Attacks
80% of Hungarians are convinced that "gypsies only bring harm to the country".
Hungary does not collect or publish official hate crime statistics. However, various NGOs have recorded several hate crime attacks during the monitored period. A Jewish teenager was assaulted in Budapest on June 27. On July 5, Jobbik supporters and 64 Regions Youth Movement tried to attack a gay pride event in Budapest, but were stopped by the police.
In April 2015 a Roma man was shot dead by police officer in Örkény, a village near to Budapest. Four policemen went to the house of the victim on an evening, and some minutes after the man was shot 500 meters away from his house. The police claimed that the officer fired in self-defence. However, the Roma residents in Örkény said, that the police officer who killed the man, “doesn’t like the Roma”. During the autopsy of the victim turned out the he had other injuries than that from the shooting, and they did not support the story of neither the police, not the eye-witnesses.
In April 2015 two men attacked a Roma family, a grandmother and her granddaughter, in Eger, a city in East-Central Hungary. First the perpetrators shouted anti-Gypsy slogans to them over the fence, then broke into their house, and brutally beat them up. The victims are represented by Legal Defence Bureau for National and Ethnic Minorities, since it cannot be excluded that the crime was motivated by prejudice.
As it was mentioned earlier in the chapter titled “Presence of neo-Nazi and ultranationalist groups, movements, political parties (both in the centre and in the localities), discriminatory demands in their programmes and in the statements of their leaders towards the minorities” in May it was made public that a Roma family in Szúcs had been harassed by members of the Outlaws’ Army for three months. Police did not do anything, claiming the presence of the Army cannot be proved. The victims also reported, that sometimes when they called the Police, the officer told them “call us back when there is blood”. Therefore the victims are represented by the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union who pressed charge.
In March 2015 fifteen to twenty gravestones were damaged in the Jewish cemetery in Gyöngyös, a middle-sized town in North-East Hungary. After the incident, the police department of Gyöngyös initiated proceedings against an unknown perpetrator for reasonable suspicion of the felony of vandalism. The Prime Ministry strongly condemned the barbaric act of the vandals. Officials from Gyöngyös also spoke about the incident. László Tatár, Deputy Mayor of Gyöngyös, visited the cemetery and offered the help of the city for its restitution. Mayor György Heisz called the act despicable and deeply condemned it. He said: the local government has to consult with the Jewish community to see what help they can provide. László Horváth, parliamentary representative of the area took the news shocked and with indignation, and refused such violent manifestations.
In 2015, 89 anti-Semitic incidents were recorded by the TEV Foundation, the Internet Forum against Anti-Semitism and the US Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour. All these cases were related to hate speech or vandalism.
There is a significant growth in anti-Muslim sentiments in the country. More than 70% of the Hungarian population has a negative attitude towards Muslims, which, given the extremely low Islamic presence, is solely a consequence of government policies and extreme right propaganda aimed at creating a negative image not just a migrant, but namely a Muslim who is necessarily "linked to terrorism" and opposes "Hungarian culture". Given that there is no official statistics of crimes against Muslims, we can rely only on the data from the Muslim community itself. According to the information of the Hungarian Islamic community, about 10-15 attacks on women in hijabs were recorded in 2015. Attacks were often accompanied by the threat of stabbing, physical abuse and attempts to tear hijabs of women. According to the representative of the community, none of the attacks was reported to the police, as women were afraid to do so. In addition, the Muslim community stated that in 2015, it felt a deterioration in previously good and cooperative relations with state bodies.
Action and Protection Foundation registered 37 anti-Semitic hate crimes and incidents in 2017, including no attacks or threats. However, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee reported a physical assault that happened in December, when the victim was hit on the back and head by two offenders who he acquainted with in a local bar. Before the accident, they discussed differences in the feelings towards Roma and Jews and seriously quarrelled. Action and Protection Foundation reported thirteen cases of vandalism. The remaining 24 cases were categorised as hate speech. The vandalism included an attack against Holocaust memorials, Jewish cemeteries, some of them described in detail in the next chapter, and anti-Semitic graffiti on various surfaces.
Due to the physical and legal closure of Hungary, there are practically no migrants in the country, at least none that could be seen in public spaces. Yet, there were hate incidents against people thought to be migrants. For example, in May 2017 an employee, of a pizza shop in downtown Budapest, thinking that one of his customers was a tourist, talked to him in English. In turn, the customer called him a “filthy migrant” and kept yelling that Hungary belongs to the Hungarians and that he is not a tourist in his own country. He also called the waiter “a cockroach.” When a young woman asked the man to stop insulting the waiter, he hit the woman on the head, knocked her glasses off, and called her a stupid woman whose brain is filled with urine. Later MP Szilárd Németh, National Security Committee Deputy Chairman and Fidesz Vice President when asked about the incident, said that the whole thing had nothing to do with the government’s hateful propaganda. He called the act a “damned provocation” and expressed his belief that “anything can happen since George Soros set foot in this country, and his provocateurs do what he tells them to do.”
The Action and Defense Foundation recorded 37 anti-Semitic crimes in 2017, including threats of attacks. However, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee reported another physical assault in December, when the victim was hit on the back and head by two perpetrators he met at a local bar. Before the crime, they discussed the differences in feelings towards the Gypsies and Jews and had a serious quarrel. The Action and Defense Fund reported 13 incidents of vandalism. The remaining 24 cases were classified as hate speech. The vandalism included attacks on Holocaust memorials, Jewish cemeteries, some of which are detailed in the next chapter, and anti-Semitic graffiti on various surfaces.
According to the annual report published by Foundation Tett es Vedelem, in Hungary, unlike the rest of Europe, the number of crimes motivated by anti-Semitism in 2018 decreased. There were 32 anti-Semitic hate crimes, four fewer than in 2017. There were 48 such cases in 2016, 52 in 2015, and 37 in 2014. In 2018, three cases concerned physical attacks, ten acts of vandalism and 19 cases of hate speech. According to the report, in all cases, the perpetrators were men, and none of the cases were organized.
A study conducted on behalf of Mazsihisz - the country's oldest and largest religious Jewish federation - found that in 2019 and 2020, the overall level of anti-Semitism (measured by reported incidents) was lower in Hungary than in the UK, France and Germany. . However, the number of incidents has increased since 2015.
The Mazsihisz security service - the equivalent of the CST - registered 53 incidents in 2019 and 70 in 2020. Hungarian Jews fear physical attack to a lesser extent than Jewish communities in Western Europe, but the number of physical attacks and acts of vandalism has decreased. , hate speech and other forms of anti-Semitism in public life are on the rise.
