Last New Year’s Eve, a couple of weeks after the train incident, I left a dinner party when the conversation turned to Israel-Palestine. I began by saying I didn’t think we should talk about politics over dinner, but when one of the guests retorted that we weren’t talking about politics, but about genocide, I snapped. I said: “I’m sorry but I can’t stay at this table and listen to this antisemitism. If you knew the history of this region, you would know that the Jews are indigenous to that land and have every right, nay duty, to defend themselves from people who openly declare they want to wipe them off the face of the Earth.” And with that, I upped and left.
HR manager Carlton Martin[Missing Credit]
But you know something else happened on that train journey from Manchester to London. As I watched the gentleman recite what I now know are referred to as the afternoon prayers, as I heard him chant words that Jews have sung for millennia, I felt an enormous sense of privilege.
Afterwards, we sat and talked. As a gay non-Jewish person, you might not think we had much in common, but we did. He told me about a book called the Garden of Emuna: A Practical Guide to Life by Rabbi Shalom Arush, which I then – very ironically I know – asked for as a Christmas gift, and which has since been a huge comfort to me. Its central message is that everything that happens to us is from and of Hashem and is working to correct our souls, and this resonates.
After our encounter, I took out a subscription to this newspaper and have begun, in my own way, to engage earnestly with Jewish thought and tradition. I work in HR at an airport where I am now in regular conversation with the chaplaincy rabbi and I have also attended two communal events: a Purim service at Suffolk Liberal Jewish Community and a seder at Harlow Jewish Community, a Reform congregation where Irit Shillor has served since 2025. Both communities could not have made me feel more welcome, and like me Rabbi Irit is also gay.
Until now, I’ve never been an advocate for anything. I’ve never even been to Gay Pride and after seeing the ‘no Zionists’ placards, I never will
And alongside this, I am doing my best to inform other HR professionals of the growing problem of antisemitism. I ask them straightforwardly: “What are you doing for your Jewish colleagues, right now?” And if I get a noncommittal answer I ask: “Do you even know if you have Jewish colleagues? And if you don’t, that’s worrying, isn’t it? It probably means that someone somewhere feels they can’t talk to you about being Jewish, about who they are.” I am acutely aware that workplaces across the country are not responding adequately to the national emergency that antisemitism has become and people in my industry need to know about it.
And of course antisemitism leaks far beyond the workplace. I can’t actually get over the fact that it was even a possibility Kanye West, with his track record of antisemitism, might come to the UK this summer to perform at Wireless festival.
You know, until now I’ve never really been an advocate for anything. I am an openly gay man who has never been to Gay Pride.
And after I saw people en route to last year’s event with Free Palestine banners and their Queers for Palestine merch, I never will.
And don’t get me started on the “No homophobes, no Zionists” placards. What are these people like? Do they have any idea how they would be treated if they ever wound up in the West Bank or Gaza. The idiocy and ignorance is gobsmacking. So, no, I could never allow myself to walk among these people. Send me and Ross on a day trip to Stonehenge instead, please.
Given the strength of my feelings, people have asked if I might convert one day. And the answer is that I don’t know where my Jewish journey will end. But what I do know is I will always be your visible and vocal friend. I want Jews to know they are not alone.
As told to Eliana Jordan
