First-Ever Study on Antisemitism in Ireland Reveals Most Incidents Go Unreported

The main body representing the Irish Jewish community on Sunday released what it described as the “first-ever” report on antisemitic acts in Ireland, revealing 143 incidents tracked between July 2025 and January 2026, with analysts warning these findings represented only the iceberg’s tip of a much larger unreported total

“The incidents span public spaces, workplaces, educational institutions, health-care environments, retail and hospitality settings, and digital communications,” Maurice Cohen, chairman of the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland (JRCI), said in a statement. “A recurring feature is hostility triggered solely by Jewish identity or perceived Jewish identity, including visible symbols, the Hebrew language, or accent.”

Thirty percent of the reported incidents began as normal interactions but became hostile when some “cue” revealed the soon-to-be victim’s Jewish or Israeli identity, triggering antisemitic abuse, the data shows.

The report emphasizes that the incident count should be understood in the context of the low population — only 2,200 Jews in Ireland.

According to the JRCI, the research fills the void caused by “the absence of a national system for recording antisemitic hate incidents.”

The data shows that 75 percent of the recorded incidents occurred in “everyday environments,” with 50 in public spaces, 21 in educational settings, and 13 in stores. The types of incidents in this category include verbal abuse (52), vandalism or graffiti (47), threats (35), exclusion or discrimination (29), and Holocaust denial (10). Researchers also received three reports of antisemitic assaults.

The other 25 percent of incidents researchers analyzed qualify as what the report describes as “direct digital targeting,” 47 percent of which included violent language and death threats. These digital messages refer to threatening emails or direct messages which are specifically sent to individuals or organizations. This category does not include social media antisemitism, which the JCRI notes will come in “a separate comprehensive report dedicated to that issue.”

Cohen noted that researchers observed “conspiracy narratives, Holocaust distortion, collective blame, and identity-based hostility,” which “reflect forms of antisemitism observed across Europe.” He said that “these dynamics cannot be adequately addressed through generalized anti-racism frameworks alone. Antisemitism presents distinct characteristics requiring targeted policy responses.”

The report emphasizes that the incidents themselves are only the beginning of harm for victims, explaining that institutional responses can exacerbate the experience. Common institutional failures cited include refusals to recognize antisemitism, premature closures without investigations, the reframing of incidents of hate as “neutral conflicts,” and offering “generic, unhelpful responses without resolution.”

These experiences of inadequate law enforcement response correspond with a reluctance among Irish Jews to report incidents. The report cites a 2026 analysis which found only 10 percent of victims of racist incidents in Ireland report the crime to police, a figure aligning with the 11 percent report rate for Jewish victims across Europe found by a 2024 EU Fundamental Rights Agency survey.

The JCRI data follows a report released in January by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (Claims Conference), a nonprofit organization that negotiates and secures compensation for survivors of the Nazis’ atrocities worldwide. The report analyzed Holocaust denial in Ireland and found higher levels among the young. For the total adult population, 8 percent of respondents agreed that “the Holocaust is a myth and did not happen.” The number rose to 9 percent among those 18-29.

Similarly, 17 percent of total Irish adults agreed that the Holocaust happened but thought that the number of Jews murdered had been “greatly exaggerated,” while 19 percent of those 18-29 embraced this conspiracy theory.

Researchers also found that 20 percent of total Irish adults and 23 percent of adults 18-29 disagreed with the statement “the Holocaust happened, and the number of Jews killed has been accurately and fairly described.”

The JRCI emphasizes in its new report that unlike 17 other EU member states, Ireland lacks a national antisemitism strategy.

“The EU Strategy establishes a dual responsibility: combating antisemitism and fostering Jewish life. These objectives are interdependent. Communities cannot flourish where hostility is insufficiently recognized or addressed,” Cohen said. “A dedicated national strategy, aligned with European standards, is the necessary and logical next step to ensure both the protection of Jewish citizens and the fostering of Jewish life and to remove contemporary, ambient antisemitism from our society.”

Gideon Taylor is a prominent Jewish American born in Ireland who discussed the report’s findings with The Algemeiner, describing the research as “the lived experience of Irish Jews,” who inhabit an environment today he described as infused with an “ambient antisemitism.”

“This is very different from an Ireland I grew up in,” Taylor told The Algemeiner. “The Irish youth community was a very robust, very active community, very involved in the public life of the country and the social life of the country and the cultural life of the country.”

Taylor recalled that Ireland “was a very warm place to grow up. I think what this report brings out is a very different Ireland and a very different part of living in Ireland today with its rise in antisemitism.”

Taylor added that he thought “there are people who are very concerned about this in government and others about this rise in antisemitism, and you see it from the statement of the prime minister down.”

Ireland has been one of Europe’s fiercest critics of Israel since the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, a posture that, according to critics, has helped foster a more hostile environment for Jews.

In 2024, for example, an Irish official, Dublin City Councilor Punam Rane, claimed during a council meeting that Jews and Israel control the US economy, arguing that is why Washington, DC did not oppose Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

Antisemitism in Ireland has become “blatant and obvious” in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel, according to Alan Shatter, a former member of parliament who served in the Irish cabinet between 2011 and 2014 as Minister for Justice, Equality and Defense.

Shatter told The Algemeiner in an interview in 2024 that Ireland has “evolved into the most hostile state towards Israel in the entire EU.”

In recent weeks, however, Irish officials have expressed support for the Jewish community amid mounting concern over antisemitism.

The “report from the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland is a sobering reminder of the increase we are experiencing in the scourge of antisemitism, both here in Ireland and internationally,” Irish Foreign Minister Helen McEntee said in a statement. “The report provides a clear and undeniable picture of the difficult situation currently experienced by Ireland’s Jewish communities.”

“This is completely unacceptable in the modern, inclusive republic we aspire to, and I condemn these incidents unreservedly,” she continued. “This government is committed to countering all forms of antisemitism and all forms of racism. The Program for Government sets out a clear commitment to implement the EU declaration on ‘Fostering Jewish Life in Europe’ and to give effect to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance ‘Working Definition of Antisemitism.”

Weeks earlier, Prime Minister Micheál Martin expressed similar sentiments ahead of International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

“I am acutely conscious that our Jewish community here in Ireland is experiencing a growing level of antisemitism,” he said. “I know that elements of our public discourse have coarsened.”

Taylor told The Algemeiner that, in response to the JRCI report’s findings, a goal should be to look at “how to move forward, how to have a national plan that will be clear, laid out with guidelines to try to combat this pernicious hatred.”