The warning is clear on the BBC today “German Jews warned not to wear kippas after rise in anti-Semitism”, Christine Douglass-Williams covered the background to the story well earlier. You can read it here. But if Joe Public wanted to find more on this and searched Google, he would have gotten this result.

So we see CNN, The Guardian and the BBC all get top spot, and each seem to be in line, even down to the image they used. So let’s have a look what Joe Public would have learned from the public funded BBC.

The German government’s anti-Semitism commissioner has urged Jews to avoid wearing skullcaps in public.

Felix Klein warned Jews against donning the kippa in parts of the country following a rise in anti-Semitism.

He said his opinion on the matter had “changed compared with what it used to be”.

Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin said the recommendation amounted to “an admittance that, again, Jews are not safe on German soil”.

A sharp increase in the number of anti-Semitic offences was recorded by the German government last year.

Official figures showed 1,646 hate crimes against Jews were committed in 2018 – an increase of 10% on the previous year.

All true, nothing misleading here, yet.

Physical attacks against Jews in Germany also rose in the same period, with 62 violent incidents recorded, up from 37 in 2017.

Don’t want to be sharing that as a percentage though 67% increase in violent attacks in a year sounds a bit too extreme, lets only use a percentage where it’s suitable.

Speaking to the Handelsblatt newspaper, Justice Minister Katarina Barley said the increase in anti-Semitic crimes was “shameful for our country”.

What did Mr Klein say?

“I cannot recommend to Jews that they wear the skullcap at all times everywhere in Germany,” he told the Funke newspaper group.

Mr Klein suggested “the lifting of inhibitions and the uncouthness” of society could be behind the spike in anti-Semitic crimes.

Ahh, the “inhibitions and the uncouthness” in society is attacking Jews, Joe Public is starting to get some understanding of the situation. The internet, social media and “constant attacks against our culture of remembrance” may be contributing factors, he said. Maybe all that “Fake News” he keep hearing about, but we can trust the BBC, being publicly funded, they wouldn’t be biased. He also called for police officers, teachers, and lawyers to receive training to clarify “what is allowed and what is not” when “dealing with anti-Semitism”. Great, Joe is pleased to hear the authorities are being sprung into action. His comments came weeks after Germany’s top legal expert on anti-Semitism said the prejudice remained “deeply rooted” in German society. “Anti-Semitism has always been here. But I think that recently, it has again become louder, more aggressive and flagrant,” Claudia Vanoni told the AFP news agency. Joe shakes his head, a world war, Hitler dead and the Nuremberg trials, Nazism is still “deeply rooted”, and has re-surged. How has Israel’s president responded? Mr Rivlin said he was “shocked” by Mr Klein’s warning and considered it a “a capitulation to anti-Semitism”. “We will never submit, will never lower our gaze and will never react to anti-Semitism with defeatism, and expect and demand our allies act in the same way,” the Israeli president said. He also acknowledged “the moral position of the German government and its commitment to the Jewish community”. Yes, Mr Rivlin is right, this is an appeasement. Why is anti-Semitism on the rise? That is why I did my Google search, let’s get to the meat of it… Jewish groups have warned that a rise in popularity of far-right groups is fostering anti-Semitism and hatred of other minorities throughout Europe. This is a tricky sentence, quoting “Jewish Groups” which have at some time complained about “far-right groups“, and “other minorities” who are victims. Ahh, Muslims must also be the victims here. Since 2017, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has been the country’s main opposition party. AfD is openly against immigration but the party denies holding anti-Semitic views. However, a number of comments from their politicians, including remarks about the Holocaust, have drawn criticism from Jewish groups and other politicians. So that’s it. The summary here is that Jews have been told to hide their Jewishness, because a couple of AfD representatives went against party policy and made some remarks about the Holocaust. Last year, a survey of thousands of European Jews revealed that many were increasingly worried about anti-Semitism.