Foreign Minister Yair Lapid delivered a brief but contentious speech before the 7th Global Forum on Combatting Anti-Semitism on July 14, and his remarks are still the subject of heated debate and discussion.
Lapid’s many critics, led by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, argued that the speech damaged the struggle against anti-Semitism. Politicians and opinion-makers, mainly from the right, called what Lapid said “strange” and “post-modern,” claiming that it played straight into the hands of those who deny that the very phenomenon of anti-Semitism exists.