 and distributed by the EUMC in 2005, at a time when there were 17 members of the EU, and the monitoring center, which did its own survey the previous year, had to admit that over half of its national monitors had no definition of anti-Semitism. And of those that did, no two were the same. So the working definition really provided a service for governments, for monitors and for civil societies. And mind you, it's a comprehensive definition, and it took on and described aspects of anti-Semitism which maybe today we more fully recognize. But if you think back 10, 15 years ago, it wasn't the case. In other words, Holocaust denial is a form of anti-Semitism. When you spread these conspiracy theories about Jews, that's a form of anti- Semitism. In a way, you can have anti-Semitism still without having Jews. But the reality is that it has a corrosive effect on day- to-day Jewish life, and particularly when you look at the issue with regard to Israel. You think about this. People who have negative views of Israel take them out on Jewish community members. Jews and Israel are conflated. It's as though they're responsible, the Jews of Stockholm or of Paris or of Copenhagen, for what the Israeli Government is doing. Or you have attacks that emerge from what are maybe pro-Palestinian, pro-Arab, anti-Israel demonstrations. But they're not just against Israel. At some point they turn on Jews. And we saw that two summers ago during the Gaza conflict in Paris and in other European cities. So the working definition describes this, but it's also a useful tool for law enforcement, for judges and prosecutors witnessing these events, to say, wait a minute; I need to think twice. I can't just say, oh, this is Middle East politics. No, there's something more. And the value of that definition and of trying to get it more and more in play, in use, goes to precisely things that also will make a difference in the day- to-day lives and security of Jewish communities. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Let me ask Mr. Biermann, with regards to the MoU, potential MoU with the Belgian Government, is that coming along? Is it likely to happen? Are you at liberty to explain what some of its contents might be? Is the U.S. Government being at all--you know, our embassy and our ambassador being helpful to that effort? Mr. Biermann. I think the coming visit, the planned visit of John Farmer and Paul Goldenberg will be a great opportunity to share a good practice. And I think they would be the actors of introducing the idea to the authorities that an inspiration of what is working in the U.K. and France could be implemented here and adapted to the Belgian institutions, which are, as you know, very complicated. But I do believe that the House Resolution 354 and the expertise, the network established by Rutgers University, will be instrumental in convincing that such an MoU would be an opportunity to empower the Jewish communities, and maybe later other communities, to be part of building a new strategy involving the different communities, in establishing greater security in Brussels and in Belgium. I have the feeling that there's a very strong political will of the Belgian Government to put all the resources needed to fight terrorism, enhance public security and public safety, specifically for the Jewish community. But as I mentioned earlier, we should not reinvent the wheel. Good solutions exist and are implemented in neighboring countries. And we need to be inspired and to be able to implement it here as well and to adapt it to our local reality. Mr. Smith. Let me just ask, Mr. Farmer--first of all, Attorney General Farmer, thank you for your work as well--I should have emphasized it--with the 9/11 Commission. I actually chaired two of those follow-up hearings; was the Republican co- sponsor, not the prime sponsor but the co-sponsor, of the actual commission. And there were concerns that it was going to be politicized. And certainly Tom Kean did a magnificent job, in my opinion, along with his counterpart on the Democrat side of the aisle, to say this is above board; we want this to work for the betterment of Americans, regardless of political persuasion. And they did that. So thank you for your critical role in that report, because it was the blueprint for everything we have done since. You know, all the stovepiping is largely gone, although never completely gone. So thank you for that leadership. And I'm wondering, with these best practices and your initiatives, which I think are extraordinary--you know, the open-sourcing, the guide to best practices--are there next steps you think we ought to be taking in the U.S. Government? It seems to me, you know, it is excellent that the OSCE raises these issues. And the Personal Representative, Rabbi Baker, does an unbelievably effective job, but he's only one voice; and it seems to me all of our ambassadors, Homeland Security, in its daily interface with law enforcement, needs to make this a priority. I find that human rights issues in general, including combating anti-Semitism, all of that often takes a backseat to the tyranny of the urgent, whatever that might be, economic issues or whatever it might be. And I believe--and I believe you do as well--that this hate that is festering and growing worse by the day not only manifests against Jews but all other--as you pointed out in your comments--if the oldest diaspora community in the world cannot survive in the place where it has lived for longer than 2,000 years, in a place where it survived the Nazis, the future of other vulnerable communities can only be described as bleak. And as you point out, the wholesale slaughter of Christians and non-conforming Muslims in Syria and Iraq and elsewhere begins to look less like isolated atrocities and more like a harrowing vision of our children's future. I do believe that anti-Semitism, especially with radical Islam, is at the core of all the other problems. And we've had hearings here, as Rabbi Baker knows, where we called on all the other faiths to step up and do more. So maybe if you could, all of you, make recommendations now or in the future on how we get a whole-of- government approach. Right now I do believe, with all due respect to the administration and the previous administrations and Congress, we do it in an isolated way. We're in there but we're not doing enough--never enough money, never enough commitment, political will. If we really want to eradicate anti-Semitism to the greatest extent possible, it will take a Herculean whole-of- government approach. Homeland Security needs to be--it's part of their agenda. Every ambassador needs to make it a part of his or her agenda, especially in countries where it is festering but elsewhere as well. As Rabbi Baker said, there is anti-Semitism about Jews, particularly in Holocaust denial. So you might want to--and when you--for example, your visits to Brussels and Copenhagen, upcoming, it seems to me that if the FBI director were at least involved in some way-- the more the better, as well as his top people--that would make a difference. You know law enforcement like few people--and Paul as well. How do we get that whole-of-government approach as well? Mr. Farmer. Well, I think the--and thank you for the kind words about the 9/11 Commission, and Governor Kean did a spectacular job next to Chairman Hamilton in driving us toward a truly nonpartisan product--but I think the eradication of hate, and anti-Semitism in particular, is part of a larger project--the first part of a larger project, which is the engagement of--and it's transformed the project for law enforcement and for--frankly, for the citizenry. It's engagement of the public at the street level, you know, both in Europe and the United States. The average citizen has been told: Just live your normal life. Let us worry about the terrorist threat. Let us take care of it in law enforcement. And if that was true, if that approach worked 15 years ago, it certainly doesn't work anymore. And there's been a recognition by FBI Director Comey for at least the last year that law enforcement by itself can't fight this because the threat is so atomized, it's so diffused, there's no way to predict where the next attack is coming, absent a level of community engagement that simply hasn't existed before. That reality is true on both sides of the ocean. But I think we have to be careful, though, in terms of dealing with other countries. You know, they all have unique situations too and there is no one size fits all. So ``see something, say something'' might look one way in one community and another way in a different community depending on demographics and depending on the structure of their privacy laws and other, you know, complicating factors. But what's needed is a commitment to the principle of community engagement, and a real commitment. MoUs are great, and we've all worked with some that are terrific and work and we've all worked with others that are just empty documents. What's really needed is cultivation of the kind of cooperative attitude toward community engagement that hasn't existed before. When you have that, you'll find the resources, because there are resources that can address these issues. Mr. Smith. Are there examples of an off-ramp for radicalization, as you suggested? Mr. Farmer. Well, we've been in the process of developing them both here and in Europe, communities like Dearborn, Michigan. And Paul can speak to this as he's worked with these folks over the years. In Cook County in Illinois, we've been part of an ongoing process. And again, these off-ramps involve the expertise that's on the ground in these vulnerable communities, which will differ from place to place. So in one place it might be school officials who are integrally involved in the identification and diversion of potential radicalization. In other places it might be faith- based. In other places it might be--but the principles underlying them are uniform, and that is the principle that law enforcement just simply can't do this by itself, that there are--especially in some communities in the United States and in Europe, there's a level of distrust among certain vulnerable communities and law enforcement. So there's a bridge that needs to be built between them. And frankly, one of the reasons that I thought Rutgers was a good idea getting involved in this is we're a secular state institution. We have no orientation here other than the safety of our citizens. So I think that we could bring a credibility to these discussions and lower the levels of mistrust that might already exist. Mr. Goldenberg. The off-ramps, I'm very engaged at DHS now nationally. I spent a lot of time in Dearborn. The chief and the mayor have both become friends. And Dearborn has done a tremendous amount of good works in this area. When we refer to off-ramp, though, the problem is there has to be a collaborative agreement between the law enforcement community, mental health community, the educators, et cetera, because the police community is trained to become engaged and involved when people are conspiring and/or are involved in criminal activity. So where's the line? So right now the off-ramps are a gray area. Law enforcement is trained to do its job, which is to engage if someone is planning a terrorist attack. And yet at the same time, if it's an effort that could be collaborative in nature where you engage the mental health community, juvenile justice, et cetera--look, the common denominator between most of these young people--or people that could be in their 30s--they're inspired by the Internet now. That's the bottom line. The parents of a lot of these young people are as concerned as we are. They just don't have a protocol or a process on when and how to report. So, well, you heard John say time and time again, it really does need to be a collaborative effort. So the off-ramping, as you refer to, is one part of the process. The concern and the issue is, is what's happening now. What's happening is that we've got well-trained, well-inspired people with resources now who are not only attacking institutions within their countries but they're attacking Jewish institutions. They're attacking the Jewish people. So when I say it's a matter of record that that's what we are dealing with--so it's not just a matter of the off-ramp is one piece, because maybe we can grab some of them beforehand, but the real challenge is the exchange of intelligence and the training of members of the community to be good partners. And that's what we're hearing from people like Jonathan and others across eight, nine countries that we visited in the years--Andy Baker and I have been visiting these countries for 10 years and we hear the same thing: We want to be partners. There's a quid pro quo that's so simple. A good partner gives you information that says, I have a suspicious person standing in front of my institution; therefore, maybe if I engage with the police early enough they'll respond and save lives. So the police get the information they need and the community becomes empowered to be a partner in this process versus living in total fear. When I closed before, I'll tell you, it was a stark--when they cancelled New Year's Eve--and whole school systems are now shutting down in Los Angeles due to these threats--they've won, Chairman. Mr. Chairman, they have won. And that's why the building of capacity with the public is now more important than ever. Resilience is going to be as important as response, because if we shut down, we're really in bigger trouble than we think. Mr. Smith. Training the trainers, could you just, for the sake of the Commission, where you think that might go in the future, a little bit about the past, the importance of---- Mr. Goldenberg. Yes, sir. And the past was very effective. The reason it was effective was the team that we built had Kosovoans training next to Serbs, training next to Croats, training next to the French gendarmerie, training next to people from MI5--I mean MI6. And you met them, sir. I mean, you had an opportunity to meet the team. It was 12 colonels, lieutenant colonels, majors; male, female. It was an exemplary team of people who all had a single purpose, to work with police partners to provide best practices and training on how other countries are effectively working with their communities, particularly with regard to keeping the houses of worship open--i.e. synagogues, mosques and churches. So is this effective? Extremely effective. Police are part of that change. So what we're talking about at Rutgers University is we're talking about building out capacity where--because there's such a tremendous amount of expertise here, not only nationally but internationally, that could be brought to the table, we would need the support for this effort to build a training institute that could be either on the ground, or we could train here in the metropolitan area. Mr. Smith. Let me just ask a final question and then yield--two questions. One, is there a need for additional legislation that would, again, encourage a whole-of-government approach on our part? Again, when I talk to ambassadors--and I travel frequently-- when I bring up human rights, it's usually not the priority. When I bring up anti-Semitism, it is definitely not the priority. And that goes for a lot of places in Europe. You know, there's a standard, yes, we care about it. And then, well, what are you doing? And then there's a blank stare. So is there something we could be doing to motivate? Of course it starts from the top down. And it seems to me that personnel is policy. If the right people are--secretary, undersecretary, right on down--you're more apt to get a more focused response and not a hermetically sealed response from, oh, go talk to Human Rights or go talk to the special envoy or someone. Secondly, the impact on young people--you know, obviously war and hatred has a disproportionate impact on the most vulnerable, and that always includes children. How are the European Jewish children responding to this onslaught of hate towards them and to their parents and their faith? Mr. Goldenberg. I'm going to leave that second part to Andy because I think he's best suited. He's been working very closely with the communities. And we have Jonathan here. But I'd like to respond to the first part, and I'll tell you why. Look, when we think in terms of institutionalized anti- Semitism, it's much more complex than this. If people in the United States of America or Canada or any of the free countries of the West do not feel safe in their houses of worship, democracy is in trouble. And it's not only a police problem. It's a problem for those that are involved in running the nation, the administration of the nation. If people are not safe any longer in their houses of worship, it's really a critical issue. So if right now it's synagogues or Jewish community centers that are under attack, tomorrow churches--we're seeing it now-- or mosques or temples, and if people no longer feel safe and their children don't feel safe, we have a real concern. So what I'm saying is it's anti-Semitism--and I'm not taking away from the fact that it's anti-Semitism--but it's also taking away from the fact that people can no longer worship, who, where and when. And that is a threat to all members of a society or any Westernized free democratic country. Mr. Farmer. If I can just jump in on that, a good example of what Paul just was referring to--the church shooting last year in South Carolina is a classic case of an incident that might have been preventable had best practices been widely disseminated in terms of securing houses of worship across denominations. So in terms of your question about a change in the law, I'm not sure a change in the law necessarily but encouraging a reallocation of resources so that rather than buying--you know, instead of buying homeland security equipment and quasi- military equipment at great expense, some of those funds be redirected to efforts to engage the communities at that level that we've been talking about. That's the kind of prodding that I think Congress is expert at doing and could really yield results in terms of reallocating resources toward community engagement. Rabbi Baker. I was struck in one of the gatherings that Rutgers has organized, a hearing from one of the New York City police officials talking about their goal in dealing with hate crimes in New York City, is that the people should feel safe in their identity on the streets of New York. It's not just to feel safe but to be able to be openly expressive of who you are and feel safe. That's what we've lost in so many European capitals already. I mean, if you go out in the street and you don't have anything that identifies you as being Jewish, or perhaps--I don't want to limit it to Jews--you don't look openly strange, a Muslim or another sort of immigrant, you're probably fine. But if something marks you as different, I think people have come to recognize you're in danger--maybe not physical danger of being murdered, but certainly in danger of being verbally harassed and maybe something more. And we've almost conceded that. So somehow we have to get past that. We have to say, no, no, that isn't acceptable. I think one of the real values that I've observed over the years, certainly with Paul and with John, is the way in which people--practitioners here, people who come from a law enforcement background, are able to have a direct conversation with the European counterparts in the way that the human rights organizations maybe simply cannot connect. So even if the human rights organizations themselves are committed to and have as their priority getting these issues addressed, getting people who have kind of gone through the experience from the law enforcement, justice side of things here to share their experiences over there can be valuable and helpful. I'm not sure that the issue in Congress is more legislation, at least legislation that's going to change things on the ground in Europe, but as you said, there are so many CODELs that travel, foreign delegations with whom you meet. The degree to which they hear from American leaders, from American members of Congress that this matters, we know it elevates the attention over there. And we've seen it going back 15 years, I think, at every important juncture in a way you have made the difference. So I would urge that to really continue and to be kept up. I have to say I wrestle with the very same question, Congressman Smith, you raised when it comes to children, when it comes to kids. On the one hand, we can say kids are resilient. Yes, they're going to school, they're going past military barriers. Jonathan will tell you there's so many anecdotes of the kids waving to soldiers, little accounts of how well the soldiers in Paris have never had so many cookies and everything else that the kids' families are bringing, but we know that even getting used to it is hardly the solution. It can only be temporary. And we really do need to figure out how the environment can change. Yes, there's a larger picture. The threat of terrorism is with us. The inability of European governments to really get a handle on it and deal with it is evident. How do you combat this radicalization? There's the added dilemma of a kind of political correctness that plays out in Europe where we want to do something but we can't sort of single out communities, and yet we know that the sources of the problems are not spread equally--yet one more barrier to cross. But hopefully the more that there is a back and forth and the more that there can be work on a practical, pragmatic level, that can maybe take what's gone on here, admittedly translated in ways that make sense in Europe that's mindful of the different laws and traditions, hopefully that will achieve something in the long term too. Mr. Smith. Just thinking out loud--maybe we need to also engage the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and NATO itself to be integrating this concern more in their agenda, even though they're a security--this is a security issue. I do have one final question, and that would be about monitoring or at least analyzing the news media. You know, I remember when Mubarak would come here--all the time, I and others would always raise the issue of the Coptic Christians, which weren't doing all that well under his regime, although better than Morsi by a long shot before he was deposed--and secondly, anti-Semitism state-run media, which would be filled with Nazi pictures and the like, Ariel Sharon and--it's just not good. My question is, our own media and the media in Europe has an ability by how they shade things, the readers who write in, particularly online, that can really--we have some of that going on in own district right now vis-a-vis a community known as Lakewood. And I read some of these readers' responses and I shudder. I mean, there ought to be an ability to not allow that kind of expression. And I am a free speech man, believe me, to my core, but not anti-Semitism hate speech, or hate speech of any kind. So monitoring the newspapers, is that being done adequately? Is that a best practice we need to be promoting? I mean, again, not taking away from press freedom, but there are lines that can be crossed. Mr. Farmer. Yes, there is work being done, and in fact some interesting--I can get it to you--showing a correlation between the use of certain words in the media and certain types of coverage, and the spike in anti-Semitism incidents, I believe both in the U.S. and in Europe. So that kind of monitoring is taking place. Rabbi Baker. You know, I just want to point out first, very anecdotally, I have four adult children. None of them read newspapers. I get two newspapers delivered to me every day. I'm such a fossil when it comes to this. I think we know people get their news, their information from social media, or maybe they read newspapers online. But I think it's the social media that is really the vehicle. In one survey that was done in France that did try and gauge, with some depth, attitudes in the Muslim community, those that harbored the most extreme views correlated--they didn't correlate with education. It didn't correlate with economic situation. It correlated with who was getting their information from social media, because it was a kind of reinforcing of all the hate and all the negative stereotypes that came through there. How we monitor it and how we can deal with it, let alone how we control it--and of course the Europeans would like to come here to you and tell you what you should do to control it, which is change that little problem called the First Amendment. I mean, obviously this is an enormous challenge and this is a divide in some ways between Europe and here. But we do need to, I think, recognize this is a new source--this is the new source today of where the anti-Semitism and other forms of hatred are being spread, and it's almost impossible to keep up with the monitoring that's necessary and to ask these social media companies, who have the ability voluntarily to police and to remove things, to really step up to that. Mr. Goldenberg. You know, I want to go back---- Mr. Biermann. Mr. Chairman, if I may---- Mr. Goldenberg. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead, Jonathan. Mr. Biermann. Thank you. Just to answer the previous and the current question maybe together, in Belgium for the last two or three years, young Jews leave public schools. Those schools become Jews-free. How can we hope that there will be mutual understanding, cultural exchanges among Belgian younger generation without an opportunity for them to even meet and sit together in the same class? I believe that the Jewish day schools cannot become a refuge for young Jews because that would be rebuilding the walls of the ghetto. I believe that dedication is key to establish a melting pot society in which everyone feels safe and secure with its own culture, faith and roots. And I also do believe that the media have a huge responsibility in the last decade in not being able to build a positive environment to mutual understanding, and also because the media have used a terminology which has banalized anti- Semitism, mixed concepts on the Middle Eastern conflict. And also the media have probably not reacted strongly enough to anti-Semitism in the newspapers or in the comments of the readers on the social media. In that respect, I do believe that the media should better take a bigger responsibility in the way they are contributing to educate the population, and specifically the younger generation. I do believe also that less and less of the younger generation read the newspaper, but they are commentating on the articles on the Web, and I believe that the atmosphere and the banalization of anti-Semitism led us to the situation we know today, to the fact that young Jews escape from public schools and join Jewish day schools, probably not for positive reasons. Thank you. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Yes? Mr. Goldenberg. Yes, I do want to make one comment and just go back to one thing that you said. One of the things that someone said was they talked about the economics of anti-Semitism and the fact that many are not even considering the economics of anti-Semitism. Well, the food for thought for many in Europe and here even in the United States is, right now, on any given day, probably tens of millions of euros are being spent to have troops and police standing in front of what technically should be the most precious institutions in any country, and that's a synagogue, a mosque or a school even. So the economics of anti-Semitism are going to have a toll and I don't think anyone has taken a close look at that, not only what it takes to protect a vulnerable community because they're under attack, unfortunately, but it's the economics of people who have lived for hundreds of years and now are determining whether to leave or not, and leave behind professions and resources. So there is definitely economics that will come to play here, and that's something to be considered for any free country, the cost if we let this go to where it's become today. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Just to conclude--and then if there's anything you'd like to add that we have not touched, the floor would be yours. But, you know, to Rabbi Baker's thought and comments regarding social media, I was in Bethlehem a number of years ago and I spoke at a Catholic university that has three-fourths of its students are Muslim--and very disciplined, good conversation. So we had a forum, and they asked me questions and I asked them questions. And when we got to 9/11, Mr. Attorney General, they claimed, to a person--and these were some of the best and the brightest students at that university--that it was all the Jews' fault, obviously, and that no Jewish person died. Now, I had some 58 people in my district die in the Twin Towers. I know many of the widows. I hired one of the widows on my staff. Several of those widows who lived in Middletown and elsewhere, New Jersey, were Jewish. And I said, I know these people personally. They are Jewish. Where did you get this big lie that the Jews caused it and no Jews died in the Twin Towers? I said, you're looking at someone who will bear witness to the fact that many Jews died in the Twin Towers as well as in the Pentagon. And they said, the Internet, and social media to a lesser extent but it was the Internet that was the source of virtually all of their--and it was to a person. So a radicalized youth who are very sympathetic to the arguments of Hamas are made even more so by those big lies. You know, I walked away so troubled. And I said to the headmaster, I said, you know, you've just got to tell the truth. And he said, it was good that you did. But it shouldn't take a congressman from New Jersey in a forum to be doing that. It is amazing how the disinformation campaign has worked, and so effectively. Mr. Farmer. Those reports were circulating the day of 9/11 itself, along with, by the way, the reports of thousands of Muslims dancing on the rooftops in Jersey City, which were about as true. [Chuckles.] Mr. Smith. Well put. Thank you, Rabbi Baker. Rabbi Baker. Thank you. Mr. Smith. Thank you for your testimony. Thank you, Mr. Biermann, for your contribution and for--it must be a little later there than it is here. Thank you. We will forward any thoughts you have. This Commission stands ready, in a bipartisan way, to do everything humanly possible to promote this extremely important human rights cause. And I thank you so much. The meeting is adjourned. [Whereupon, at 3:38 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] A P P E N D I C E S ======================================================================= Prepared Statements ---------- Prepared Statement of Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe Good afternoon to everyone joining us today and especially to our witnesses, Rabbi Andy Baker, Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism, and Director of International Jewish Affairs for the American Jewish Committee; Jonathan Biermann, Executive Director of the crisis cell for the Belgian Jewish community, who will testify by video link from Brussels; John Farmer, Director of the Faith-Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers University; and Paul Goldenberg, Director of the Secure Community Network. Today we will discuss how to anticipate and prevent deadly attacks on European Jewish communities. The recent terrorist attacks in Brussels were reminders that Europeans of all religions and ethnicities are at risk from ISIS. But there can be no European security without Jewish security. As we have seen so many times in so many places, violence against Jewish communities often foreshadows violence against other religious, ethnic, and national communities. ISIS especially hates the Jewish people and has instructed its followers to prioritize killing them. The group's cronies targeted the Jewish Museum of Belgium in May 2014, the Paris kosher supermarket in January 2015, and the Great Synagogue in Copenhagen in February 2015, and murdered people in all of them. Some thwarted plots have revealed plans to target even more Jewish community places and kill even more Jewish people. Other Islamist terrorist groups share its hatred and intent. However, terrorist and terrorism only account for some of the annual increases in violent anti-Semitic attacks in Europe over the past few years. Survey and crime data show that anti-Semitic attitudes and violence in Europe are most rife in Muslim communities. Anti- Semitic attitudes, and non-terroristic anti-Semitic violence, have also risen across the religious, political, and ideological spectrum. There are many different aspects of combating anti-Semitic violence. For example, European Jewish and Muslim civil society groups are collaborating with each other to counter violent extremism and hatred that impacts their respective communities. Today's hearing though will zero in on the role of law enforcement agencies and especially on their relationships with Jewish community groups. These partnerships are essential, according to Jewish communities and experts on both sides of the Atlantic. That is why I authored House Resolution 354 as a blueprint for action and why the House passed it unanimously last November. Our witnesses will testify about what European law enforcement agencies, their governments, and Jewish community groups need to do to ensure these partnerships are formalized and effective. They will discuss the ideal roles for the OSCE, the United States, and other civil society groups, in supporting these initiatives. The witnesses will also share what can be learned from the experiences of law enforcement agencies and Jewish communities to counter terrorism, and strengthen public safety more broadly. Their insights will help guide the efforts of the U.S. Government, the Congress, and my fellow Helsinki Commissioners, especially Commission Co-Chairman Senator Roger Wicker, and Ranking Member Senator Ben Cardin, who has been the Special Representative on Anti-Semitism, Racism and Intolerance for the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly since last March. Today's witnesses are world-class experts and practitioners on the subject. Rabbi Baker has been one of the most important figures in combating anti- Semitism and addressing Holocaust-era issues over the past few decades. He was first appointed as Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman- in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism in 2009 and every subsequent Chairman-in-Office has reappointed him. He has been the Director of International Jewish Affairs for the American Jewish Committee since 2001 and with the organization since 1979. He has served in senior leadership roles in many initiatives and been publicly commended many times over, including by heads of state in countries like Germany, for his efforts. Rabbi Baker and I have worked together closely to combat anti- Semitism for many years. I am pleased that we are able to hear a voice from Brussels, where ISIS followers murdered 32 people and injured more than 300 others only a month ago. Jonathan Biermann is Executive Director of the crisis cell of the Belgian Jewish community and was in charge of the cell at the time of the attack on the Jewish Museum in 2014. A lawyer by profession, he has been a member of the City Council of Uccle, a municipality in Brussels, since 2012 and is currently an Alderman on the Council. Mr. Biermann is a former Political Adviser to the President of the Belgian Senate, the Minister of Development Cooperation, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He brings the perspective of a Brussels native and resident born into a family very involved in the Jewish community. John Farmer is the Director of the Faith-Based Communities Security Program, part of the Institute for Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security, at Rutgers University, the State University of my home State of New Jersey. The Program spearheaded a major conference last July on ``Developing Community-Based Strategies to Prevent Targeted Violence and Mass Casualty Attacks'' in collaboration with the FBI, Department of Justice, and others. He was the Attorney General of New Jersey from 1999 to 2002 and Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission. Attorney General Farmer was later the Dean of the Rutgers Law School. Paul Goldenberg is the National Director of the Secure Community Network, a national homeland security initiative of the American Jewish community, and is also the CEO of Cardinal Point Strategies. A New Jersey native, for decades he was part of the law enforcement community, starting as a cop--including years of undercover work--and eventually as the first Chief of the Office of Bias Crimes and Community Relations for the State of New Jersey. Goldenberg has relevant experience with the OSCE, as the former Program Manager and Special Advisor for the OSCE/ODIHR Law Enforcement Officer Training Program for Combating Hate Crimes. He is currently Co-Chair of the Department of Homeland Security's Fighter Task Force, Vice Chair of the DHS Faith-Based Advisory Council, and a Special Advisor and Member of the Secretary of Homeland Security's Combating Violent Extremism Working Group. Finally, I am pleased to recognize the presence here today of Paul Miller, a Member of the Board of Overseers of Rutgers University. Throughout his law career, he was involved in public safety and security initiatives--including for the Jewish community--and continues that important work now through the Miller Family International Initiative at the Rutgers School of Law. To you, and to our witnesses, a warm welcome. I will now turn to my fellow Commissioners and other Members for any remarks they wish to make. We will then shift to opening statements from witnesses, starting with Rabbi Baker, and then moving to questions from Commissioners and other Members. Prepared Statement of Hon. Roger Wicker, Co-Chairman, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe I would like to thank Chairman Smith for holding this timely hearing and for his leadership in combating anti-Semitism. Nearly 71 years after the end of the Holocaust, it is appalling that people are still being attacked and murdered because they are Jewish. Anti-Semitism is part of the Islamic State's brutal ideology. The terrorist organization's followers have already shown their willingness and ability to target and kill members of European Jewish communities. They join other jihadi groups like al Qaeda, who kill innocent people because of their religion, ethnicity, or race. Terrorists are not the only violent threats to European Jewish communities. Others also contributing to anti-Semitic violence include individuals in disaffected and marginalized communities, Neo-Nazis, nationalist political forces that exploit historical anti-Semitism, and ideologues who invoke the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to justify anti- Semitic actions. Mr. Chairman, I would like to use this opportunity to mention another serious problem: Russia's manipulation and misrepresentation of issues related to anti-Semitism. Time and again, representatives of the Russian Federation have attended the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna or the annual OSCE human dimension meeting in Warsaw. These individuals have portrayed those who oppose Moscow as fascists. Russia may make a great deal of noise about fascism and anti- Semitism, but it continues to fund extremist, anti-Semitic parties like the National Front in France. It is therefore all the more important, Mr. Chairman, that hearings such as this are held. I have collaborated on these issues with my long-time friend Senator Ben Cardin, Ranking Member on this Commission, and the Special Representative on Anti-Semitism, Racism, and Intolerance for the OSCE's Parliamentary Assembly. We led Resolution 290, ``Commemorating the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht, or the Night of the Broken Glass,'' which the Senate passed unanimously. The resolution reaffirms America's steadfast commitment to remembering the Holocaust and eliminating the evil of anti-Semitism. As Chairman of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's Committee on Political Affairs and Security, I will do my part to help ensure that combating anti-Semitism is integrated into OSCE initiatives against terrorism and violent extremism. I will also continue to monitor Russia's outrageous exploitation of the scourge of anti-Semitism. Mr. Chairman, thank you again for convening this hearing. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses. Prepared Statement of Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin, Ranking Member, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe Recent events indicate the clear need for strategies to ensure the global security of Jewish communities. Last year, after being appointed the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's Special Representative on Anti-Semitism, Racism, and Intolerance, I visited with members of Jewish communities and others in Paris and Copenhagen, to hear directly from those most egregiously affected by the 2015 attacks. They not only expressed continuing security concerns, but a certainty that more attacks would occur. Despite government efforts to secure Jewish sites in the wake of the attacks, they questioned how long such security could realistically remain in place given the need to also secure larger society. Moreover, they questioned their future in a country where Jews and others could not live together without fear of violence. For some time, I have advocated for efforts that would address the root causes of anti-Semitism and stem the tide of violence. More resources have now been marshaled in this fight, from increased State Department funds to new initiatives at the OSCE spearheaded by the German Chairmanship. Human rights leaders from across Europe and the United States are now working together to address hate. I recently hosted young Muslim and Jewish leaders who were encouraging their communities to join forces. The OSCE has trained law enforcement officials across the region to recognize and prosecute anti-Semitic and other hate crimes across the region so that perpetrators know they will be punished. In addition to my position within the OSCE PA, the OSCE, EU, and many governments including our own have appointed officials to address anti-Semitism in our societies. I have long worked with the Department of State's Special Envoy on Combatting Anti-Semitism, Ira Forman, who unfortunately could not be here today. I am pleased that we are joined by the OSCE Chair-in-Office Personal Representative Rabbi Baker. Despite these best efforts, more must be done. We are currently witnessing a growth in extremist political rhetoric across the OSCE region, fueling an environment where expressions of hate are becoming increasingly more acceptable, and violence more frequent. For this reason I have advocated closer cooperation between the United States' government and European counter- parts ?to combat anti-Semitism and other biases. Our countries have had a long history of cooperation in the military and economic spheres. It's now time to apply our common efforts to strengthen our societies. Our repeated failures to protect the most vulnerable are increasingly challenging the very tenets of our democracies, and leading to their erosion. Alongside hard power, governments must equally provide long-term investments in soft power, such that we no longer need to fear our neighbors--and there's something worth saving behind the walls we erect. Finally, efforts to promote the security of Jewish communities, or to combat anti-Semitism more broadly, depend on robust protections for democracy, the rule of law, and human rights: democracy and minority rights will stand or fall together. In this regard, I am troubled by reports that Princeton-based Holocaust historian Jan Gross was recently summoned and interrogated by Polish prosecutors. Apparently Polish law enforcement is concerned that Gross's remarks on war-time events in Poland may have ``insulted the Polish nation.'' If we are to combat anti-Semitism, we must be able to discuss it without fear of prosecution. I look forward to hearing the recommendations from our witnesses today on strategies to address the immediate safety concerns of Jewish communities. I also await your thoughts on what more we can be doing to shift societal attitudes so that there is no longer a need for enhanced security measures, and Jews can live as all others in our societies. Prepared Statement of Rabbi Andrew Baker, AJC Director of International Jewish Affairs, Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson At the outset, let me express my appreciation to this Helsinki Commission and to its Chairman, Representative Chris Smith, for the pioneering work you have done in identifying and addressing the problem of antiSemitism in Europe. You have taken the lead in pressing the United States Government and European States and in mobilizing the OSCE to confront this ageold scourge which has now presented itself in this century in yet new forms and manifestations. Sadly, one of the problems we have faced and we continue to face is that governments are slow to recognize the very problem itself, let alone to marshal the necessary resolve and expertise to confront it. Fifteen years ago at a meeting with American Jewish representatives in New York the French Foreign Minister argued strenuously that the vandalism and violent attacks on Jewish targets that were just then beginning to occur in France could not be considered antiSemitic. They were, he said, merely the random misdeeds of unemployed and disaffected youth from the suburbs that paid no special attention to their frequent neighborhood targets. He then allowed that, perhaps they could be understood as reflecting the anger of the youthful perpetrators who were witnesses to the daily suffering of the Palestinians by their Israeli occupiers, as broadcast on French television. But in this case, he said, they should be considered political actions rather than antiSemitic incidents. But it eventually became clear that Jews were singled out for attack. And this antiSemitism plain and simple could not be excused as some justifiable expression of antiIsrael views. Today no less a personage than the current Prime Minister of France says clearly and repeatedly that antiZionism and hatred of Israel are synonymous with antiSemitism. The comments of that French Foreign Minister were not an isolated example. Governments and even Jewish communities themselves in France and elsewhere were slow to recognize that early increase in antiSemitic incidents. Most governments lacked the mechanisms to identify and record hate crimes, and fewer still to label those that were antiSemitic in nature. Jewish organizations were only just beginning to develop their own tools to record incidents. And as we have come to learn, many of those incidents then and still now go unrecorded. So when the European foreign policy chief Javier Solana said to me in 2002, when we discussed the problem of antiSemitism, ``I don't see it,'' he was correct. Most incidents were unreported, and most recorded incidents were not even identified as being antiSemitic. Although the problem of identifying the perpetrators of these antiSemitic attacks may be less ignorance than political correctness, at the time it was often asserted that many of them had particularly strong feelings about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict precisely because they or their families came from the region. In doing so, they were not trying to identify and address the problem, but instead to explain and excuse it. After the breakdown of an active peace process and with the Second Intifada there was increasing animosity toward the State of Israel shared by a growing number of political leaders and the general public, and fueled by what many considered a distorted and biased media. Perhaps the targets such as synagogues and Jewish schools were not appropriate, but the anger toward Israel that drove these youthful attackers was somehow considered understandable. For some, merely identifying a political motivation somehow separated it from the ``genuine'' antiSemitism that would be used to define attacks on the very same victims carried out by rightwing extremists. Eventually, some balance was restored to this discussion. The very act of throwing a Molotov cocktail at a Jewish school bus defines it as antiSemitism, regardless of the particular motives of the bomb thrower. These early struggles on recognition and identification were reflected in the debates and deliberations of international organizations. The OSCE Parliamentary Assembly took the lead, and it was followed by the OSCE itself and the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC). In 2004, the EUMC conducted its own survey on antiSemitism in the European Union. In interviews with Jewish leaders and representatives it found a high degree of anxiety and uncertainty. It also acknowledged the limited monitoring of antiSemitic incidents and hate crimes more generally, and it revealed that most of the EUMC's own country-by- country monitors lacked even a working definition of antiSemitism. The Berlin Declaration adopted by the OSCE in April 2004 declared, `` . . .unambiguously that international developments or political issues, including those in Israel or elsewhere in the Middle East, never justify antiSemitism.'' It also expressed the commitment of all the participating States to collect and maintain data on antiSemitic hate crimes. While many speakers in Berlin did not mince words, the official declaration could only hint at the problem, noting that antiSemitism had, ``assumed new forms and manifestations.'' Everyone was aware that the ``new antiSemitism'' was a term used to describe the special animus being directed at Israel, whereby the Jewish State was demonized and its very legitimacy called into question. Scholars and practitioners increasingly focused on this, arguing that any understanding of present-day antiSemitism must take it into account. Only some months later, this was reflected in the Working Definition of antiSemitism adopted by the EUMC and intended to fill the need made evident from its own first survey. The Working Definition was comprehensive, and it was especially notable for including a section describing how antiSemitism manifests itself with regard to the State of Israel. This included calling Israel a racist endeavor, applying double standards, using classic antiSemitic images to describe it, and equating its actions to those of the Nazis. It also cited an increasingly common phenomenon where Jewish communities themselves were held responsible for the actions of the Israeli State. Since it was first issued in 2005, a growing number of governments, international organizations, and civil society groups have employed the Working Definition in their monitoring and education work, and others such as the InterParliamentary Coalition to Combat AntiSemitism have called for its adoption. Unfortunately, these efforts were stalled a few years ago when the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), the successor to the EUMC, removed the definition from its website. At the same time, we can now cite the words of international leaders including Prime Minister Valls, President Obama, Prime Minister Cameron and Pope Francis that describe antiZionism as a form of antiSemitism. The Swiss Foreign Minister, Didier Burkhalter, during his OSCE Chairmanship in 2014 called the Working Definition a useful document for governments and civil society in understanding this phenomenon, and the current German Chairmanship has voiced a commitment to press for the greater use of it. Some people while acknowledging this new form of antiSemitism might still question its impact, dismissing it as just a matter of words. But that would be a mistake. We have seen how those words have consequences, where antiIsrael demonstrations have turned antiSemitic and then violent. They have had a corrosive effect on Jewish community security and have certainly caused many Jews to refrain from any public display of support for Israel or even their own Jewish identity. Of course it is second nature for Jews to worry. But there has been a change, and more and more European Jews themselves wonder about their future in Europe. We know this not just anecdotally but empirically, as a result of FRA's comprehensive survey of Jewish experiences and perceptions in eight EU States carried out in 2012. Nearly half of those surveyed worry about being a victim of an antiSemitic attack. Four in ten frequently or always avoid wearing anything in public that would identify them as being Jewish. And thirty percent have considered emigration because of the problem. We also learn from this survey that upwards of three quarters of antiSemitic incidents goes unreported. Even as more governments undertake to record antiSemitic hate crimes, very few of them seek to identify the perpetrators. Of those that do, they are usually defined in political terms--namely, those ascribed to rightwing populists or leftwing extremists. But in the FRA survey those who witnessed or experienced antiSemitism were offered a greater number of choices to identify the sources, and over fifty percent said they were people who hold, ``Muslim extremist views.'' This reality--that many of the antiSemitic incidents that Jews are experiencing today especially in Western and Northern Europe are coming from parts of the Arab and Muslim communities--still remains a very difficult thing for some governments to acknowledge. Some may fear that by doing so one is labeling an entire religious or ethnic group, although that must not be the case. There may be a concern that this will add to the prejudice and discrimination that many Muslims in Europe already experience and provide further ammunition to rightwing extremist parties. And in the case of France, home to the largest Jewish community in Europe, there are legal restrictions on even identifying people by religion or ethnicity. But all of this leads to the same result. How can Jewish communities have faith that their governments will address a problem that cannot even be named? And some attempts to speak about this while maintaining political correctness actually exacerbate the situation. It may be described as an issue for and between Jews and Muslims--``intercommunal tension'' as one French Interior Ministry official termed it--as though this is somehow a problem for two minorities who bear equal blame. Some political leaders move immediately to the assumed prescriptions. We need to foster Jewish-Muslim dialogue, they say. There is no question that dialogue between Jews and Muslims (and between other religious and ethnic groups) is enormously valuable. But we should be clear. It was not the lack of dialogue that created the problem, and dialogue alone will certainly not solve it. Although survey data is limited, we can see from what is available in some countries that European Muslims often have a higher level of anti-Jewish prejudice than the majority of the society. This should not come as a surprise. As German Chancellor Merkel pointed out earlier this year, they or their families come from countries where attitudes toward Jews are quite negative. Acknowledging this is not to ascribe blame. It is the necessary first step to develop effective educational and public awareness programs to address the problem. That FRA survey of 2012 already reflected a high degree of anxiety and uncertainty about day to day comfort and security, but government authorities were slow in recognizing it or responding to it. Meeting with Dutch officials in The Hague, I was told that increasing security in front of synagogues could not be done unless similar steps were taken for churches and mosques. In Brussels, Belgian officials conceded that the threat levels to Jewish communal buildings were quite high, but said they did not have the money to protect them. When the subject came up in Copenhagen, I was told by Danish officials that they rejected a request by the Jewish community to position police in front of the synagogue and school because they had, as they put it, ``a relaxed approach to security.'' They were more concerned that the general public would feel uncomfortable if they saw armed guards in front of buildings. Tragically, it took the terrorist attacks in Paris and Copenhagen in early 2015 to awaken authorities to the fact that Jews and Jewish institutions were among the first targets of radical Islamist extremists. Fortunately, most governments have stepped up their defense of Jewish institutions. Heavily armed police now patrol in front of synagogues and schools in Sweden and Denmark. In France and Belgium the military has been mobilized to guard these same buildings. In the Netherlands mobile police trailers have been erected in front of each synagogue and communal building, although (inexplicably) the police are only there to monitor and cannot leave the trailers. Jewish communities are grateful for these measures, which were long overdue. But now it is time to evaluate and compare them, to determine which are most effective and efficient. And what are the long term implications? Can this level of security be sustained indefinitely? What is the impact on Jewish children and their parents when the daily trip to school is a walk through military barricades? The fear of radical Islamist extremists in Europe--and in America-- has become palpable after the November attacks in Paris and last month's bombings in Brussels. The task of identifying returning foreign fighters and those who are self radicalized or inspired by ISIS has been an enormous challenge to intelligence and law enforcement agencies throughout the West. It is further complicated with the realization that among the hundreds of thousands of genuine refugees fleeing wartorn Iraq and Syria, there are likely additional terrorists and ISIS propagandists. And even for the vast majority who harbor no terrorist inclinations, there are obvious questions about how to address the deficit in values such as secularity, pluralism and gender equality that are an essential part of our Western societies. Surely then, it should be no surprise that the steady diet of anti-Israel and antiSemitic propaganda which marked those Middle Eastern societies will not be easily corrected. Overwhelmed as many countries are with the physical tasks of providing for them, will they have the necessary resources and skills to genuinely absorb and assimilate these immigrants as well? Previous experience with smaller numbers over many more years makes it hard to be optimistic, but what then is the alternative? In the meantime, rightwing, populist movements are emboldened by the crisis. Longstanding parties such as the National Front in France and the Freedom Party in Austria see their numbers growing. New parties such as Alternative for Germany are filling the vacuum. Some of these extremist parties--notably Jobbik in Hungary and Golden Dawn in Greece--have made antiSemitism a main feature of their ideology. But even those which primarily feed on anti-migrant and anti-Muslim prejudices are cause for alarm. Bigotry cannot be compartmentalized, and the supporters of these parties are rather generous with their hatreds. That 2004 OSCE Berlin Declaration stated that antiSemitism poses a threat to democracy, to the values of civilization and to security in the OSCE region and beyond. That was both a warning and a more expansive reason (if one was necessary) that Jew hatred is wrong and must be confronted. Today there is ample evidence that this is true and that all are linked together. Yes, the struggle to combat antiSemitism is about ensuring that we have an environment that is safe and secure and nurturing of Jewish communal life and the lives of individual Jews. But it cannot be separated from--and in fact it is really the measure of--how successful we will be in preserving the democratic and pluralist values which all of us holds dear. Rabbi Andrew Baker is Director of International Jewish Affairs for the American Jewish Committee. In this position he is responsible for maintaining and developing AJC's network of relationships with Jewish communities throughout the Diaspora and addressing the accompanying international issues and concerns. He has been a prominent figure in addressing Holocaust-era issues in Europe and in international efforts to combat anti-Semitism. In January 2009 he was appointed the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism and has been reappointed in each successive year. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, an intergovernmental body of 57 nations headquartered in Vienna, has become a central arena for addressing the problems of a resurgent anti-Semitism. He has played an active role in confronting the legacy of the Holocaust. He is a Vice President of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims against Germany, the Jewish umbrella organization that has worked on restitution issues for over half a century. In 2003 he was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit (First Class) by the President of Germany for his work in German-Jewish relations. He was a member of Government Commissions in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia that were established to address the claims of Holocaust Victims. He was a founding member of the National Historical Commission of Lithuania and involved in restitution negotiations there. He currently serves as co-chairman of the Lithuanian Good Will Foundation, established in 2012 to administer communal compensation payments. In 2006 the President of Lithuania presented him with the Officer's Cross of Merit for his work, and in 2012 he was awarded the Lithuanian Diplomacy Star. For similar work he was awarded the Order of the Three Stars by the President of Latvia in 2007. He helped the Romanian Government establish a national commission to examine its Holocaust history and served as one of its founding members. For this work he was awarded the National Order of Merit (Commander) by the President of Romania in 2009. Rabbi Baker directed AJC efforts in the development and construction of the Belzec Memorial and Museum, a joint project of AJC and the Polish Government on the site of the former Nazi death camp in Southeastern Poland. In May 2006 he was appointed by the Prime Minister of Poland to a six-year term on the International Auschwitz Council, the official governmental body that oversees the work of the Auschwitz State Museum. A long-time resident of Washington, DC, Rabbi Baker has served as President of the Washington Board of Rabbis, President of the Interfaith Conference of Washington and Commissioner on the District of Columbia Human Rights Commission. He has also served as a congregational rabbi in Chicago and a chaplain at San Quentin Prison in California. A native of Worcester, Massachusetts, Rabbi Baker received a B.A. from Wesleyan University and a Masters' Degree and Rabbinic Ordination from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York City. He is the father of four children. Prepared Statement of Jonathan Biermann, Executive Director, Crisis Cell for the Belgian Jewish Community The presence of Jews in Belgium can be traced from the 1st century A.C. and is confirmed during the 13th century. The religious institutions were organized under French authority and Napoleon created the Consistory organizing the cult before the establishment of the Kingdom of Belgium. With two main locations, the Antwerp community is for its majority composed by orthodox movements (comparable to the communities established in New York or in Israel) while Brussels is more secular with vivid institutions and approximately 20,000 individuals in a city of 1.1 million. Allow me to describe the current atmosphere among Belgian Jews: Community members are nowadays used to seeing police, guards, military in front of Jewish buildings and schools. It has been so for decades and I would say that although it is not a normal situation for a well integrated community, it is a relief to know that the risks on the Jewish community are assessed and taken seriously, in the limits of the governments capacities. Yet the situation is worrying as the statistics compiled by the NGO Antisemitisme.be (data are also used by Study centers and universities, International institutions (OSCE), Daily contacts with the Interfederal Center for Equal Opportunities) show the following: The level of hatred has not been so high since 1945 (raise of 70% in 2014 compared to 2016:Anti-Semitic discourse spreads in an unprecedented extent, especially in internet. A new phenomenon of discrimination is targeting the Jewish individuals and violence has reached an unprecedented level of horror as were killed in the terrorist attack of the Brussels Jewish Museum (May 24 2014) A major survey among Flemish teenagers has indicated that anti-Semitism is seven times more prevalent among Muslim youths than in non-Muslim teenagers (Mark Elchardus and Johan Put, Jong in Brussel. Bevindingen uit de JOP-monitor, Acco, Leuven, 2011). In the last two years, the press denounced anti-semitic incidents in public schools, including with teachers making anti- semitics problems. As a consequence, for several years, jews are leaving public schools for Jewish schools which increases the distance between jews and non-jews in what should remain a community where diversity in promoted. Jewish life in Europe is part of its diversity. As we also know from the Fundamental Rights Agency Survey, an increasing number of Jews feel less and less comfortable attending Jewish events and institutions. In such a situation, and I will express a personal opinion on this matter, the propagation of radical Islam is the symptom of the failure in education specifically within the younger generation of the Muslim community. Many causes and effects can be described. But to stay focused on our purpose, it also results in mistrust and suspicion in the relationship existing between the community and the police, intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Having the opportunity to observe the work and expertise of John Farmer and Paul Goldenberg, the Institute for Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security, the Faith- Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers University and their international partners, I am convinced that sharing best practices in the implementation of the ``See something Say something strategy'' is of crucial importance. Such a strategy should be implemented at the level of each community as at the level of the broader community. The communication channels established between communities and the authorities, government and law enforcement agencies would participate in the establishment of a more balanced society based on respect and mutual understanding. Sharing concern about what is happening in the various communities is a fundamental step which has to be followed by action. Creating the tools to communicate amongst communities with the government will be considerably facilitated by the ``See something Say something strategy.'' The collaboration with law enforcement agencies has to be based on trust and confidence, in respect of international laws and rules protecting individual freedom, civil liberties and privacy. Communication channels, types of intelligence collected by each actor must be clearly defined. The protocols existing in the US, the UK and France should be a reference for local police and national law enforcement agencies empowering local communities. The situation of local communities and the relationship with the authorities should be regularly assessed. Taking the example of Brussels after the attack on the Jewish Museum, emergency planning and communication with local police have worked properly. Lessons have now to be taken in order to structure the coordination. Establishing a Memorandum of Understanding would now be an important step and should be based on what is already implemented in neighboring countries like France. At this stage, communal leadership is crucial as operational and symbolic choices have to be made. Considering the risks assessing the threats and knowing that public resources are limited (especially in the days following the terrorist attacks that occurred in Brussels on March 22), what decisions should be taken about the activities planned? In this case, security challenges the constitutional principle of freedom of religion. Who should take responsibility? Confidence and collaboration should guide community leadership, law enforcement agencies and political leaders in the decisionmaking process. Fortunately enough, political statements have also been of great determination in condemning Antisemitism and violence. The Belgian Government has provided public funding to improve the physical protection of buildings used by the Jewish community. As a conclusion, I would underline the necessity of establishing the terms of reference that European governments should use. International organizations and agencies are a key player in that matter. I personally believe that the OSCE could develop a platform to exchange good practices and confront the approaches and strategies in fighting an external threat with domestic impact and support. I would finally formulate the following recommendations: Implement ``If you see something, Say Something'' with Jewish Communities as pilots Empower Jewish Communities by establishing a MoU defining the collaboration between law enforcement agencies and Jewish communities Never banalize Antisemitism Annex: List of Antisemitic terrorist attacks in Belgium: In 1980, grenades were launched in Antwerp on a group of Jewish children, one is killed. On 20 October 1981 a car bomb outside a synagogue in Antwerp killing three and sixty wounded. In 1982, a gunman opened fire at the entrance to the Great Synagogue of Brussels and injured four people. In 1989, Dr. Joseph Wybran, chairman of the Jewish Organizations Coordinating Committee of Belgium is assassinated. Several places of worship in Brussels, Antwerp and Charleroi are attacked in 2002. In June 2003, a person tries to blow up the synagogue in Charleroi. May 24, 2014, individual broke into the Jewish Museum of Belgium in Brussels and killed two tourists, volunteer and an employee. All Antisemitic incident is officially recorded by www.Antisemitisme.be Jonathan Biermann is a lawyer admitted to the Bar of Brussels. He has been a Member of the City Council of the Municipality of Uccle in Brussels since 2006 and an Alderman in the same municipality since 2012. He was the Political Adviser to the President of the Belgian Senate, the Development Minister, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. As Political Adviser, Biermann was responsible for politicomilitary issues, combating Anti-Semitism, and the broader fight against intolerance. While obtaining his law degree at the Free University of Brussels, Biermann was Chairman of a students' association ``Circle of Free Inquiry'' and then Adviser to the Rector for cultural affairs. Since July 2015, Jonathan has been the President of the Alumni of the University. Biermann comes from a family that is very involved in the Jewish community and was born and raised in Brussels. After being involved in various cultural organizations, he was appointed to establish the crisis plan of the Jewish community. He is the executive director of the crisis cell of the Jewish community and was in charge of the cell at the time of the attack on the Jewish Museum on May 24th 2014. Prepared Statement of John J. Farmer, Jr., Rutgers University Professor of Law Mr. Chairman and distinguished Helsinki Commission Members: Thank you for this opportunity to testify today on the subject of ``Anticipating and Preventing Attacks on the European Jewish Communities in Europe.'' Today's hearing comes at a critical juncture in the struggle against transnational terrorism, in the history of the Jewish communities in Europe, and in the progress of civilization in securing the safety of vulnerable communities worldwide. My name is John Farmer. I am currently a University Professor of Law at Rutgers University. Prior to my current position, I served as Rutgers University Counsel, as Dean of Rutgers School of Law-Newark, as a partner in two law firms, as Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission, as New Jersey's Attorney General, as Chief Counsel to Governor Whitman, and as a federal prosecutor. Of most relevance to today's hearing, I was the chief law enforcement officer in New Jersey on 9/11, a day when our state lost some 700 of its citizens. I can never forget that day, or the sense of failure and disbelief I felt that such an attack could have succeeded. Understanding exactly what went wrong and how public safety can be protected during a terrorist attack or other crisis has been a focus of my work in the years since. As Senior Counsel for the 9/11 Commission, I had the opportunity to study the crisis as it was experienced in real time by everyone from the President to the evacuating civilians in New York's Twin Towers. I wrote a book, ``The Ground Truth,'' comparing the response on 9/11 to the response to Hurricane Katrina, and found disturbing parallels between the way the government reacted to a complete surprise attack and the way it reacted to a storm that had been anticipated for years and for which detailed plans were in place. The responses to both events, I found, failed to take account of the fact that, as stated in The 9/11 Commission Report, ``[t]he `first' first responders on 9/11, as in most catastrophes, were private-sector civilians. . . [P]rivate-sector civilians are likely to be the first responders in any future catastrophes.'' (The 9/11 Commission Report, at 317.) Among trained emergency personnel like police, fire, and EMTs, moreover, both crises demonstrated that ``critical early decisions will have to be made by responders who are not the top officials. . . Planning for a crisis should accept that reality and empower and train people `on the ground' to make critical decisions.'' (John Farmer, The Ground Truth, at 324.) The truth of that observation has been borne out in subsequent attacks ranging from the London subway bombing to the murders at the Jewish museum in Brussels to the murders at the kosher grocery store in Paris to the most recent attacks at the Paris cafes, stadium, and concert hall and at the Brussels airport. As the threat has become more diffuse, and the attacks less predictable, I believe the following conclusion has become inescapable: Anticipating and preventing attacks on European Jewish communities--or, for that matter, on any vulnerable communities--will be impossible without a dramatically greater engagement of law enforcement with the affected communities and people, and of the affected communities and people with each other. For the past nearly two years, I have had the privilege of leading, along with Rutgers Professor of Criminal Justice John Cohen, formerly Counterterrorism Coordinator for the Department of Homeland Security, an initiative at Rutgers University designed to identify the best ways to protect vulnerable communities in light of the evolving threat. Funded generously by Rutgers alumnus Paul Miller, former general counsel of Pfizer, and his family, Rutgers began what we have called the Faith-Based Communities Security Program two years ago by taking a close look at the evolving threat, and by taking an equally close look at the security situations of several European Jewish communities. To assist us, we have had the privilege of working with subject matter experts like Paul Goldenberg, Rabbi Baker, Sean Griffin, recently retired as Counterterrorism Coordinator for Europol, and Richard Benson, who helped establish the Community Security Trust in Great Britain. The reasons for our initial focus on the European Jewish communities are two-fold. First, because the European Jewish communities are the original diaspora communities, and have survived in parts of Europe despite attempts to eliminate them for over two thousand years, we believe that these communities have much to teach other vulnerable communities about security and resilience. These lessons are particularly important, in our view, because the demographics of our world have been transformed within our lifetimes; according to estimates that predate the recent Syrian refugee crisis, over 20 percent of the world's people now live in a nation other than where they were born. That amounts to well over a billion people trying to adapt to foreign cultures. The world of the future is therefore a diaspora world, a world of vulnerable communities. Second, we thought it would be instructive to look at European Jewish communities now because, as Jonathan Biermann, Paul Goldenberg and Rabbi Baker will describe in greater detail, they have been under renewed stress in Europe as a consequence of Islamist radicalization and, to a lesser but persistent extent, age-old European anti-Semitism. The occurrence of anti-Semitic incidents had spiked dramatically, culminating in the murders at the Jewish Museum in Brussels shortly before we began our study. The threat evolved and became more deadly even as we undertook our work. Indeed, the urgency of our work has escalated with each new attack. A team from Rutgers was on the ground in Paris during the Paris attacks of 2015 and in the aftermath of December's attack, in the aftermath of Copenhagen's attack, in the weeks preceding the Brussels attacks last month, and also in sensitive locations such as Malmo, Stockholm, Amsterdam, London, Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. In those locations and others we have met and consulted with Jewish community security leaders and representatives of law enforcement, the governments, and civil society. At the same time, we have worked with U.S. communities and law enforcement partners to develop what FBI officials have called an ``off-ramp'' from radicalization: an adaptable, multi-disciplinary intervention strategy to attempt to identify precursor conduct and enable communities to protect themselves and each other. The development of such strategies is impossible without a high level of public, community, and civil society engagement with law enforcement. We did a read-out of preliminary findings at a conference last year in Washington, co-sponsored by the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the Bipartisan Policy Center, and Rutgers, and hosted by the FBI at its headquarters. We also had the opportunity to describe our work at the Hague to an audience of European police chiefs. As a consequence of that meeting, we had planned to conduct a follow-up summit at Europol headquarters this summer. But the time for conference-level discussion is over. The recent attacks in Paris and Brussels have made more urgent the need to take action now to protect vulnerable communities. The situation on the ground has become dire; the challenge to the Jewish communities has become nothing less than existential. Many stalwart leaders have become ambivalent about remaining in Europe at all. The communities have become caught in a double-helix of hate, in which terrorist attacks energize the forces of xenophobia and nationalism, which have tended historically to turn eventually on the Jewish communities. The only thing the Islamist terrorists have in common with such forces is that both hate the Jews. In short, this is a time of particular peril for the Jewish future in Europe, and it is incumbent upon us to do what we can to assure that future. Why? In addition to the fact that assisting these communities is simply the right thing to do, in my view the future of our world of vulnerable communities is at stake. If the oldest diaspora community in the world cannot survive in a place where it has lived for longer than two thousand years, in a place where it survived the Nazis, the future of other vulnerable communities can only be described as bleak. The wholesale slaughter of Christians and nonconforming Muslims in Syria and Iraq and elsewhere begins to look less like isolated atrocities and more like a harrowing vision of our children's future. After consulting with our European partners in Brussels, Copenhagen, London, the Hague, and elsewhere, we have decided to take action now in the following ways that are a direct outgrowth of our work. FIRST, with the encouragement of law enforcement and the affected communities, we will be traveling back to Brussels and Copenhagen in the coming weeks to explore concrete ways in which we might assist the Jewish and other vulnerable communities and law enforcement in working together to enhance public safety. At a meeting of the OSCE last spring in Vienna, many joined the representative of France in calling for some variation of ``if you see something, say something'' training and public engagement as an essential step in improving public safety. The need for a similar kind of civil defense approach has grown with each attack since then. We are working on refining that approach to meet the needs of individual communities. But our assistance extends beyond that program. SECOND, with a view to their application to all vulnerable communities, we are writing and plan to publish online this summer the Rutgers Guide to Protecting Vulnerable Communities. This work will provide a distillation of best practices that we have identified in the course of our work. These practices are adaptable to other vulnerable communities and to various law enforcement structures around the world. They will represent our assessment of the most effective ways in which governments and communities can work together to provide safety for vulnerable populations. They range from relatively obvious and easily adaptable steps--the creation of crisis management teams within communities; regular exercising in crisis management; facilities audits to ensure that potential soft targets are hardened--to more challenging but essential steps, such as regular communication with law enforcement, training of individuals to identify potential threats, and outreach to other vulnerable communities and elements of civil society in order to develop effective approaches to intervention. The guide will be available to all, and we plan to offer on the ground assistance to those who request it, within our means. THIRD, we plan to focus our efforts on filling a need that has been highlighted in the United States and in every country we have visited, and echoed by communities, government officials and members of the private sector alike: improved information sharing of open source and social media information. After having consulted with current and former law enforcement officials as well as having heard the concerns of the faith community, NGOs, and private sector entities, I believe that a lasting contribution of our project to public safety may well lie in facilitating the more efficient sharing of critical open source information with faith-based communities, NGOs, human rights organizations, and the private sector. This effort would not be meant to replace, but rather to complement, governmental information-sharing efforts which, while admirable, have a necessarily different and primarily law enforcement focus. Such an effort will be fundamental to promoting the enhanced level of public engagement that I believe is required in order to protect public safety. Mr. Chairman, our work in Europe, and the recent attacks in Paris and Brussels, has underscored the ground truth of every attack and natural catastrophe since 9/11: it is more essential now than ever that the public be engaged at every level in its own protection. As FBI Director Comey and other law enforcement leaders have recognized for over a year now, the threat to public safety is evolving; law enforcement can no longer act alone--if it ever truly could--in combating it. A better informed, trained, and engaged community is a safer community. We are committed to providing the education, information, and training that will enable the Jewish and the vulnerable communities of other cultures and beliefs, wherever they are threatened and whenever they ask, not just to survive but to flourish. The stakes for the Jewish and other vulnerable communities today cannot be higher; if done right, however, the rewards from these efforts will be reflected in a safer and more peaceful future for all. Thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity. John Farmer became dean of Rutgers School of Law-Newark in July 2009. From April 2013 until June 30, 2014 he was on a leave of absence to serve as Senior Vice President and University Counsel. He returned to the faculty as University Professor, effective July 1, 2014. Professor Farmer continues to hold an administrative post as Special Counsel to the President. Professor Farmer received his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, where he was a member of The Tax Lawyer and received first prize in the 1984 Lincoln and the Law Essay Contest. He received his B.A. from Georgetown University, with a major in English. He began his career as a law clerk to Associate Justice Alan B. Handler of the New Jersey Supreme Court. He then worked for two years as a litigation associate at Riker, Danzig, Scherer, Hyland & Perretti LLP before joining the Office of the U.S. Attorney in Newark, where he prosecuted crimes ranging from kidnapping and arms dealing to bank fraud. In 1993 he received the U.S. Attorney General's Special Achievement Award for Sustained Performance. Professor Farmer joined the administration of New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman in 1994, serving as assistant counsel, deputy chief counsel, and then chief counsel. From 1999-2002 he was New Jersey attorney general. Among his noteworthy accomplishments, he argued school funding and criminal justice matters before the New Jersey Supreme Court and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals; moved forward with reform of the New Jersey State Police, from eliminating racial profiling to increasing diversity in recruitment and promotion; created the Office of Inspector General to investigate allegations of official impropriety and/or corruption; and served as the first chairman of the New Jersey Domestic Preparedness Task Force, leading the coordination of the state's law enforcement and victim/witness response to the terror attacks of September 11, 2001. From 2003-2004 Professor Farmer served as senior counsel and team leader for the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (commonly known as the 9/11 Commission). In that position he led the investigation of the country's preparedness for and response to the terrorist attacks and was a principal author of the Commission's final report. His book, ``The Ground Truth: The Untold Story of America Under Attack on 9/11,'' a reconsideration of the government's 9/11 response in light of its response to Hurricane Katrina, was published by Riverhead/Penguin Press. Professor Farmer has received the highest peer-reviewed rating from Martindale-Hubbell, and has been named a New Jersey Super Lawyer, one of New York Magazine's Best Lawyers in the New York area, and one of the Best Lawyers in America. He was a partner in the white collar crime and internal investigations group at K&L Gates and in 2007 became a founding partner of the law firm Arseneault, Whipple, Farmer, Fassett and Azzarello, LLP. In addition to his law practice, in 2008 he served as senior advisor to General James Jones, Special Envoy for Middle East Regional Security, on development of the rule of law in the Palestinian Authority territory, and was invited by the U.S. Embassy in Armenia to assist that nation's legislative commission in investigating widespread violence and unrest following its elections. Professor Farmer has been a frequent contributor to the Star-Ledger and the New York Times, with essays and opinion columns on legal and political issues, and has had articles published in the Rutgers Law Review, Seton Hall Law Review, and other journals. His article on the Patriot Act, ``At Freedom's Edge,'' was part of a Star-Ledger series that was awarded the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award for outstanding legal reporting in 2006. Dean Farmer has also lectured extensively on post 9/11 safety and security issues, and spoken on panels at Harvard Law School, the University of Southern California, Willamette Law School, and Johns Hopkins University's Paul Nitze School of Advanced International Studies. Professor Farmer is president of the board of trustees of the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice and a former member of the New Jersey Governor's Ethics Advisory Board. Prepared Statement of Paul Goldenberg, National Director, Secure Community Network Good Afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen. My name is Paul Goldenberg. I currently serve as a senior advisor to the United States Department of Homeland Security as a member of the Secretary's Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC). In that capacity, I serve on the Countering Violent Extremism Sub-Committee, Co-Chair the Foreign Fighter Task Force and am Vice-Chair of the Faith-Based Advisory & Communications Sub-Committee. In addition, for the past decade, I've served as the National Director of the Secure Community Network (SCN), the official national homeland security initiative of the American Jewish community. Working under the auspices of The Jewish Federations of North America and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, we serve to connect the 151 Federations, 300 network communities and over fifty organizations that make up these entities with vital information, intelligence and resources to best ensure the safety and security of the Jewish community, here in the United States. In addition to these efforts, I have had the recent privilege of working closely with the Faith-Based Communities Security Program at Rutgers University. As a part of this new initiative, and working under the leadership of former New Jersey Attorney General John Farmer, I have made countless trips in recent months overseas, traveling to multiple European cities. Through these trips, I have been able to gain a first-hand understanding of the current climate, hearing the concerns of communities who are under threat, and assessing what can do to best assist them. What we have seen, heard and learned has confirmed our initial hypothesis: while the levels of cooperation and partnerships between Jewish and other minority religious communities with their respective policing services--in many parts of Europe--is as diverse as the communities themselves, more work needs to be accomplished to move closer to a medium and standard of safety and security. While this presents distinct challenges, there is also hope. For much of what we have learned, innovated, tested and improved upon here in the United States, as well as in other progressive nations, can be imparted to, and replicated by, many of our partners. Mr. Chairman: thank you for the opportunity to testify today about the current state of affairs in Europe, specifically the alarming levels of anti-Semitism impacting Jewish communities but, more broadly, acts of targeted violence, extremism and terrorism impacting both vulnerable communities as well as the broader public. I am both proud and honored to be here with such a distinguished group of colleagues, today. I applaud you and the Commission for its steadfast commitment and unwavering support towards ensuring that human security dimension remains an enduring right of all people, particularly during such challenging times. I speak to you today not as an academic, but as a practitioner--as a former law enforcement executive who has personally seen the impact of hate crimes, acts of targeted violence, extremism and terrorism. I began my career over thirty-five years ago walking the beat, a rare American Jewish cop on the streets of Irvington, New Jersey. I retired as Chief of the New Jersey Attorney General's Office of Bias Crimes and Community Affairs, the first-of-its-kind office in the nation. In 2004, I was appointed by the Chairman as a senior law enforcement advisor to the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). In that capacity, I had the honor of working with law enforcement officials and community leaders in nearly 10 European countries, working hand in hand to combat anti-Semitism, xenophobia, extremism and domestic terrorism. As a law enforcement professional who spent over twenty years working on the issues we are discussing today, what I can tell you is that, over seventy years after the fires of National Socialism in Europe were extinguished, sadly, disturbingly and dangerously, the embers of that hatred still glow. In some places, they burn. Fires can move quickly. Engulfing things rapidly. Unless we act, we risk allowing the fires of hate to kindle further. To move faster. To reach farther. Jewish communities in Europe have long been targeted. But much more than simply the target of hate, they represent something else. They have often acted as the proverbial canaries in a coal mine, forecasting larger problems and issues. . . foreshadowing broader concerns for other communities. In this, recent events--from the attacks in Paris against Jewish targets to the potential targeting of Jewish people in Brussels--are not a new phenomenon for Jewish communities, across Europe. Rather, the most recent attacks merely represent the continuation of targeted violence that has changed the way in which--as a community--they function, from the way religious institutions and schools approach gatherings to what community members wear in public. Highlighting these issues, the Anti-Semitism Report for 2014 saw a significant increase in anti-Semitic incidents worldwide and found that local governments are often not doing enough to eradicate the incidents and violence. The report also notes that 2014 showed a marked increase in terrorism as well as unprecedented violent attacks against Jewish targets: Some 55% of respondents do not feel safe in their own country and are afraid to walk around with Jewish symbols in the street. In the United Kingdom, 45% of respondents reported that they do not feel safe in their own country and about 37% of respondents are afraid to walk around with Jewish symbols. In the span of two decades, we've moved from swastikas on buildings, the desecration of graveyards and simple assaults, as well as long-standing institutionalized anti-Semitism, to brutal violence, commando-style shooting attacks and even suicide bombings on the streets of Europe by battlefield-trained terrorist cells and organizations. From the 2006 torture and killing of Ilan Halimi, to the schoolyard slaughter of Jewish children in Toulouse, France in 2012 to the attack against the Brussels Jewish Museum, largely viewed as the first ISIS- related attack in Europe, and nearly two years before many European countries recognized ISIS-trained operatives were immersed across the continent. The list goes on. The escalation of these attacks, from seemingly isolated incidents against Jewish communities and military targets, has materialized into a recurring phenomenon where no soft targets, including children, are safe. ``Soft targets''--once thought of as safe havens and sanctuaries--have become the chosen targets of hatred and violent extremism. and Jewish affiliated locations, organizations and people, the preferred victims. Unfortunately, some communities have imported the Middle Eastern conflict into their host countries, with attending acts of violence and unbridled anti-Semitism toward local Jewish communities which had otherwise lived peacefully except during the Holocaust interregnum. While these events are not without precedent, the pace, frequency, and scale should be setting off alarms not just in Europe, but here in the U.S. According to the annual Terrorism and Political Violence Map released by Aon Risk Solutions just last week, ``2015 was the most lethal year for terrorist violence in Europe in nearly a decade.'' Over the past year, France in particular has been on the frontlines of this battle, experiencing multiple mass casualty attacks within the span of eight months including one of the worst terrorist attacks in French history. In the past few years, we have watched as a storm has been brewed. Growing anti-Semitism, xenophobia, attacks against religious institutions by those inspired by Jihad, and now ultra-nationalism, is growing unlike anything we have seen since the 1930s. This vortex has spawned not just a threat to select vulnerable communities and populations in Europe, but poses an overarching threat to human security and the safety and security of free and open societies where citizens enjoy the right to worship and gather freely without intimidation, fear and harm. When citizens of free countries, including our own, no longer feel safe in their houses of worship.this is a direct threat to a nation's democracy and freedom. But, as so many have watched the storm brew. . . few did little, if anything, to prepare. For some, it now appears that we have little more at our disposal than an umbrella. . . for a hurricane. What is at risk from this threat? This new reality? In a sense, it is the very fabric and spirit of these democratic societies and the collaborative, cooperative and trusting relationships between authorities and the communities they're sworn to protect. The passage of House Resolution 354, ``Expressing the Sense of the House of Representatives Regarding the Safety and Security of Jewish Communities in Europe'' is a watershed moment that has reinvigorated and will provide much needed support to enable much needed collaboration with our European partners. It is the formalization of this resolution, Mr. Chairman, and years of tireless work leading up to it, which has provided us with the impetus and roadmap to truly operationalize these public-private capacity building and community engagement efforts across the EU. An epidemic that plagues Europe requires a transnational approach and commitment to working across borders and jurisdictions to effectively combat the threat. Our effort proposes a comprehensive approach that would connect the Jewish and other communities, law enforcement and other mechanisms of civil society in identifying the specific challenges facing the communities of Europe from the perspective of organizational structure, training, awareness efforts, standardized technologies, and coalition building. The effort will then develop operational recommendations for partnership building, exchanging good practices, providing critical security awareness training, based on strategies that have been developed over time in Europe, Israel, the United States and elsewhere, and that can be effective in confronting the identified challenges. One of the most critical outcomes of the effort would be a formalized recognition and relationship between those responsible for Jewish communal security and the policing agencies that vow to protect them. Inherent in this effort will be the sensitization of law enforcement to the issues, engaging the men and women of those agencies to work to build trust between the police and the communities of Europe. . . their communities. Committing themselves to undertake a partnership to address the threats on an ongoing--as opposed to an ad- hoc--basis; as attacks on Europe's diverse, distinct and various religious communities continue, the police will be increasingly called upon to respond to these attacks in more resolute ways. This effort will require the engagement and coalition support of regional governing bodies, policing consortiums and non-governmental organizations with deep experience in combatting anti-Semitism, xenophobia, violent extremism and terrorism; it will include leadership and security heads of European Jewish communities, along with the OSCE, European Union, Europol and Interpol. Developing an organic strategy is paramount to the success of this initiative. This is particularly critical as those targeting Jewish institutions and other communities have often, and seemingly successfully, influenced some within the public and private sector with the belief that Jewish institutions are not part of the fabric of European society; that they are nothing more than an extension of some foreign government whom are represented by its security, intelligence and military activities. Nothing could be farther from the truth; these Jewish communities are a part of Europe. and they have been for hundreds of years and despite a history replete with efforts to expel, exterminate or simply excoriate them. Focusing on collaborative partnerships and the protection and preservation of shared, common values can--and will--trump suspicions and differences. We will work collectively to promote community cohesion. Despite religious, ethnic and cultural differences, we've achieved success in rallying around the common shared values of protecting our houses of worship and safeguarding our children; both from becoming victims of violence and being lured, inspired and radicalized to become perpetrators of that same violence. While law enforcement and policing services, taking on roles as agents of social change and a visible extension of their governments' interests in protecting its people, are integral to this process and solution, community participation, engagement and responsibility are paramount to achieve success. As we've experienced here at home with our own diffuse and evolving terrorism threat, law enforcement cannot tackle this burden alone. As such, educating and empowering communities to become active participants and stakeholders in their own safety and security pays measurable dividends in contributing to the safety and security of the neighborhoods in which they live, work and play. Here in the U.S., the expansion of the ``If you See Something, Say Something'' campaign has harnessed millions of eyes and ears as force-multipliers to detect and report suspicious activities. Treating the public as a key partner in counter-terrorism promotes greater engagement and reduced public apathy and believe counter-terrorism is primarily a responsibility of government. Increasing information sharing efforts between law enforcement and community leaders and organizations builds ``communities of trust'' and facilitates greater cooperation and collaboration. Engaging citizens and communities through trainings and exercises teaches people to know what to look for and know how to respond in an emergency. In closing, I'd ask you to consider this: In January 2015, The Grand Synagogue of Paris shuttered for Shabbat services on Friday night following the terrorist attacks against Charlie Hebdo and Hyper Cacher, marking the first time since World War II that the synagogue was closed on the Sabbath. Following the attacks, 10,000 police and soldiers were deployed across France to guard Jewish institutions against follow on attacks, an effort that, in many places, continues today. In December 2015, New Year's Eve fireworks and festivities in Brussels were canceled following a terror alert warning of an imminent attack against the city, a month after the November terrorist attacks in Paris killed over 130 people. These are NOT the ``kind of firsts'' we wish to celebrate. . . nor will we tolerate; we cannot be plagued and paralyzed by the violent will of hate and extremism. Through programs and initiatives of trust and collaboration, we'll continue to pursue these efforts to ensure vigilance is eternal and communities and neighborhoods remain safe and secure; we'll continue building a culture of awareness, not a community of fear. Our strength lies in our diversity, acceptance and common collective goal to assemble freely in our respective houses of worship, without fear, intimidation or threat of violence. We've long recognized that an attack on one of us, is an attack on all of us. While the threat of terrorism remains our resolve has grown. However, our response will be measured, devoid of the fear and uncertainty that terrorism and violent extremist ideologies seek to instill. Time is not on our side. We're past the time for more summits, conferences and meetings. The pace and tempo of attacks requires swift, yet informed conviction and actions. We've experienced hard lessons, we must LEARN from them; we've developed best practices; we must SHARE them. Mahatma Gandhi once said, ``The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable.'' I'd like to personally thank the Chairman and his staff for their continued leadership with the Commission in ensuring that the United States of America will forever fight for the protection and preservation of the human rights, safety and security of all global citizens. Mr. Goldenberg is Chairman and President of Cardinal Point Strategies and a member of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC). In December 2014, DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson appointed Mr. Goldenberg as co-chair of the National DHS Foreign Fighter Task Force. He currently serves as Vice Chair of the US Department of Homeland Security's Faith-Based Council and as senior advisor to the Department's newly established Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) initiative. Before founding CPS, he played a key role in setting domestic and international policy for the legislation and investigation of hate crimes and countering violent extremism and has been an international thought leader in information sharing, conflict resolution, public safety and counter terrorism policy. He established community policing, hate crimes, and CVE-related programs for transnational agencies, many of which were adopted by governments in North America and Europe. His public career includes more than two decades as a former senior official of the New Jersey State Attorney General's Office, Director of the nation's 6th largest county social service and juvenile justice system, and as a law enforcement official who headed investigation efforts for significant cases of domestic terrorism, political corruption, and organized crime. Following a series of highly publicized incidents of domestic terrorism and hate crimes, the NJ State Attorney General appointed Mr. Goldenberg as the first state Chief of the Office of Bias Crimes and Community Relations. During his tenure, he wrote many of the model procedures for domestic terrorism investigations and policy framework for building police and community partnerships, many of which became models for national and international policy and legislation. In 2004, he spearheaded an international law enforcement mission for the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), during which he worked in over 10 European nations including Ukraine, Hungary, Kosovo and Croatia where he assisted government agencies with addressing conflict and growing transnational extremism. He continues to remain active in the non-profit and think tank communities. His current and former leadership positions include: Special Adviser to the Chairman of Crime Stoppers, USA, the County Executives of America, representing 700 of the nation's largest county governments; Senior CT Advisor to the American Hotel and Lodging Association, representing over 50,000 hoteliers here and abroad; Vice Chair of the US Department of Homeland Security's Faith Based Advisory Security Council; as well as National Director of the Secure Community Network, the nation's first full time faith based threat and information sharing center. He also sits on the Board of Directors for several publicly traded and privately held companies. Mr. Goldenberg has received numerous awards including South Florida's most distinguished citation for valor, Officer of the Year. Goldenberg spent 4 years long term undercover as an agent assigned to the South Florida Special Investigations Strike Force. His experiences have been featured in numerous articles and publications.Mr. Goldenberg is Chairman and President of Cardinal Point Strategies and a member of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC). In December 2014, DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson appointed Mr. Goldenberg as co-chair of the National DHS Foreign Fighter Task Force. He currently serves as Vice Chair of the US Department of Homeland Security's Faith-Based Council and as senior advisor to the Department's newly established CVE initiative. Before founding CPS, he played a key role in setting domestic and international policy for the legislation and investigation of hate crimes and countering violent extremism and has been an international thought leader in information sharing, conflict resolution, public safety and counter terrorism policy. He established community policing, hate crimes, and CVE-related programs for transnational agencies, many of which were adopted by governments in North America and Europe. His public career includes more than two decades as a former senior official of the New Jersey State Attorney General's Office, Director of the nation's 6th largest county social service and juvenile justice system, and as a law enforcement official who headed investigation efforts for significant cases of domestic terrorism, political corruption, and organized crime. Following a series of highly publicized incidents of domestic terrorism and hate crimes, the NJ State Attorney General appointed Mr. Goldenberg as the first state Chief of the Office of Bias Crimes and Community Relations. During his tenure, he wrote many of the model procedures for domestic terrorism investigations and policy framework for building police and community partnerships, many of which became models for national and international policy and legislation. In 2004, he spearheaded an international law enforcement mission for the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), during which he worked in over 10 European nations including Ukraine, Hungary, Kosovo and Croatia where he assisted government agencies with addressing conflict and growing transnational extremism. He continues to remain active in the non-profit and think tank communities. His current and former leadership positions include: Special Adviser to the Chairman of Crime Stoppers, USA, the County Executives of America, representing 700 of the nation's largest county governments; Senior CT Advisor to the American Hotel and Lodging Association, representing over 50,000 hoteliers here and abroad; Vice Chair of the US Department of Homeland Security's Faith Based Advisory Security Council; as well as National Director of the Secure Community Network, the nation's first full time faith based threat and information sharing center. He also sits on the Board of Directors for several publicly traded and privately held companies. Mr. Goldenberg has received numerous awards including South Florida's most distinguished citation for valor, Officer of the Year. Goldenberg spent 4 years long term undercover as an agent assigned to the South Florida Special Investigations Strike Force. His experiences have been featured in numerous articles and publications. 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