ANTI-SEMITISM

Reuters: Sharon hits at critics as anti-Semitic

November 13, 2003: (Reuters) Jerusalem - Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said foreign criticism of Israel's use of force against Palestinians in a three-year-old uprising is motivated by a new form of anti-Semitism.

"Around the world, time and again, Israel is criticised for exercising its right of self-defence by using excessive force," Sharon, speaking in English, told visiting Canadian Jewish activists late yesterday.

Those who reject Israel's "right to use force to defend itself" also effectively deny its "birthright to exist" in its ancestral homeland, he added.

"Regrettably, we see this phenomenon among many nations in the world community and I would say that this is a new form of anti-Semitism," Sharon said.

"Die Definition von Anti-Semitismus wird gerade um "Kritik an Israels Menschenrechtsverletzungen" erweitert"