Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks told students in a speech at Tel Hai Academic College that despite the “challenges facing all humanity, Israel is the role model of hope.”

In his keynote lecture, titled ‘The 21st Century Challenge for Jews and Israel’, the Chief Rabbi explained to 180 guests that Israel leads the world in environmentalism, economic equality, technology, approaches to terror, refugee policies and democratic processes – “Israel is not just a democracy, it is a hyper democracy. Everyone is prime minister here,” he said.

The Chief Rabbi discussed the changing face of antisemitism. “Like a virus, antisemitism mutates and so it changes from time to time and we are living through one of the greatest mutations.”

Current day “antisemitism is antizionism”, he said and expressed his frustrations with criticisms that Israel is a regular violator of human rights. “People believe crazy things,” he said.

The Chief Rabbi called upon “our dearly beloved Muslim and Christian friends, chaverim” to fight the delegitimsation of Israel and the Jewish people. “Jews cannot fight antisemitism alone,” he said.

The Chief Rabbi’s talk at Tel Hai Academic College was part of his two-day tour of UJIA programmes in the Galil in February.