Jewish Culture Month is chance for community ‘rebrand’, says Board president

While he has not made up his mind yet whether he will seek a second three-year term, he is “leaning” towards it, he says.

The response to the Board’s call to the community to offer events for the cultural programme has so far been “positive”, he says. When he was in Birmingham recently, “they had already come up with four events. I know there are similar initiatives under way in Leeds and other places around the country.”

The Board hopes to announce the first events next month. And if any community is stuck for an idea, he says, it can always arrange to find a local venue for the Board’s Jewish Living Exhibition – copies of which have been expanded from eight to 20 over the last year and a half.

He hopes JCM will come to inspire local authorities and museums to commission events off their own back. “It’s probably too soon yet for this year, although we have some major institutions that are interested about utilising their existing collections.”

Of the 78 action points set out in the Board’s triennial plan, he says, 20 per cent have been completed, another 75 per cent have been started and most of the rest will begin over the next months.

Another core initiative, the Commission on Antisemitism headed by Penny Mordaunt and Lord Mann, issued its report in summer. Now the work on implementing its recommendations is under way.

The Board, for example, has had some “good meetings” with the NHS on uniform guidance – with the aim of preventing political insignia that might upset patients.

Following meetings with the police there have been changes to policy on the management of demonstrations, whether on preventing protests outside places of worship or encouraging the police to take into account the “cumulative” effect of multiple demonstrations on a particular community.

But he would still like to see the government “go further and faster” with steps to tackle antisemitism and “lead with its chest” rather than at times appearing hesitant.

While there have been “strong disagreements” on foreign policy, not least over recognition of Palestinian statehood in the autumn. But, he says, “there is a constructive relationship, even if, as with all governments, we don’t get all of the things we want.”

But attention will switch now to what requirements should be made of the Palestinians, whether reform of the Palestinian Authority or the removal of Hamas from Gaza.

High on his agenda in the coming year will be the fight against extremism – not just Islamist extremism, but its far-right and far-left versions too. In Birmingham, “there were people putting up signs saying ‘Zionists not welcome’, and it took five days for them to remove those signs because police and contractors were scared about being attacked by extremist mobs. When the state is in retreat from extremists, we [have] real problems.”

He believes moderate Muslims who support interfaith work and co-operation with other faiths need more protection from intimidation by antagonistic influencers. But more positively, he says the Board’s Optimistic Alliance of Jews and Muslims is progressing with new members coming on stream.

The Alliance has held workshops in a number of areas and organised joint Jewish-Muslim delegations to government departments on common concerns.

If the Gaza War posed challenges for interfaith relations, the Board has also had to weather internal storms - most dramatically, with the disciplinary action taken against deputies who signed a letter to the Financial Times criticising Israel’s conduct in Gaza.

“The important point is this: by our code of conduct, it wasn’t an issue that people had different views, they are entitled to their views. The problem is that they appeared to be speaking in our name rather than in their name.”

But despite that episode with some communities threatening to quit the organisation, he says he believes that the Board has since emerged with more deputies joining. “We have managed to hold community organisations together in this really fractious time. That has taken a lot of effort.”

He cites the late Rabbi Lord Sacks who said “we shouldn’t import conflict, we should export peace. So part of the mission for this year is how do we have those conversations about challenging things, how can we speak to Arab states, Palestinians and others about building a future peace and security for Israelis and Palestinians and the wider Middle East.”

The Board’s notional commitment to a two-state solution inevitably goes against the grain of the current Israeli government. British Jewry, he says, is what “you might call broadly a liberal Zionist community” which does a create a “sense of friction” with some elements of the Israeli government that do not share that outlook.

But when he was in Jerusalem last month for the “J50” forum of world Jewish leaders hosted by Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, there was “a constructive exchange” of views.

Over the next year, he will be hoping for the advance of the Abraham Accords and moves towards Israel’s greater normalisation in the Middle East. “We don’t want to see annexation and things that will go against that,” he says.

And while Sa’ar has recently called for Western Jews to make aliyah in the wake of rising antisemitism, Rosenberg takes a more measured view. “It would be correct to say particularly after the Heaton Park [attack] there is a level of nerve-jangling and jitteriness – that’s completely understandable and we need to confront those challenges with clear-eyed determination.

“At the same time, the figures that we have show that for every two Jews that make aliyah, three Israelis come to the UK and there is a reason for that. This country has been an amazing home for Jews and we are seeing as we prepare for Jewish Culture Month, the amazing creativity that has been, that is, and will be. There is a lot of reason for positivity about our community notwithstanding the challenges.”