Young Israeli advocacy activist Ben Carasso, who lit a torch at last Independence Day ceremony, was interviewed over the weekend with the Italian newspaper Il Riformista and discussed the challenges Israeli children face.
Hundreds of antisemitic responses appeared on the newspaper's social media and website, including demands that Carasso, a third-generation Holocaust survivor, "go back to Auschwitz like his grandfather," claims that Jewish history proves they "love to murder babies," and caricatures of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers with Nazi swastikas on their arms.
In the interview with the Italian newspaper, 10-year-old Carasso said Israeli children suffered greatly in the war. He said 62 children were murdered, 36 children were kidnapped, including Ariel and Kfir Bibas who were killed in captivity. 116 children were orphaned, 50,000 children were evacuated from their homes, and approximately 20,000 children were physically and emotionally affected by the war forced on Israel. When Carasso told the newspaper he started a memorial project for children murdered since October 7, hundreds of social media followers responded with antisemitism.
Carasso noted that Israel and the world mark Kristallnacht, the night when antisemitism raised its head in Nazi Germany. Hundreds of Jews were murdered and many synagogues were set on fire. "Today, as it was then, there are those who try to burn our hearts and spread antisemitism – on social media, on the media and on the streets," he said.
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My duty is to continue with spreading the truth everywhere. In the past few weeks, I have been on an advocating campaign in the USA. I met thousands of people and explained what the children of Israel had and still need to cope with due to the war. Because they are Jewish. Because they are Israeli."
Since October 7, Carasso has volunteered as an independent advocacy activist for Israel. Through his social media, he explains in English and Hebrew to hundreds of thousands of viewers what's happening in Israel from the perspective of Israeli children and the challenges and difficulties they face. During this period, Carasso was invited to the United Nations Security Council and the British Parliament, and met with leaders, heads of organizations, social activists, government members, students, and pupils in Europe and the United States.
Carasso promised the antisemitic responses would not stop him from continuing to tell the truth and fight antisemitism.
