United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres received Project Aladdin’s Chair Leah Pisar and Executive Director Abe Radkin at the UN Headquarters on January 18, 2022, to discuss plans to expand the existing cooperation between Project Aladdin and UN agencies. Judith Pisar, UNESCO Special Envoy for Cultural Diplomacy, also attended the meeting, as did several senior officials of the UN Secretariat. 

Project Aladdin’s representatives outlined the organization’s plans to mobilize governments and civil society actors for a global campaign to address the new phenomenon of  ”weaponized hate”: the lethal cocktail of conspiracy theories, fake news and hate speech exacerbated by the impact of the pandemic and given unprecedented reach by social media. The organization is currently implementing several programs that focus on sports clubs, religious establishments, schools, universities, and museums as key venues for immunizing young people against the virus of hate through education and dialogue. 

The Secretary-General thanked Project Aladdin’s leadership for the important work that the organization has been conducting in the past fifteen years. He spoke passionately about his long-held conviction that hate crimes and hate speech represent a grave threat to all societies and gave his full support for an expanded cooperation between the relevant UN agencies and Project Aladdin to shape impactful and targeted responses. Project Aladdin’s delegation thanked the Secretary-General for his strong leadership on countering hate speech, antisemitism, racism, and xenophobia.