The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) warmly welcomed Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer’s announcement on Wednesday that a common anti-Israel chant — “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” — will be considered as a murder threat in Austria and prosecuted as a criminal offense.

“Finally,” CAM CEO Sacha Roytman Dratwa stated. “For years, this clear call for the genocide of all Jews in Israel has been treated as legitimate political discourse. However, after Hamas revealed its true intentions to the world on October 7, with its frenzied slaughter of 1,400 Israeli men, women, and children of all ages just because they lived in the Jewish state, the world can no longer be indifferent to such expressions of exterminationist hatred.”

The American Jewish Committee explained on their website:

“From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free” is a common call-to-arms for pro-Palestinian activists, especially student activists on college campuses. It calls for the establishment of a State of Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, erasing the State of Israel and its people. It is also a rallying cry for terrorist groups and their sympathizers, from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) to Hamas, which called for Israel’s destruction in its original governing charter in 1988 and was responsible for the October 7, 2023 terror attack on Israeli civilians, murdering over 1,000 people in the single deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust.

“I urge other national and local leaders across the globe to follow Chancellor Nehammer’s lead and take this important step to protect Jewish communities from the violent incitement that we have seen an explosion of over the past two and half weeks,” Roytman Dratwa opf CAM added.

Chancellor Nehammer’s announcement was made during a wartime solidarity visit to Israel on Wednesday