Antisemitism is ‘running riot’ in UK, British October 7 survivor says

Ron-Kendall, who was 55 at the time of the attacks, had been visiting her parents at Kibbutz Nahal Oz, where she grew up, on the day of the massacre. Her father Shlomo Ron, 84, a founding member of the kibbutz and a firm believer in the two-state solution, was scheduled to undergo surgery on October 8 at the nearby Soroka Hospital.

He was shot and killed by Hamas terrorists through the kitchen window as he sat in his reclining chair, watching the news, at around 10.30am on October 7. The terrorists, assuming he was alone, did not enter the house. Shlomo’s wife Hannah, who has dementia, and the couple’s Filipino carer remained alone in the house for several hours until they were rescued.

Ron-Kendall had managed to enter a safe room in the annexed part of her parents’ house with her son and her sister, remaining there for 12 hours until the IDF arrived to rescue them. Her son, Jordan Kendall, 20, is also a British citizen but lives in Israel.

“We just became like a big like a huddled ball on the floor,” Ron-Kendall’s testimony states,

“The shooting was immense. It was relentless. It was automatic gunshots. We felt the walls were shaking, the floor was shaking, and we just huddled together, held each other. At that point, we kind of lost control of our bodily fluids, because it just happens. It's just like the fear was so intense, and we just sat there waiting. To be shot.”

She continued: “The mind kept saying, ‘This is not real. This is not happening.’ It's something from some kind of dystopian life. For hours we sat in puddles of wee, we didn't eat, we didn't drink, we couldn't, we could hardly breathe. We were frightened, and we couldn't move, and we kept texting ‘send someone, send someone, send someone.’ That's all we could think of.

“When we were evacuated, eventually, there were things everywhere, you know, it was a scene of dystopia. It was a scene of chaos. There were bodies which I didn't want to look at it was just like something that you imagine in the movies.”

Turning to the lack of support she said she received from the UK authorities, Ron-Kendall said: “I was abandoned by the British government at a time of total vulnerability. The British

government is allowing what's going on ever since, in demonstrations and in antisemitism running riot, students in universities suffering, Jewish students, communities affected every day since, and that's been allowed to happen to me. I still live under threat. I cannot feel safe in a country that that normalises this kind of behaviour.”

She added: “I had no recognition. I came back here to the UK, expected to be grateful that I survived and put that event behind me and just function in my everyday life. I didn't have any acknowledgement from the authorities, from the British government.

October 7 “really did happen,” Ron-Kendall said. “It happened to me. I am a testament that it did happen and I survived it. I think bearing witness is the most important thing.”

The updated October 7 Parliamentary Commission report also includes testimony from freed British-Israeli hostage Emily Damari, whose account forms one of the 13 new documented testimonies.

Lord Roberts said: “As we continue to uncover yet more horrors, the updated report continues to serve as a permanent memorial and enduring resource for governments, educators, and civil society in order to safeguard the truth against denialism and distortion.

“The purpose of commissioning our report has always been to chronicle the events of October 7 with clarity and meticulous, fact-checking precision, to ensure it is never forgotten, diminished or disregarded by malign forces intent on washing away the true scale of that fateful day.”

The full 340-page report can be read here.