Attacks against synagogues have been documented

The study singles out Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Britain, where it says the rise in anti-Semitism has been of particular concern.

Other countries, including Ireland and Portugal, showed little sign of any rise in attacks, the report says.

It identifies "young, disaffected white Europeans" as the key culprits followed by North African or Asian Muslims.

The report urges European states to co-operate more closely to fight racism.

It suggests school text books should be checked for bias and teachers trained to increase awareness of race issues.

Most Jewish people wish to be a recognised equal part of European societies and to live in good relationships with their neighbours EUMC report

That led the heads of the World and European Jewish Congresses, Edgar Bronfman and Cobi Benatoff, to accuse European officials themselves of being anti-Semitic.

Anti-Jewish attacks ranged from hate mail to arson in the incidents catalogued by the EUMC in 2002 and the first quarter of 2003.

In the UK there were there were violent attacks on two synagogues in 2002 and in 2003 there were two cases of suspected arson and several attacks on Jewish cemeteries.

Debate

France's statistics suggested a "significant" rise in anti-Semitic violent incidents and threats in 2002 - six times as many as in 2001.

There were "many incidents of Jewish people assaulted and insulted, attacks against synagogues, cemeteries and other Jewish property, and arson against a Jewish school," the report said.

The report also highlights member states where there is little evidence of any increase in anti-Semitism - such as Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal and Finland.

EUMC director Beatte Winkler said: "It is clear that anti-Semitism manifests itself with greater strength in some countries than in others, and where relatively reliable statistics are kept, there is evidence of an increase in the regularity of these incidents over the past two or three years.

"Such a conclusion is reached in the case of Belgium, Germany, France, the Netherlands and the UK.