How one NGO is using AI to change how antisemitism is monitored

Created in 2012 in a collaboration between Hungarian Jewish communities and civil society groups, the Action and Protection Foundation (TEV) began operation in 2013, with one of its tasks being the monitoring of antisemitic activity in the country.

Many Jewish organizations around Europe reported antisemitic activity through community reports, but TEV Chairman Kalman Szalal felt that monitoring helped understand the phenomenon of antisemitism, and thereby inform the establishment of objectives, such as the need for changing Holocaust education or pursuing new legislation.

For almost a decade, TEV monitored radio, television, and newspapers, but three years ago realized this was not enough, as mainstream media was already largely self-regulated, and much of the world's zeitgeist could only be tapped into on social media.

The system gathers social media posts, prioritizing them by likes, comments, shares, and the likelihood that, in the context, they are truly antisemitic.

A brief summary is given of the text's topics. At this point, a human analyst is still needed to verify that the text is indeed antisemitic and to categorize the type of content as Holocaust denial, conspiracy theories, anti-Judaism, structural antisemitism, classical antisemitism, or anti-Israel.

Szalal said that in the near future, human analysts would no longer be needed to perform the function, which allows for deeper analysis of antisemitic trends.

Based on the data collected, Szalal can tell in his analyses that in Hungary, online anti-Israel sentiment was becoming more popular in Hungary, slightly over classical antisemitism, though the latter is more popular among male social media users, and the former among women.

Szalal believed that anti-Israel rhetoric often disguised antisemitism, coming from a slow osmosis of Western European ideology and sentiment into Hungary. His research also showed that while there were growing positions taken that Israel should be able to defend itself, there was also a slower-trending opinion that Israel was committing a genocide in Gaza.

The system doesn't treat all anti-Israel opinions as antisemitic, Szalal insisted, but had built in the  International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism to determine when criticism crossed into the territory of demonization.

Younger demographic groups also preferred anti-Israel manifestations of antisemitism online, according to TEV's statistics. Szalal assessed that it was only natural that younger groups that grew up online would use different parlance, and would want to distance themselves from more classic and controversial terms and phrases associated with Jew hatred.

The software has no language limit, according to Szalal, and is currently operating in France, Germany, and Sweden. He wanted to proliferate the software's use in other countries in Europe, creating common systems and definitions to measure antisemitism. As it stood, with different systems of reporting and monitoring in each state, it was difficult to compare the sentiments in different countries, and thereby harder to ascertain the correct course of action, such as legislation.

The data that TEV collected aided it in providing legislative assistance, and in some cases referred incidents like incitement to prosecutors or police. Szalal explained that with Holocaust denial, legislation had been an effective tool. A 2010 law had been effective in deterring Holocaust denial.

TEV's September data showed that only 0.01 percent of the posts they collected in Hungary contained Holocaust denial. Understanding the rhetoric used in antisemitism also informed educational programs, such as a high school program in which a rabbi comes and presents Jewish identity, and opens the floor to any student's questions.

Engaging with the intellectual and emotional sensitivities of students would ostensibly help them understand facts and historical events. TEV had also been involved in revising materials in 32 elementary school texts and 45 secondary school texts, with 70 and 50 of the proposed amendments being adopted.

The benefits of understanding and thereby developing and comparing tools and methodology for other countries were clear, though Szalal acknowledged that the system would have to be fine-tuned to the different legal and privacy restrictions in each polity.

Szalal has been campaigning to see the system adopted by other Jewish organizations and communities, but there have been hurdles. There are high costs of communities adopting monitoring systems, setting up the equipment and hiring human resources.

It was essential to get local communities to work on the project so that they wouldn't feel that outside actors were determining what antisemitism was. Szalal suggested that NGOs or even the state of Israel could be involved in finding solutions for the costs and challenges of local communities adopting the system.

TEV said in a  2024 analysis of European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) survey data that Hungary had been one of the worst performers in terms of antisemitic harassment in 2013 but became one of the top performers by 2018.

While 90% of Hungarian Jews saw antisemitism as a major problem in 2013, the concern had subsided by 13% within five years. The FRA said that 65% of respondents saw antisemitism as a problem in Hungary in 2023.

Szalal said that there was an odd reality that dictated online and offline antisemitism. In eastern Europe, there was often a lot of prejudice expressed, but there were few antisemitic incidents.

The reverse was true for western Europe. He assessed that there might be a distortion of the information, in which people may not have been vocally expressing their true opinions in the west because it was not politically correct. There were also far more Middle Eastern migrants in the West, and Israel was more involved in incidents there than in the East.

TEV offered its data-centric approach as a means to better understand such a phenomenon, arguing that one could only hope to fight antisemitism if one first understood antisemitism.