Belgium’s Jewish community does indeed face intensified antisemitism (Antisemitism: ‘In Belgian schools the biggest insult is Jew’, 10 May). An additional factor making Jews question their future in Belgium has come not from the street, or from murderous Islamist attacks like that at the Jewish Museum in 2014, but from the legislature. The regional parliaments of both Flanders and Wallonia have passed laws banning kosher slaughter, an attack on religious freedom that sends an unwelcoming message to Jews and other minority faiths.
With the rise in antisemitic attacks, legislatures should seek to protect Jews, not attack them further. My organisation, The Lawfare Project, is therefore supporting the umbrella body for Belgium’s Jews, the Coordinating Committee of Jewish Organizations in Belgium, in its lawsuits against this discrimination. The matter is currently under review by the European court of justice, but overturning the ban on kosher meat production is a necessary step in reassuring Belgium’s Jews of their future in the country.
Brooke Goldstein
Executive director, The Lawfare Project
• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com
• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters
• Do you have a photo you’d like to share with Guardian readers? Click here to upload it and we’ll publish the best submissions in the letters spread of our print edition
