(Spectator-UK) Stephen Daisley - The explosion of hatred and extremism prompted by the Oct. 7 massacre was never going to limit itself to the Jewish state. The news that Palestinian terrorists had infiltrated Israel and slaughtered its citizens appeared to kickstart a dynamo of Jew-hatred in the West. A report from the Community Security Trust (CST) finds there were more antisemitic incidents in the UK over the past 12 months than in any previous year, with Oct. 7 pinpointed as the most significant factor. The first warning siren sounded in Israel at 8.30 a.m. UK time and the first incident in the CST report was at 12.55 p.m. "The speed at which antisemites mobilized in the UK following Hamas' attack shows that, initially at least, the significant increase in anti-Jewish hate was, if anything, a celebration of Hamas' massacre by people whose own hatred was emboldened and, in their minds, legitimized by the brutality enacted on civilians in Israel," said the report. The report confirms antisemitism as a grave and growing problem in this country, with attacks on Israeli Jews inspiring antisemitism against British Jews. Some Jews already are wary of being visibly Jewish in public. That British citizens are even having to think in these terms is abhorrent but it is the country we now find ourselves with. This is a country where an MP was murdered partly over his membership of Conservative Friends of Israel, while another has just been intimidated into standing down over his pro-Israel views. I don't want us to be this sort of country. One of the most admirable qualities of the British is their tolerance. We need to become much less tolerant - hotly intolerant, in fact - when it comes to antisemitism.
2024-02-20 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive