Excerpt:
Less than one year after the election of Sebastian Kurz as Austria’s leader, he has taken his government to the forefront of the fight against Europe’s spiraling anti-Semitism problem.
Frequently criticized for failing to own up to Nazi persecution, Austria with Kurz as chancellor has become an international hub for top-level conferences and symposia on the issue.
It began with February’s five-day “An End to Anti-Semitism” conference at the University of Vienna. In October, the National Student Union held a conference on anti-Semitism. This month, Kurz invited survivors to parliament for a commemoration of Kristallnacht’s 80th anniversary.
And this week the effort is culminating with two high-level events held in the framework of Austria’s rotating presidency of the European Union. The European Jewish Congress and American Jewish Committee will be attending at least one of the two events.