A total 143 incidents considered anti-Semitic were reported to the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland (JRCI) in the six-month period from July 2025 to January 2026, according to a report the body published on Monday.
None of the incidents was “independently investigated or adjudicated”, the report said, and less than a quarter (24 per cent) of the people involved reported such incidents to the authorities.
There are approximately 2,200 people in Ireland’s Jewish community.
The self-reported incidents occurred before and during the six-month period, July 17th, 2025-January 9th, 2026 and have not previously been documented.
READ MORE
There is no official State mechanism in Ireland for recording anti-Semitic incidents.
The JRCI expressed “deep concern” about the findings and urged “rapid development of a dedicated national plan to counter growing antisemitism”.
Its report represented “only a partial picture” of the reality, it said. “International research consistently shows that antisemitism is significantly underreported due to normalisation, reporting fatigue, uncertainty about recognition, and limited confidence in institutional responses. Community members confirm that these factors also shape reporting behaviour in Ireland.”
Examples provided in its report of the type of incidents referred to included a case where “a patient reported fear of speaking up” after “remarks attributed to staff that the patient experienced as antisemitic”, while another “person had to stop wearing their star of David to work due to constant abuse & antisemitic comments”.
Others included “a poster displayed above the entry door to a local bar stating, ‘ALL ZIONISTS ARE BARRED FROM The XXX pub’”, and “a row of Graffiti of swastikas and the writing ‘Jew Rat’ all over a public road”.
During an argument in school “a young Jewish person received images of swastikas and was told that ‘the classroom will turn into a modern-day gas chamber’”, while, following the Hamas massacre in southern Israel on October 7th, 2023, “a professional relationship severely deteriorated and shifted into hostile remarks and practical obstruction that affected business and reputation”.
One family “described gradual social exclusion”, while a provider was “refused service after hearing they were originally from Israel, even though they are Irish citizens”.
Another incident involved a taxi driver who, on finding out the passenger was originally from Israel, “asked them to leave mid-way, while cursing and shouting abuse at them”.
Of the 143 incidents, 52 involved verbal abuse or slurs, 47 included vandalism or graffiti, 35 were threats or intimidation, 29 involved exclusion or discrimination, and 24 being direct digital targeting (hate emails and unsolicited messages).
Fifty incidents took place in public spaces, with 21 in schools or universities, 13 in hospitality or retail settings, eight in the workplace, six in the home or a private context, and four on public transport. Twenty-five reports (17 per cent) “included Holocaust denial & trivialisation and/or antisemitic conspiracy theories, including classic tropes of Jewish control and manipulation”.
A total 43 incidents involved a shift “to hostile and antisemitic because a Jewish/Israeli identity cue was revealed”.
The report also showed “recurring patterns where institutional responses contributed to distress” due to a “refusal to explicitly recognise antisemitism, premature case closures, reframing of incidents as neutral conflict”. In such cases, “how the response was handled became part of the harm experienced”, the report said.
Asked whether the reported incidents might be in response to the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza and in the West Bank by Israelis forces, Maurice Cohen, chair of the JRCI, said such was “victim blaming” and risked “a troubling inversion”.
“It shifts attention away from those engaging in antisemitic behaviour and toward the victims themselves. Framing hostility against Irish Jews as an understandable consequence of events elsewhere is victim blaming,” Cohen said.
The “real question is whether people in Ireland can live free from hostility because of who they are, regardless of developments abroad”, he said.
The JRCI survey “records antisemitic incidents experienced by Jewish people in Ireland”.
“It documents behaviour directed at Irish citizens, not foreign policy. When anger about events abroad results in harassment, intimidation, or discrimination against Jews at home, that is not a political response. It is antisemitism,” he said.
[ ‘It was dead people everywhere’: Inside Australia’s Hanukkah massacreOpens in new window ]
A spokesperson for the Garda said it takes “anti-Semitism and all hate crime very seriously. Every hate crime reported to An Garda Síochána is professionally investigated and victims supported during the criminal justice process”.
The gardaí encourage “any victim of any crime to report this to An Garda Síochána, including any indication that the crime may have a hate motivation. The increase in reporting of such incidents has been noted in each year of reporting, which is positive”.
The spokesperson also noted how “last December following a terrorist attack on Australia’s Jewish community, the Garda Commissioner Justin Kelly spoke with the Chief Rabbi of Ireland Yoni Wieder to express his sympathies and reassure Ireland’s Jewish community”.
It was also the case that the Criminal Justice (Hate Offences) Act 2024 “commenced into Irish Law on 31st December 2024”, which included “aggravation of certain offences by hatred”, he said.
In a statement Chief Rabbi of Ireland Yoni Wieder said that the report does not claim that antisemitism has become a daily reality for all Jewish people in Ireland.
“What it does show is that antisemitism surfaces often enough, and in ordinary enough settings, that it cannot be dismissed as rare or confined to the margins of society. This means that for many, Jewish belonging in Ireland feels more fragile than it should,” he said.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs Helen McEntee called the number of anti-Semitic incidents reported “alarming”.
“This is completely unacceptable in the modern, inclusive republic we aspire to, and I condemn these incidents unreservedly,” she said in a statement on Monday, reiterating the Government’s commitment to countering anti-Semitism and all forms of racism.
