Hate crimes against the LGBTQ community in Israel rose by 10% in 2021, a new report from The Aguda – The Association for LGBTQ Equality in Israel published Wednesday reveals.

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According to the report, a homophobic hate crime was reported to the Aguda's hate crime incident center every three hours last year.

The report also pointed to a worrying increase in anti-LGBTQ sentiment in families, with 43% of homophobic incidents reported involving family members, compared to 28% in 2020. The number of reported cases of LGBTQ youth rejected by their families in 2021 jumped by 41% compared to 2020. In 2021, 444 young people were kicked out of their parents' households because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

According to the report, cisgender male homosexuals reported the most attacks by family members.

Over one-third of reported homophobic hate crimes in 2021 involved incidents against transsexuals, nearly twice the amount reported against transsexuals in 2020.

The report also indicated that 29% of reported transphobic incidents occurred in the healthcare system, whereas 12% of reported transphobic incidents occurred in families. Approximately 9% of reported transphobic incidents took place in the school and university systems.

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Pope Francis paid a surprise visit on Saturday to the home of Edith Bruck, a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor and author, and paid homage to all those killed by Nazi "insanity."

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Bruck, 89, who lives in Rome, was born into a poor Jewish family and spent time in a series of concentration camps, losing her father, mother and brother in them.

A Vatican spokesman, who announced the visit after it ended, said the two spoke of her time in the camps and the importance that future generations be made aware of what happened.

"I came here to thank you for your witness and to pay homage to the people martyred by the insanity of Nazi populism," the Vatican quoted the pope as telling Bruck.

Bruck, who has lived in Italy for decades and writes in Italian, was about 13 when she was taken to Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland with her family.

Video: Reuters

Her mother died there and her father died in Dachau, in Germany, where they were taken after that. While in Dachau, she dug trenches and laid railway sleepers (ties), she recently told the Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano.

She later spent time in Christianstadt, a sub-camp of the larger Gross-Rosen camp. She finally wound up in Bergen-Belsen, where she was liberated by the Allies in 1945.

The Nazis and their allies murdered around 6 million Jews, as well as others, in German-occupied Europe.

More than a million people, most of them Jews, were killed at Auschwitz in southern Poland, which was liberated by Soviet troops on Jan. 27, 1945. The vast majority were gassed to death.

The pope, who rarely leaves the Vatican for private visits, spent about an hour with Bruck, who has written novels and plays and directed films.

Last month on Holocaust Remembrance Day, the pope, who visited Auschwitz in 2016, urged people to keep a close watch on ideological extremism, because "these things can happen again."

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ACCESS and Mimouna have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to organize joint missions to Israel and Morocco; convene virtual conferences on Jewish heritage and regional cooperation; and create English and Arabic-language videos highlighting diversity and commonalities between Jews and Arabs.

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The two groups first began working together in 2014 to emphasize the importance of Jewish culture to Moroccan identity and cultural heritage. In 2017, the two organizations held a conference in Essaouira, Morocco, to discuss interfaith approaches to promoting understanding in the Middle East.  A follow-up conference in 2018 examined the importance of education and social media in promoting interfaith cooperation.

Since 2015, the Mimouna Association has participated in all AJC Global Forums, including in Jerusalem in 2018.

"2,500 years of Jewish history in Morocco has created unique ties between Morocco and the Jewish people," said Mimouna Association President Elmehdi Boudra.

"AJC has been a committed partner of ours for many years. Together we are looking forward to strengthening the natural bonds between our communities and enriching the new period of engagement between Israel and Morocco," Boudra said.

Director of ACCESS Dana Steiner said, "Formalizing relations between our two organizations will allow our young professionals to unite and work toward creating positive shifts between Jews and Arabs. There is no better organization with which to accomplish this goal than the Mimouna Association."

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Saudi Arabia condemned cartoons offending the Prophet Mohammad, but held back from echoing calls by other Muslim states for action against images being displayed in France of the Prophet.

A foreign ministry official also said in a statement that the Gulf state condemns all acts of terrorism, an apparent reference to the beheading of a Paris teacher who showed cartoons of the Prophet in a class on freedom of speech.

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"Freedom of expression and culture should be a beacon of respect, tolerance and peace that rejects practices and acts which generate hatred, violence and extremism and are contrary to coexistence," said the statement carried by state media.

Saudi Arabia's daily Arab News on Tuesday cited the head of the Saudi-based Muslim World League, Mohammed al-Issa, as cautioning that an over-reaction "that is negative and goes beyond what is acceptable" would only benefit "haters."

The cartoons depicting Mohammad were first published years ago by French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, whose editorial offices were attacked by gunmen in 2015, killing 12 people. Since the beheading of the teacher this month, the cartoons have been displayed in France in solidarity, angering some Muslims.

Turkey's leader has called for a boycott of French goods and Pakistan's parliament passing a resolution urging the government to recall its envoy from Paris.

In Saudi Arabia, calls for a boycott of French supermarket chain Carrefour were trending on social media, though stores Reuters visited in Riyadh on Monday seemed busy as normal. A company representative in France said it had yet to feel any impact.

United Arab Emirates-based Majid Al Futtaim, which owns and operates Carrefour supermarkets across the Middle East, said the chain supported regional economies by sourcing most items from local suppliers and employing thousands of people.

"We understand that there is some concern among consumers across the region at present and we are monitoring the situation closely," it said in a statement.

In Kuwait, some supermarkets have pulled French products.

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According to news reports from across the Arab world, the sermon dealt with the prophet Muhammad's first days in Mecca and the ties he formed with members of other religions, particularly Jews. The bottom line was that Muslims must practice religious tolerance, especially toward Jews.

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"We must clean and purify Islam from the doubt and superstition that has stuck to it," the imam said, referring to the hatred for members of other religions espoused by some members of radical schools of Islam.

In the past, Sudais has spoken to foreign news outlets about tolerance and accepting others, but the timing of this weekend's sermon, in which he clearly referenced Jews, caused many media outlets to treat the sermon as a call for normalization.

While Saudi Arabia is insisting that it will establish diplomatic ties with Israel only after the latter signs a peace deal with the Palestinians, Riyadh welcomed normalization between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, and even helped the process by allowing Israeli flights to the UAE to cross Saudi airspace.

Social media was especially atwitter with discussion of the sermon. The Moroccan news site Morocco World News published a selection of comments from Moroccan social media users who criticized the Saudi imam.

"He speaks like a rabbi, not an imam," one user wrote. Another said, "The Zionists are tweeting praise of the Mecca imam."

Still, Sudais has made blatantly anti-Semitic comments in the past. In 2002, he called the Jews "the sickness of the world … rats ... sons of monkeys and pigs." As a result of these comments, he was banned from the US and Canada.

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The nonprofit Beit Ha'Gefen calls itself the Arab-Jewish Cultural Center and in a mission statement on its homepage declares that it believes in "creating shared egalitarian spaces that contain the variety of identities and culture in Haifa in particular and Israel in general."

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But despite expressions of peaceful coexistence and tolerance, Beit Ha'Gefen is currently hosting an Arab cultural festival in which Palestinians are referred to as the "third generation of the Nakba," and says that Israeli society is in the process of "becoming fascist."

The festival program calls to screen a film that presents terrorists and supporters of terrorism as cultural heroes, while the Intifada is characterized as a "key Palestinian event."

Rami Younis, artistic director of the festival and a supporter of the BDS movement, wrote in a Facebook post that "the Nazi Israelis shot Palestinians in the biggest ghetto in the world," referring to the Hamas-organized "marches of return" on the Gaza border.

According to a special report put out by the right-wing Zionist group Im Tirtzu, approximately 80% of the center's budget comes from taxpayer money. From 2012-2017, the Culture and Sport and Education ministries supplied Beit Ha'Gefen with a total of 11,540,387 shekels ($3,205,112). In those same years, the Haifa Municipality funded Beit Ha'Gefen to the tune of 50,265,000 shekels ($13,960,000).

Alon Schwartzer, head of the policy department for Im Tirtzu, said, "It's time for the Israeli government to stop being the only country in the world that forces its citizens to pay people to promote a boycott of their country.

"It is inconceivable that a city institution, which in recent years has received [millions of] shekels in taxpayer money, will hold a festival devoted to glorifying the culture of an entity hostile to Israel, in whose name terrorists have set out to murder thousands of Israelis," Schwartzer said.

The Treasury said it had been contacted over the matter and the complaint was under review by its legal counsel. Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon said he would "use his authority to cancel budgets to institutions that incite or act against the state."

Culture Minister Miri Regev said, "Unfortunately, the current legal situation does not allow me to cancel funds to institutions that undermine the existence and identity of the state of Israel."

The Education Ministry denied any link to funding for the festival.

No response was forthcoming from either the Haifa Municipality or Beit Ha'Gefen.

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She is one of 100 women admitted every year to study for up to three years in the institute in Rabat, run by Morocco's ministry of religious affairs.

Morocco, which is nearly 100% Muslim, has marketed itself as an oasis of religious tolerance in a region torn by militancy – and has offered training to imams and male and female preachers of Islam from Africa and Europe on what it describes as moderate Islam.

It currently trains 1,300 people mostly from the sub-Sahara nations of Mali, Senegal, Nigeria, Guinea, Gambia and Chad, where Al Qaida and Islamic State are active.

"When I go back to my country, I will find some children and women who did not go to school and don't know a lot about religion...we will be very useful to them and we will teach them about the fundamentals of religion," said Koulibaly.

"We will show them how to behave with others and not to be extremists. We will show them how to be moderate in religion".

Compared to other countries in North Africa Morocco has been largely insulated from militant attacks. The first since 2011 took place last December when two Scandinavian tourists were found murdered in a tourist spot in the Atlas Mountains. Four suspects had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State.

Students at the institute receive 2,000 dirhams ($208.33) a month in addition to free accommodation, plane tickets, and health insurance. Admission criteria include having a BA degree.

The curriculum covers Islamic studies along with philosophy, history of religions, sexual education and mental health.

"We show them that the concepts of democracy and human rights serve purposes rooted in Islamic values," said institute director Abdeslam Lazaar.

Imams also receive vocational training in electrics, agriculture or tailoring to enable them to have a source of stable revenue when they return home.

Imam training can help sub-Saharan countries facing militancy and a vacuum in the supervision of religion, Salim Hmimnat of the Rabat-based African Studies Institute said.

Pope Francis visited the imam training institute during his trip to Morocco in March.

Students also come from France, such as 25-year-old Aboubakr Hmaidouch.

"The Muslim community in France is in great need of imams and female religious preachers to ensure that the values of religion contribute to living together and to the spiritual well-being of society," he said.

Training takes into account practical life and culture, and accepts diversity he said.

"When I return... I hope to put into practice and transmit this knowledge, especially this spirit of peace, love, fraternity and tolerance."

The institute also helps Rabat expand its foothold in a region where major Moroccan banks and companies have been investing for years.

"The use of religion plays an important role in the kingdom's overall soft power equation," said Anouar Boukhars, a Maghreb expert and Carnegie Endowment fellow, noting Morocco promotes its tolerant Islam as an alternative to the extremist ideologies in the Sahel.

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Jane Haining, who cared for hundreds of Jewish girls at the Scottish Mission School in Budapest during World War II, died at Auschwitz camp after the Nazis invaded Hungary in 1944. Author Mary Miller said Haining was "an ordinary person who became extraordinary" through her love and courage.

"She was an independent woman and kept an independent spirit throughout all the awful things that were later to happen," Miller told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Born into a humble farming family in Dumfries in 1987, Haining studied business and became "an early career girl."

In 1932, she moved to Hungary to work as a matron at the school, which educated Christian and Jewish children together to foster mutual respect.

"They were part of that whole movement to give girls a good education," Miller said.

Pressure on the school grew rapidly as Jewish refugees poured into Budapest, fleeing persecution elsewhere in Europe.

As anti-Semitism intensified, the Scottish Mission, which oversaw the school, organized courses in practical subjects to help Jews emigrate and get jobs abroad. Haining helped women secure work as domestic servants in Britain under the program.

Following the outbreak of war in 1939, Haining refused her employers' orders to return to Britain.

"She said that if these girls needed me in good times, they need me much more in bad times," Miller said.

By then, most of the school's 400 pupils were Jewish, and many of the boarders Haining cared for were orphans.

In one letter, Haining wrote: "What a ghastly feeling it must be to know that no one wants you. … We have been enabled … to provide an oasis in a troubled world."

She described how one Jewish mother of twins, who approached her for help, broke down in her office in desperation.

"[She] was at the stage when she was thinking of adding some poison to their food and ending it all," Haining wrote.

The school attracted attention for speaking out repeatedly against anti-Semitism, according to Miller's book "Jane Haining – A Life of Love and Courage."

From 1943, Miller said the Mission helped many people, including former pupils, to escape transportation to Nazi death camps, hiding them in cellars or getting them to safe houses.

Haining was arrested by the Nazis in April 1944.

A former pupil who saw her taken away said her last words to the sobbing children were: "Don't worry, I'll be back by lunch."

She died in Auschwitz in Nazi-occupied Poland two months later, aged 47.

Yad Vashem honored Haining as a Righteous Among the Nations in 1997 and she was awarded a Hero of the Holocaust medal by the British government in 2010.

"She did not compromise, and in our own difficult times, there is a challenge there for all ordinary people tempted to look away from evil and find reasons to say, 'There is nothing we can do,'" Miller said.

"Jane Haining reminds us that there is always something we can do."

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