Last year, 244 anti-Semitic incidents were reported in New Jersey — more than in any state other than New York. This made for a slight decline since 2005, but any act of anti-Semitism is unacceptable.

    Etzion Neuer of the Anti-Defamation League told me the worst news is the growing number of incidents in New Jersey schools and campuses. The ADL report went beyond shocking numbers to the horrifying realities.

    In my congressional district, at an East Windsor middle school, vandals carved a 2-foot swastika into the floor of a boys' bathroom. In Roosevelt, the dormitory at a yeshiva was sprayed with paint-gun bullets. At a school in Lakewood, a student shouted anti-Semitic obscenities at a school administrator. Elsewhere in New Jersey, a professor at Ramapo College found swastikas and other anti-Semitic graffiti on her white-board. And an anti-Semitic obscenity was written on a menorah display at a Cedar Grove high school.

    Anti-Semitism threatens us all. One of the things at issue is the kind of communities we want to live in. More than most Americans, New Jerseyans remain close to their ethnic roots. We have vibrant connections to ethnic communities. We are proud of this, but it also challenges us. We want to be part of a larger community that includes but does not diminish our ethnic and religious communities. But we cannot have these welcoming communities if we let the purveyors of religious bigotry marginalize minorities. We must protect the vulnerable and permit no one to be excluded. When we do this, we defend fundamental human rights and the roots of all that is worthwhile in our own lives.

    I will not remain silent in the face of such abominations. In my 27 years in Congress, I have worked to ensure that government protects the vulnerable. This includes vulnerable religious minorities — Jews from Russia to Egypt, Christians from Cuba to Romania, Buddhists from Tibet to Myanmar. It includes Jews in Monmouth County, where almost 25 percent of New Jersey's reported incidents of anti-Semitism took place.

    As I stated in 2004 at the International Conference on Anti-Semitism in Berlin, "When national leaders fail to denounce anti-Semitic violence and slurs, the void is not only demoralizing to the victims, but silence actually enables the wrongdoing. Silence by elected officials in particular conveys acquiescence and can contribute to a climate of fear and a sense of vulnerability."

    But speaking up is only a first step. In Congress, I have fought anti-Semitism with Holocaust education, improved police training and by gathering statistics on anti-Semitic incidents. I have fought anti-Semitism with all the tools available to me: hearings, resolutions, international diplomacy and legislation. I have worked to require the State Department to keep detailed statistics on anti-Semitism around the world. Our government uses these statistics to prod foreign governments into taking action.

    Thankfully, Trenton has given New Jersey a model system of Holocaust education, training and reporting.

    Anti-Semitism is a unique evil. In my fight against it, I have cooperated with many Democratic congress members, as well as Republican New York City mayors. We recognize that anti-Semitism is a distinct form of intolerance, the oldest form of religious bigotry, and a disease of the heart that has very often led to murder. So we must take every anti-Semitic incident seriously.

    After World War II, much of the hatred that drove the Holocaust in Europe went underground. In the 1990s, it surfaced in the silence of many European leaders when hooligans assaulted Jewish citizens and vandalized Jewish cemeteries. It was apparent also in the contempt and scorn many Europeans poured on Israel, even in so-called "polite society." In 2003 in Rotterdam, I told the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe that, "Anti-Semitism can't be allowed to conceal its ugliness as mere policy differences with the state of Israel."

    In Rotterdam, I was speaking to our own government as well — the U.S. is a member of the organization. Americans can disagree with the policies of Israel without being anti-Semitic. But to demonize or vilify Israel or its leaders — that is anti-Semitism. This is where, in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, we drew the line between legitimate disagreement with Israel and crudely cloaked anti-Semitism.

    Sadly, the same anti-Semitic hooliganism is spreading in the United States, and the demonization of Israel is growing on college campuses.

    My own Holocaust education began in my Middlesex County neighborhood. My family owned a sporting goods store next to a Jewish deli. A Holocaust survivor used to come into the deli. My father made sure my brothers and I sat down and talked with this man. I'll never forget being shown his concentration camp number, indelibly marked on his arm. The pain in his eyes will stay with me forever. It made me very open and eager to do whatever I can, so that to me "Never again" means never again with regard to the Jewish or any other people.

Christopher H. Smith is a Republican member of Congress from the 4th District, which includes parts of Ocean, Monmouth, Mercer and Burlington counties.