British Jews have been left feeling targeted and less secure in the UK in the past 12 months, a rabbi has said on the first anniversary of the Hamas attacks on Israel.
Many were “shocked” by the speed at which anti-Israel feeling “quickly morphed into anti-Jewish feeling”, Jonathan Romain said.
Hamas undertook an unprecedented cross-border attack on Israel on October 7 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and some 240 others were taken hostage.
The year since has seen more than 41,000 Palestinians killed in the subsequent war in Gaza, during Israel’s military bombardment.
The Middle East conflict has more recently escalated as Israel launched a ground incursion into Lebanon, as its forces clashed with Hezbollah militants.
Dr Romain, based in Maidenhead, said while he is “optimistic” about the likelihood of a long-term peaceful solution in the Middle East, peace in the near future “looks pretty impossible at the moment”.
In an interview with the PA news agency, he said: “It’s going to need a whole new mindset, or mind reset, by both the Arab states and Israel, and probably a new generation of leaders who are willing to trust each other in the way that the current generation does not.”
In the days after October 7, the rabbi warned of the need to try not to “import whatever’s happening in the Middle East to England where there are basically very good relationships between Jews and Muslims”.
But a year on, he acknowledged there is a “changed atmosphere”, with people having “felt suddenly less secure being Jewish in Britain”.
The Community Security Trust (CST), which monitors antisemitism and provides security for the Jewish community in Britain, said it recorded 5,583 incidents between October 7 2023 and September 30 this year.
The figure, published last week, was three times that of the previous 12-month period – which saw 1,830 incidents recorded in total – and the highest total of any 12-month period.
Dr Romain said: “I think certainly from a Jewish point of view, quite a lot of Jews were shocked really by how anti-Israel feeling quickly morphed into anti-Jewish feeling.
“I think Jews felt suddenly less secure being Jewish in Britain. The marches and the protests and the student campus protests affected that quite strongly. It also affected friendships.”
He said while some people had the “extreme” experience of friends no longer wanting to talk to them, the more common situation had been that many “began to limit their conversations”.
He said: “Whereas perhaps with friends, they might have talked about foreign affairs, what’s happening in America, in Ukraine and in Israel, now they were very wary about doing that, because they just didn’t want to go there and didn’t want to end up with conversations that might turn out to be acrimonious.
“They were editing their conversations with their friends, and I heard that time and time again.”
He referred to recent comments by security minister Dan Jarvis about a “determination to give British Jews the protection and reassurance they want and deserve”.
Dr Romain said these words demonstrated the difference in atmosphere in the past year.
He said: “We never needed protection and reassurance. Suddenly, we need protection and reassurance.
“We never felt alone. We were part of British society. Now we feel a bit targeted. So there’s no doubt there’s a changed atmosphere.
“To put it in context, of course, Jewish life here in Britain is much better than Jewish life in most other countries. It’s also much better, frankly, than it was 100 years ago in this country. But it’s not as good as it was on October 6 (2023).”
The rabbi said he has had to repeatedly explain that “being Jewish doesn’t mean necessarily supporting (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu, and that most Jews will support the people of Israel or the land of Israel, not necessarily the government or the policies of Israel, and trying to make that nuanced distinction, which is often lost”.
He added: “We feel protective to the country, we don’t necessarily agree with the policies, just as applies obviously to Britain.”
He said he feels “simultaneously appalled at the suffering that is happening, but I also thoroughly understand why Israel is trying to destroy Hamas and get back the hostages”.
He stressed: “The battle is very much against Hamas, not against the Palestinians, and the battle is very much against Hezbollah and not the Lebanese.
“Many Israelis and many Jews are fully in favour of the two-state solution, Hamas and Hezbollah are not.”
Going forward, he said his role “as a communal leader, is to make sure that we don’t import hatred from abroad, either within the Jewish community or with wider society”.
