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Thursday, June 13, 2013

French NGO launches app for reporting anti-Semitic, racist incidents


A French nonprofit launched a smartphone application for reporting anti-Semitic and other racist incidents.

The application released this week by LICRA, the France-based International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism, allows users to photograph evidence such as offensive graffiti and send a geo-localized picture to LICRA for processing and removal by the authorities, the news site 20minutes.fr reported. 

The app also features a panic button that connects users with the police.

“You can’t fight racism and anti-Semitism in the 21st century as we did in the past,” LICRA President Alain Jakubowicz said.

Jonathan Hayoun, president of France’s main Jewish student union, told JTA that he thought the app was a good idea, "because it facilitates reporting, which in turn lends itself to treatment of the problem.”

On May 31 at Pantheon-Assas University in Paris, a swastika was carved into a door of the office of Hayoun’s Union of Jewish Students in France, or UEJF. A similar incident happened there in March.

Hayoun said the new app is not suited for reporting anti-Semitism online.

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