The government should establish a fund to cover the cost of synagogue security in Britain, a panel investigating the rise of antisemitism has said.
Terror threats facing the Jewish community mean effective measures taken to protect schools should now be rolled out to cover shuls.
The All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism makes the recommendation today as it publishes a major report into Jew-hatred in Britain.
The inquiry set up a panel to look at the changing face of antisemitism following the rise in attacks on Jews after the Gaza conflict last summer.
It also recommended a review on hate crimes committed on social media.
Chaired by MP John Mann, the cross-party group of politicians gathered evidence from Jewish communities and organisations around Britain, as well as looking to Europe for examples of how other countries tackle the problem.
Responding to the recommendations, Prime Minister David Cameron said: “This is a hugely important cross-party report. Tackling antisemitism goes right to the heart of what we stand for as a country.
“This report has a vital role to play. There can be no excuses. No disagreements over foreign policy or politics can ever be allowed to justify antisemitism or any other form of racism, prejudice or extremism.”
Labour leader Ed Miliband said the report highlighted key issues in Britain that should be addressed following the attack on a kosher supermarket in Paris last month.
Mr Mann said: “This report is a plan of action and a work programme for Parliament and government. It is the responsibility of parliamentarians to take the leads in this fight.
“Whoever is in power can be on notice that we expect it to be the basis of their work programme on tackling antisemitism and the new government will be held to account on its delivery.”
Among the panel’s other recommendations was a call for the Crown Prosecution Service to carry out a review of how hate crimes are committed online.
“Hitler” and “Holocaust” were among the top 35 key words used on Twitter in the weeks after the violence in Israel and Gaza.
The Archbishop of Canterbury said internet companies must do more to stop the spread of hate.
Most Rev Justin Welby, who will host the official launch of the report, told the Times: “To put on Twitter a photograph of someone on a bar of soap because they’re Jewish, that is so disgusting they shouldn’t allow it to go up.
"They should remove it at once. And stop the account of anyone who’s doing that. It would mean monitoring but there’s the software to do it.”
There should also be a national review of interfaith work, to provide authorities with structures to help calm tensions during “periods of potential disharmony between communities”.
In a nod to the decision taken by some local councils last summer to fly Palestinian flags, the panel called on authorities to avoid “political gesturing”.
An independent group of non-Jewish figures from public life should be set up to identify trends in antisemitism and work on explaining how language can be unintentionally offensive.
Metropolitan Police commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said: “As this report indicates, we need a wider response than the police and criminal justice system can deliver alone, we need society to become as vocally intolerant of faith-hatred as it is of other forms of discrimination and a clearer understanding of where freedom of speech oversteps the mark."
Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis said the report’s recommendations showed how fortunate the Jewish community was to be supported by parliamentarians who take antisemitism seriously.
“The threat against the Jewish community is real and anxiety remains high following recent events in France and elsewhere,” he said. “Today's report could not come at a more opportune time and I welcome its practical plan of action.”
The Board of Deputies welcomed the findings, describing the report as timely.
It said: "Last week, the Community Security Trust’s figures showed that 2014 was the worst in 30 years for antisemitic incidents. It is right that we now look at concrete steps to tackle antisemitism, including on social media, which has in many ways become a new frontier of hatred."
Polling conducted for the inquiry, and also released today, showed a number trends relating to antisemitism and Jews around Britain.
Just over half the population – 55 per cent – said they felt they would be able to explain to someone else what antisemitism was. Only 37 per cent of younger people – in the 18-24 range – said they could explain it.
Of those asked, 80 per cent said they believed the murder of the four Jews in the Paris kosher supermarket was antisemitic.
The polling showed that on average, people think there are 2.7 million Jews living in Britain. The real number is closer to 250,000. One-fifth of people think there are five million Jews in this country.
On the topic of loyalty, 62 per cent think British Jews are as loyal to the country as any other citizens. Only seven per cent believed Jews to be more loyal to Israel.
Questions relating to attitudes towards Jews showed one-thirds believed the community defended Israel regardless of its actions, and 15 per cent felt Jews “talk too much about what happened to them in the Holocaust”.
Populus interviewed 1,001 British adults in the third week of January.