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He described it as “heartbreaking” that some British Jews feel unable to display visible signs of their identity in public.
“It is heartbreaking to know there are areas in London, in places around the UK, where Jewish people don’t feel free to wear a kippah,” he said. “It is a great shame.
“In my country, a Jewish person can wear his Orthodox clothing and no one would harm them. We have a Jewish community that is thriving, while here they have to hide their identity. It’s really sad.”
A vocal opponent of Islamist groups and Iranian influence, and an online following in the millions, Taha has emerged as one of the Arab world’s most prominent public advocates of the Abraham Accords and interfaith coexistence.
He is in the UK this week to join the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference. During his tour of the north-west London community, alongside a handful of independent Arab peace advocates, Taha visited the site of one of the stabbing attacks outside a synagogue as well as Hatzola’s base of operations, where in March four ambulances were set on fire.
“We are here to show the Jewish community you have friends in the Middle East,” he said.
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The group also visited Grodz kosher bakery and café and a Jewish bookshop, Torah Treasures, where Taha purchased a book on Jewish theology. They were shown around by Rabbi Doron Birnbaum.
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Standing on Golders Green High Street, in front of the memorial wall for Iranian victims of the government’s crackdown on the uprising earlier this year, Taha pointed to images of Iranian children killed by the regime and posed a rhetorical question to his compatriots: “How many protests did you see on British streets opposing the killing of this child? What about this one? How many British MPs did you see condemn Iran for carrying out its war of aggression during the holy month of Ramadan?”
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He said Britain cannot be a safe place for Jewish people if it refuses to adopt a more robust approach toward Islamism. He claimed the stable pluralism found in the UAE was down to the country maintaining a “assertive” stance against Islamist extremism, particularly the Muslim Brotherhood, and “tough” punishments for instances of antisemitism.
“We are not in 1936, we are in 2026. We should not tolerate intolerance,” he said.
“When synagogues are being attacked, when Jewish people are being attacked openly, when are you going to ban the Muslim Brotherhood?” he asked. “Ban them to protect your own people, your own societies.”
The UAE designated the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organisation in 2014 as part of a wider crackdown on Islamist groups. He said many people and politicians in Britain did not seem to “realise” the threat posed by the group.
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“They have huge influence in the West, it is embedded here, and it is the proxy of the Iranian regime,” he said. “They are the manifest of Al Qaeda and ISIS, and they run charities in Britain, and they run mosques, they run schools, and now they run your streets. And there are [figures in] the British parliament which glorify or at least has sympathy with them.
“[The Muslim Brotherhood] want a weak Britain, they want a Britain that does not fight back, that does not stand against antisemitism, does not stand with the United States of America or its friends and allies in the Gulf. They want a weak prime minister, not a strong society or a strong British military.”
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Taha also had strong words of condemnation for the recently agreed Iran deal, an agreement which, he said, “does not serve the Middle East and the world, and does not end in peace”.
“I think America is making a huge mistake, and it’s not going to end well. When you’re going to send billions, and billions, and billions of dollars to the Islamic regime of Iran, which fills [the pockets of] the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas in Gaza, or Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Iraq militias, the Yemeni militias, that does not end the war, that does not limit the threat.
“The fact Trump says, ‘let’s give it a chance’, well, the Middle East has given the Islamic regime 47 years of chance, so did the international community. And that chance led to October 7, to 9/11, and [years] of infecting our societies with their poisonous ideology.”
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While he said he was “extremely worried” about Britain and the West, Taha was also keen to emphasise what he sees as the positive trajectory of relations between Jews and Arabs across the Middle East.
“The Jewish community is thriving right now in the UAE,” he said, pointing to the growth of Jewish communal life since the signing of the Abraham Accords in 2020.
“The Abraham Accords are growing stronger and stronger. Dozens of Israeli companies are operating in the country. Jewish life is thriving in all aspects – culture, technology, AI, education – with [as many as] 7,000 Jews now residing in the UAE.
“Peace is more than just between states, it is between people, and those relationships between people, professional and personal, are increasing and increasing [behind the scenes].”
