2023-11-01 10:20:21
London’s Jewish community has been on edge since the Hamas attack on Israel, due to the increase in anti-Semitic acts, which has led to increased security in synagogues, schools and other religious buildings.
“People feel very vulnerable, they are afraid and anti-Semitic incidents are reaching records,” says Raymond Simonson, the director of the JW3 cultural center.
In the United Kingdom, where Jews did not experience the Shoah, unlike continental Europe where they were massacred by the Nazis, the community’s nerves have been frayed since the Hamas attack in Israel.
“We have doubled our security teams. The police have quadrupled their visits these last three weeks to make sure we are okay. Every synagogue, every Jewish building has reinforced its security,” Simonson continues as he presents the installation “The Empty Sabbath Table,” intended to commemorate the more than 230 Hamas hostages.
“The Sabbath is a time of peace and it is something I respect with my family every Friday. Now I realize that I took it for granted,” says Simonson, his voice breaking.
Around a huge table there are more than 200 empty chairs, including baby chairs, and on each one you can read the name, age and nationality of the captives, as well as the word “kidnapped.”
More than 1,400 people were killed on the Israeli side on October 7 by Hamas commandos, essentially civilians, according to Israeli authorities, who have also identified nearly 230 hostages kidnapped by the Islamist movement.
Hamas’ Health Ministry says more than 8,300 people, most of them civilians, have been killed in the Palestinian territory by shelling launched by Israel in response to the attack.
Despite the reinforcement of security measures; More than 400 anti-Semitic criminal acts have been recorded in London this month, compared to 28 in the same period last year, according to police. Islamophobic acts have also increased, going from 65 to 174 in the same period, which is a sign of current tensions.
“Shocked”
British Jews are “shocked,” “still as if anesthetized and exhausted. “They spend so much time contacting their friends and family members in Israel on a daily basis, keeping an eye on the latest news, worrying regarding their children,” adds Simonson.
Marielle A., a 49-year-old analyst for a private bank who refuses to give her last name for security reasons, feels trapped in a “very anxiety-inducing” environment.
“At our daughters’ secondary school, the principal and members of the pedagogical team park along the path between the subway and the school” to be sure that the girls are not attacked, he continues.
Several Jewish schools have briefly closed their doors in the British capital. Synagogues and religious schools called for more volunteers to reinforce their patrols.
In the multicultural neighborhood of Stamford Hill, where Orthodox Jews and Muslims coexist, the local security group Shomrim, which in Hebrew means the guards, extended its patrol hours.
“People are more sensitive and feel more vulnerable” right now, admits Rabbi Hershel Gluck, president of Shomrim, even more so because many of them are descendants of Holocaust victims.
Although he says he fears the act of a possible “lone wolf,” he is quick to remember that Jews and Muslims live harmoniously in London. “On this street, he shows, there are a dozen synagogues, Jewish schools and a mosque, a Muslim cultural center and a Muslim school.”
“People live together without tension, thank God,” he says. “I think this is an inspiration for many other places.”
“The vast majority of Muslims in this country are not Hamas sympathizers,” he insists.
United States and Russia
In the United States, the White House reported this Monday “an alarming increase in anti-Semitic incidents in schools and university campuses” since the attack by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas on Israel on October 7.
The US government will hold a meeting this Monday with representatives of Jewish organizations, which will be attended by the Secretary of Education, Miguel Cardona, and Doug Emhoff, husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, a senior official reported.
Also in Russia, there were riots at an airport in the Muslim-majority republic of Dagestan, where protesters were allegedly searching for Israeli passengers. A crowd invaded the runway and terminal of an airport in the capital Makhachkala on Sunday night, amid tensions caused in the world by the deadly Israeli bombings once morest the Gaza Strip. However, many of the insults were aimed at Jews in general.
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