Gutman meanwhile regrets his words 'have been misinterpreted'.
Via EJU:
US Ambassador to Belgium, Howard Gutman, whose father was a Holocausty survivor, presented a different view on anti-Semitism.
"The temptation always exists at conferences discussing perceived biases, prejudices, discrimination and even hatred, to cite a couple of anecdotal instances of violence or hatred, sound an alarm, rally a response, take the applause and sit down," he remarked.
(...)"What I do see as growing, as gaining much more attention in the newspapers and among politicians is the problem within Europe of tension, hatred and sometimes even violence between some members of Muslim communities or Arab immigrant groups and Jews," "It is a tension and perhaps hatred largely born of and reflecting the tension between Israel, the Palestinian Territories and neighboring Arab states in the Middle East over the continuing Israeli-Palestinian problem."
He said that during his visits to different places in Belgium, the "longest and loudest ovation" he has ever received came from the high school with one of the largest percentages of Arab descent.
"These kids were not anti-Semitic as I have ever thought of the term," the ambassador said.(source)
