On June 17, the American Council on Germany will hold a discussion and luncheon with Katharina von Schnurbein, European Commission Coordinator on Combating Antisemitism and Fostering Jewish Life.
Katharina von Schnurbein (2009 Young Leader) was appointed the first European Commission Coordinator on Combating Antisemitism in December 2015. Her mandate includes liaising closely with Jewish communities, Member States, EU institutions, and international organizations as well as proposing and implementing policy to address antisemitism, foster Jewish life, and ensure Holocaust remembrance. Prior to this, she worked for five years as an advisor to EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on dialogue with churches, religions, and non-confessional organizations. Ms. von Schnurbein started working for the European Commission in 2002 as a press officer for the EU Delegation in Prague. With enlargement in 2004, she moved to Brussels as the spokesperson for Employment, Social Affairs, and Equal Opportunities for the Czech EU Commissioner Vladimir Špidla. Before that, Ms. von Schnurbein worked for the Chairman of the European Affairs Committee at the German Bundestag in Berlin (2000-2002) as well as for an international crisis management consultancy. She received B’nai B’rith Europe’s Human Rights Prize in 2018 and the Marietta and Friedrich Torberg Medal of the Jewish Community in Vienna in 2021. Ms. von Schnurbein’s educational background includes undergraduate studies in political science and Slavic studies at Charles University in Prague and the University of Bonn, a Master of Slavic Studies from Oxford University (1997), and a Master of European Studies from the Center for European Integration Studies in Bonn (1999). She spent the academic year 2017-2018 as an EU Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence to conduct research on effective measures to combat antisemitism across Europe.