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BRITAIN’S BIGGEST JEWISH NEWSPAPER 11 October 2019
• 12 Tishrei 5780 •
Issue No.1127
•
T: +44 (0)20 8349 0321 www.ogrstockdenton.com
@JewishNewsUK
‘Who shall live, who shall die?’
Yom Kippur prayer
VOICE OF THE JEWISH NEWS It doesn’t matter if you’re a devoted shul-goer or twice-a-year Jew, finding out about a terror attack on a synagogue while you’re in synagogue during Yom Kippur triggers the same thoughts and inflicts the same wounds: Jews shot for being Jews; it could have been here; it happened to be there. It feels like being at the scene of the crime. Wednesday’s deadly shootings in Halle were shocking but not surprising. There has been a chilling rise in attacks on Jews in cities like Copenhagen, Brussels, Toulouse and particularly Paris, where Jewish people and property are now casual targets for blind hate. A recent EU poll of 16,000 European Jews found 40 percent have considered fleeing. The UK terror threat is ever-present but, mercifully, British Jews don’t contend with the same level of menace, despite figures for the first six months of 2019 showing a record 892 reported antisemitic incidents. The Govern-
ment has increased its annual financial commitment to Jewish security to £14million. This funds equipment and staffing costs to protect schools and community centres, where security gates and guards, barbed wire fences, even blast doors, are commonplace. But money alone is not enough. The government should also give police greater powers to deal with racially-motivated violence and courts greater freedom to wield stiff penalties to deter the next delinquent intent on chucking a brick through a shul window, or worse. The Halle attack is another grievous lesson in how racism rapidly moves from the web to the real world. Like the Christchurch mosque killer, one of the terrorists wore a webcam to live-stream the carnage and was no doubt inspired by conspiracy sites and blogs. It’s also a painful reminder of the ever-present threat from the far-right at a time when Jews have been focused on the antisemitism of the far-left (Ken Livingstone hasn’t blamed the Yom Kippur attack on the actions of the Israel government yet. We hope he’s OK). No matter how dire the statistics, British Jews define themselves not by antisemitism but the contribution they make to British life. Despite our self-confidence, Halle will have dealt another serious blow to our sense of security. Full story, page 2