I am beyond feeling scared. Yes, we are anxious, worried, concerned. We know that today’s Golders Green terror attack will not be the last, just as the attack on Heaton Park shul was not the last, just as the firebombing of the Hatzola ambulances will not be the last, just as the arson attacks on synagogues will not be the last. More – worse – is coming, because it always does. When the genie of antisemitism is let out of the bottle, it takes hold and it grows. Always, everywhere.
But those worries are at the back of my mind now. More than those, I am angry. Because every single one of us knows why we are where we now are, and who and what is responsible.
We have a government which has spent two years portraying the Jewish state as uniquely evil in the world and rewarding Hamas for its massacre on October 7, 2023 by recognising a Palestinian state. What did they think would happen to British Jews when they attacked the world’s only Jewish state?
We have authorities which have stood and watched as hate marches have taken over the streets and have allowed pure, unbridled Jew hate to run free. Make no mistake: the hate marches are the single biggest factor behind the escalation in Jew hate, not least because they comprise much of that escalation – and inspire the rest.
And we have politicians as a class whose response to the rise of Jew hate is to mouth the obscene platitude that there is no place for antisemitism on the streets, when every one of these attacks shows that there is a very large place for antisemitism on our streets.
In addition, we have those who are no less directly responsible for the rise in Jew hate, from the early resurgence in the years of Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour leadership to its contemporary manifestation through the Green Party.
The Greens have been overrun with antisemites, many of whom are standing in next month’s local election. And what does its Jewish leader do about them? Instead of tackling the issue, he turns his fire on those Jews under threat from antisemites, saying that we need to distinguish between an actual threat to the Jewish community and the “perception of unsafety”.
We do not know yet if Iran was behind today’s attack, although we do know it will certainly have rejoiced in it. And how has our government responded to Iranian terror in Britain? By doing precisely nothing.
Last week the JC reported that Keir Starmer intends to proscribe the IRGC – a mere two years (nearly) after taking office. Let me put it this way: I will believe it when I see it. Labour is so scared of the sectarian Muslim vote that it dares not act. Look at its pusillanimous response on Monday to the Iranian embassy’s call for Iranians living in UK to sacrifice their lives for the regime. It summoned the Iranian ambassador to see a junior minister, Hamish Falconer (a man who infamously hugged the Palestinian "ambassador”) who told him off. And that was it. The Iranians, meanwhile, continue to have an embassy in which they can plan a terror campaign against British Jews, and continue to be allowed to have the IRGC operate here.
Clearly those responsible for terrorism are those who carry it out. But so too are those who plan it, those who fund it – and those who refuse, despite all the evidence, to take any action against the nation most responsible for it.
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