The European Jewish Congress is “carefully considering the possibility of taking legal action" over a cartoon in Dagbladet [click for translated version as featured on the Tundratabloids blog], one of Norway’s leading papers, which depicted circumcision in a blood-thirsty-demonic manner, the organization said in a statement.

“This cartoon has crossed all lines of decency and is dripping with hate and Antisemitism,” said Dr. Moshe Kantor, President of the European Jewish Congress. “We are now studying the possibility that this legally constitutes incitement and even a hate-crime and will therefore require legal action.”

“This obviously falls outside the boundaries of freedom of speech as no one has the freedom to incite hatred against a particular people.”

The cartoon depicts a child being stabbed in the head by a Jewish religious figure with a devil’s pitchfork while some unseen figure is cutting off a toe with a mother carrying what appears to be a religious book dripping in blood.

“This cartoon has ticked off one by one all the major historical anti-Semitic motifs, the type of which incited attacks and even the mass murder of Jews in the past,” Kantor said. “The reason we have laws against hate is because modern society understands the connection between incitement and violence.”

“This is a violent cartoon which is meant to inspire hate and contempt against one particular people. This type of hate, reminiscent of Nazi propaganda, cannot be left unanswered, and it is exactly this type of incitement which is contributing to a very troubling period for minorities in Europe at this time, especially with the rise of the far-Right.”