For British Jews, 2025 has been the worst year in living memory. France and the US have endured deadly attacks in recent years. We have not. But that changed on Yom Kippur, and perhaps the worst of it is that no one seriously thinks that it will be a one-off. The issue is not whether there will be more attacks on Jews but how, when and where.
MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 20: Rabbi Daniel Walker and King Charles III view floral tributes during a visit to Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue on October 20, 2025 in Manchester, England. The King is visiting Manchester to show his support for the Jewish community in the city, following the attack at Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue on October 02. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)Getty Images
One response to Heaton Park was the regurgitation of the platitude that follows every antisemitic incident – that there is no place for antisemitism on the streets of Britain. It is not so much a platitude as a lie, because there are plainly many places for antisemitism on the streets of Britain, as we saw in Manchester and as is seen every time there is a so-called Free Palestine demonstration, with their cries for the murder of Jews in the guise of “globalise the intifada” and with the police standing by. Now, in the wake of Sydney, the Met and Greater Manchester Police have pledged to clamp down on that particular chant. The marchers are wasting no time in finding other words to express their wish for Jews to die.
But when it comes to the police, the events surrounding the West Midland force’s decision to make the area around Villa Park Judenfrei for the Maccabi Tel Aviv match against Aston Villa in November are something altogether new – and darker. At the very least, it seems clear that the police decided to acquiesce in the idea pushed by “community leaders” that a Jewish or Israeli presence would be inherently provocative. To that end, they pushed a fictitious account of Maccabi fans’ behaviour in Amsterdam to justify a ban on their presence at Villa Park. But this was never about a football match. As Mark Gardner, CEO of the Community Security Trust, put it at the time: “[The] Aston Villa match is about who controls the streets of UK’s second largest city. The football is a very red herring.”
This was a key moment not just in British policing but in the story of Anglo-Jewry’s place in this country, because it marked a move away from the police merely acquiescing in Jew hate on the streets to them doing the bidding of Islamists. The implications are chilling.
One should note that this wasn’t a governmental decision – indeed the Prime Minister condemned it – but it is nonetheless part of a wider story in which the government and Sir Keir Starmer are very much a part. Labour’s arrival in office last year saw the foundations laid for a new approach in which the British government no longer viewed Israel as a trusted and valuable ally but instead treated the country as a recalcitrant state to be punished. Those foundations were the reaffirmation of the International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, the restoration of funding to UNRWA, despite it having employed terrorists who took part in the October 7 massacre, and a partial, albeit mainly symbolic, ban on some arms exports to Israel.
LONDON, ENGLAND - JULY 29: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer delivers a statement inside No. 10 Downing Street on the day the cabinet was recalled to discuss the situation in Gaza, on July 29, 2025 in London, England. (Photo by Toby Melville - WPA Pool/Getty Images)Getty Images
This year that approach deepened and hardened with the recognition of a Palestinian state. The implications for the region of this decision have been well covered, although the accusation that it rewards Hamas is sometimes misunderstood. It is not that Hamas is pleased because it wants to see two states – it doesn’t, it wants Israel and Jews destroyed – but that recognition, which the wider Palestinian movement has sought for decades, hands Hamas a propaganda tool. Hamas can say that while diplomacy and other tactics have got the Palestinians nowhere, October 7 worked. This is what Keir Starmer, and the other leaders who also recognised a Palestine state, have handed to Hamas. Hamas is right: Starmer et al acted because of what happened on October 7.
To understand why Starmer decided to reward Hamas, you need to understand the politics of British demography. There are 37 constituencies in which the Muslim population is over 20 per cent. That’s 37 seats where the threat of a sectarian Muslim MP being returned is very real, particularly for Labour’s electoral calculations. In a further 73 seats, the Muslim population is between 10 and 20 per cent.
Look what happened in last year’s general election in those constituencies where the Muslim population is above 15 per cent: Labour’s vote fell by over 14 per cent compared to 2019. Labour MPs in those seats live in fear of what will happen at the next election, and that drives not just their own pressure for Labour to be – and, even more importantly, to be seen to be – anti-Israel; it also drives the government.
As for the opposition, Nigel Farage has been clear in his opposition to Islamism, and has supported Israel in its right to self-defence. But he has his own issues, having been accused of making antisemitic remarks as a schoolboy. Kemi Badenoch has been principled in her support both for Israel’s right to defend itself and against the forces which are pushing Jew hate to new heights in Britain. It is important that there are such voices, but we have to remember that that is all they are – voices. Labour’s majority is such that there is no reason to think the political situation for our community is likely to improve, and every reason to think it will get far worse as Labour’s unpopularity deepens, leading to ever greater pressure from MPs to pander to the demands of voters they worry will be seduced by the sectarian Muslim threat.
LONDON, ENGLAND - JANUARY 16: Conservative Party Leader Kemi Badenoch delivers speech on how the Conservative party can rebuild voters' trust on January 16, 2025 in London, England. In the speech, Badenoch acknowledged mistakes of her predecessors, touching on a range of issues from Brexit, the economy, net zero and immigration. The Conservatives are competing with rise in popularity of the Reform UK party led by Nigel Farage. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)Getty Images
This has been a tough year to be Jewish and British – probably the toughest in living memory. We are not at the stage where most Jews feel threatened going about their daily lives. But the depressing conclusion that cannot be escaped is that there is little reason to think 2026 will not be worse.
