Jews do have long-term future in UK – but more must be done to protect community, says Chief Rabbi

He said: “We are blessed to be British Jews and please God, to have a very successful Jewish future here – while it is very important to include in the same sentence that we are genuinely and deeply concerned about our safety and security. It is real.

“We do want to see more being done effectively in order to protect us.”

He had “no doubt” that the shocking images of what had happened at Bondi transmitted around the world would prompt governments “to do more and in fact we have seen it starting to happen. But the most important thing is to maintain the momentum.”

Sir Ephraim had joined a memorial event on Sunday in Bondi Beach where thousands of people gathered to conduct the menorah lighting which the terror attack had stopped taking place.

He said that some members of the Australian community had expressed the concern that “after Chanukah, will everybody forget about it, will it be business as usual?”

He said: “I think there is an enormous fear about that. Therefore we need to guarantee that the spirit of togetherness, the recognition of this evil, our determination to tackle it has to now stay with us. Once it is off the front pages of newspapers, we can’t allow it to be off our minds.”

Australian Jewish leaders were delivering the “same message we ourselves have been saying all the time – that hate speech can very quickly become hate crime and terrorist acts of this sort don’t happen in a vacuum.”

Greater regulation was needed to curb hateful rhetoric on social media, he said, along with the recognition that “these terrorist activities are not only a threat to Jews and Judaism, they are a threat to our entire society”.

Sir Ephraim also said that if people wanted to make aliyah, that was “absolutely wonderful,” but added: “There is definitely no need for any call to be issued that Jews should flee from Western countries.”

He explained he had “felt it my responsibility” to go in person to Australia. Quoting a Hebrew phrase, he said: “We came to strengthen and emerged strengthened.”

While Australian Jewry was in a state of “deep grief”, he had been struck by ‘the determination – which was very instinctive – of the community to guarantee that this event would not push Judaism into the shadows, but quite the contrary, inspire everybody to come back in a greater spirit, with higher numbers, with increased strength of Jewish religious and traditional life.”

The estimated crowd of 20,000 at Sunday’s memorial had sent what the Chief Rabbi described as “a hugely strong message of resilience and fortitude”.

He said: “There was something unspoken about it that was very powerful. And there was no bitterness, no enmity, no call for revenge, no hatred. What was being called for in memory of victims [was] practise more good deeds, strengthen social cohesion. I found that exceptionally inspiring.”

A flight cancellation resulted in Sir Ephraim being unable to attend the funeral of the youngest victim to be killed, 10-year-old Mathilda. But he was able to pay his last respects to Boris and Sofia Gurman, immigrants from the former Soviet Union in their 60s who were killed tackling one of the two gunmen. They were “amazing heroes,” he said. “By all accounts if not for their extraordinary bravery many, many dozens more would have been killed and injured.”

Sir Ephraim also made a hospital visit to see Yakov Tetleroyd, who had left severely wounded in the attack, while his father Boris Tetleroyd had been killed. Yakov’s injuries left him unable to attend the funeral, which took place half an hour after his meeting with the Chief Rabbi. Sir Ephraim said: “He was in an enormous state of pain both emotional and physical – and yet very very strong and determined to be well.”

He also visited 14-year-old Chaya Dadon, whose heroism had made her a “global sensation,” he said. She had broken cover amid the gunfire to shield two young children with her body, sustaining injuries as a result. When he gave her some of the get-well cards from children in UK Jewish schools that he had been asked to bring with him, “she was so moved,” he said.

He said he had found “strong support” from beyond the Jewish community, offering one example. “On Friday before Shabbat, I was taken to a kosher bakery just to stock up for Shabbat in case I got hungry… At the bakery there were a few tables for people to sit and there was a family of two parents and two young kids. They called me over and started chatting to me. They were a non-Jewish family.”

They had woken up that morning and in the light of what had happened, felt they had to do something. “So they said, ‘Let’s go and buy something from a Jewish business.’ They decided to go to this bakery in order to have their lunch there… That was their tribute.”

On the plane people had come up to him to offer “heartwarming” messages, he said.

Sir Ephraim came back with “one abiding image” from the trip. On Shabbat morning, he had attended prayers at Chabad of Bondi Beach, the community which had organised the event on that first night of Chanukah. At one point during the service, more than 30 people had come to the bimah or risen in the ladies’ gallery to recite birchat hagomel, the blessing for delivery from injury or danger. “It was very, very moving,” the Chief Rabbi said.