Figure 29:
So far we have dealt with people who Jewish respondents identify as those who utter the antisemitic comments they hear or read about. A different, but related question is who they perceive to be the perpetrator( s) of physical attacks or threats they have experienced because they are Jewish. We asked those in our sample who indicated that they had experienced physical attacks or threats in the preceding five years 9: Thinking about the incident where somebody attacked or threatened you in a way that frightened you because you are Jewish – who did this to you? The respondents were given an opportunity to choose between several different kinds of possible perpetrators, among them members of one of the four groups we discussed above, viz. someone with right-wing or left-wing political view, as well as someone with Christian or Muslim extremist views. 10 The result is shown below in Figure 30:
9 The number of respondents who reported to have been victims of such attacks was around 7 %. The number of persons in Latvia who reported such experiences was too few to constitute a base for statistical description. 10 The list of options to choose from read like this: 1. Family / household member; 2. Neighbour; 3. Colleague, boss
or supervisor at work; 4. Someone from school, college or university; 5. A customer, client or patient; 6. Someone with a right-wing political view; 7. Someone with a left-wing political view; 8. Teenager or group of teenagers; 9. Doctor, healthcare worker; 10. Police officer or border guard; 11. Public official( e. g. a civil servant); 12. Private security guard; 13. Someone with a Christian extremist view; 14. Someone with a Muslim extremist view; 15. Someone else( specify); Don’ t know. Approximately 50 % of those who identified someone as a perpetrator identified this person or group to belong to one of the four categories we have focussed on here.
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