‘I f****** it’- Giles Coren apologises for article on ‘piddling’ antisemitism

"Perhaps, like me, they thought that the single most important thing the Jews, some Jews, can do to mitigate global antisemitism is to stop the assault.”

The article prompted outrage from the Jewish community. In a letter to The Times, Antisemitism Policy Trust CEO Danny Stone wrote: “In a month when a Jewish child was shot with an air rifle, and when faeces is being smeared on the doors of synagogues, his comments are as naive as they are insulting.

"Furthermore, Coren implies that not only does marching against anti-Jewish racism in some way mean associating oneself with the policies of the Israeli government, but that the best thing Jews can do to stop antisemitism is avoid being seen as representatives of said government.”

Responding to the backlash on social media, Coren wrote: “Listen, I f***** that column yesterday.

"I thought I had something to say but I f***** it.

"I’ll apologise for what I got wrong on Times Radio... and again, briefly, in the paper next week. Not because anyone’s told me to (no one has). But because I’m sorry.”

And, in his Times Radio interview, he added: “I said I thought maybe [the lower attendance at the march] had to do with a certain sense of shame that Jews couldn’t help feeling, wrongly because we are not responsible for the Israeli government or for what’s happening in Gaza.

"I made a couple of false associations and I belittled British antisemitism.

“I was trying to say that, compared with all the death, the attacks in this country on Jewish communities, I used the word ‘piddling’ which I regret massively and apologised for.

"I also talked about the things that “we Jews” were doing in Israel and how unacceptable it was. And of course it wasn’t ‘we Jews’… it was the state of Israel and you shouldn’t implicate all Jews in it.

“I’m in the doghouse with Times readers, who have been my friends for 25 years and saw me as some kind of Jewish superhero… and I’ve muffed it with them and I’m really really sorry.”

He went on that, in light of the row, he was “loathe to give an opinion” on Israel’ strike on Hamas leaders in Doha, but repeated Hamas’ claim that it targeted “the negotiators that we thought were going to end [the war]”.

And he added: “I do not speak for the Jewish community or for any other Jews. I also acknowledge that I’m not in it and I don’t practice and I don’t go to shul. And yes, I do occasionally go to church, although no I haven’t converted and become a Christian and an antisemite.”