Sweden’s Prime Minister Condemns Anti-Semitism in His Country

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GOTHENBURG, Sweden — Prime Minister Stefan Lofven of Sweden told reporters in Paris on Tuesday that his country had a problem with anti-Semitism, the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet reported.

“We must be very clear that this anti-Semitism and hatred of Jews has no place in our society,” Mr. Lofven said at a news conference in conjunction with a climate conference in Paris. “Absolutely no room at all.”

His comments followed a string of anti-Semitic episodes in Gothenburg and Malmo, Sweden’s second- and third-largest cities.

Early Sunday, the police in Gothenburg arrested three men in their 20s on suspicion of arson, after a group of about 10 masked people hurled homemade firebombs, setting fire to the courtyard in front of a synagogue on Saturday evening.

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On Friday, the police in Malmo reported that demonstrators at a protest against Israel had shouted threats of violence against Jews. Later, two firebombs were thrown at a Jewish chapel in Malmo. The police are investigating the episode as a possible hate crime, Radio Sweden reported Monday, citing the TT News Agency.

“This is totally unacceptable in Sweden,” Mr. Lofven said. “There must not be any room for this hatred toward Jews. We must tackle this from all angles to extinguish it. Anything we can find we must report. We need to get it out in the open and to see to it that people are brought to justice.”

Mr. Lofven on Monday told the newspaper Aftonbladet that Jews were under assault from both the extreme right and the far left. He also expressed concern about what he said was rising anti-Semitism among immigrants from the Middle East.

“That goes against the very moral fiber of Sweden,” he told Aftonbladet. “Here all people have the same value.”

Mr. Lofven said that the government had allocated more money to schools for trips to Auschwitz and that stiffer punishments for anti-Semitism might be needed. “More students need to see this firsthand and be in Auschwitz, for example, or another concentration camp to really understand what has happened.”

Those who attack Jews or engage in hate speech will be brought to justice, he said.

In 2010, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human rights organization, issued a travel warning about Sweden because of the harassment of Jews in Malmo. The Jewish population in Sweden is about 18,000, according to the World Jewish Congress.

On Tuesday, two young men threatened the Jewish community center in Malmo. “They said they were going to throw a bomb at us,” Fredrik Sieradzki, a spokesman for the center, told Swedish Television News.

Several European countries have reported anti-Semitic protests against President Trump’s decision last week to move the United States Embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv.

Mr. Lofven said the issue of anti-Semitism might be raised at the high-level European Union meeting in Brussels this week.

“It’s not on the program, but when we meet we raise relevant questions and big problems,” he said. “And this is clearly a big problem.”