German Jewish leader advises against skullcaps in cities

BERLIN – Germany’s main Jewish leader says he would advise people visiting big cities against wearing Jewish skullcaps, following a street assault last week on two young men wearing them.

The attack in Berlin, in which a 19-year-old Syrian asylum-seeker is a suspect, added to growing concern in Germany about anti-Semitism.

Josef Schuster, the head of Germany’s Central Council of Jews, told broadcaster Radioeins Tuesday that wearing a skullcap is right in principle, but that he was advising individuals “against showing themselves openly with a kippa in a big-city setting in Germany, and wear a baseball cap or something else to cover their head instead.”

Schuster suggested three years ago that Jews shouldn’t wear skullcaps in areas with large Muslim populations. But he stressed there’s increasing anti-Semitic sentiment among non-migrants.