To be shocked that this is happening in the UK in 2026

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https://x.com/jeanhatchet/status/2023017313327317331?s=46&t=N3lQrZ7NOBmzt0lfDUYXPA

Jean Hachet posted this today. Men going door to door in Sheffield looking for people who aren't boycotting Israel. The man grabbed one of the women by throat and headbutted her when challenged. Feels like something out of the 1930s

Similarly, what did Israel think would be the consequence of subjugating Palestinians under an apartheid state?

Interesting that Vicky Bhogal from the organisation Jewish and Proud says that "Any campaign against Israel is a campaign against British Jews." So she's directly conflating anti-Israel sentiment with antisemitism, which I've always thought is a really cynical way of shutting down any criticism of how the Israeli government is treating Gaza.

They can all go an fuck themselves with a large spiky cactus if they're that bored they have to promote this rubbish in the U.K
I'm another who couldn't give a shit about it. Why aren't they protesting in the relevant country instead of bullying people here?
Oh, wait a minute, the governments concerned wouldn't tolerate it.

It’s 21,000 according to Amnesty International (which is bad enough).
The term “children” refers to all individuals under the age of 18, so how can anyone be certain than none of them participated in the October 7th attack or in following military actions?
As I said, war is awful and ideally nobody would be dying, but what did Hamas expect would happen?
How should have Israel reacted proportionally to six thousand Gazans (around two thousand of them not even Hamas members) breaking through the border and slaughtering everyone in sight? And then vowing to do that again and again?

I don't know the answer to that. I do know that bombing schools and hospitals is not it.

I'd fully support Israel if they were targeting Hamas, but that is not what they are doing.

What should have Israel have done then, nothing?
Not tried to destroy the tunnels and get rid of as many Hamas fighters as possible?

It didn't happen out of the blue though. Israel has been controlling access to Gaza, making life tough for its citizens, and illegally settling the West Bank for decades. Gazans have never had anything approaching self-determination, and people don't enjoy living under the yoke of tyranny. The whole thing was a pressure cooker that was going to blow at some point.

Of COURSE that doesn't excuse 7/10. Thinking about it sickens me to my stomach. But I'm also sickened by the death toll in Gaza - which is much, much higher.

But that’s the issue though - how can they target Hamas if Hamas are hiding amongst civilians?

I have just read a book called the Approaching Storm, about the rise of the Nazis, written by an American Quaker woman who was living in Germany at the time. Everyone should read it IMO because we are sleepwalking into something very nasty.

Well exactly. A proportionate response to the 7/10 attack would have involved targeted attacks against members of Hamas. The Israeli government have more than proved they are capable of this and have one of the best intelligence services in the world. Remember the pager attack? It was ingenious! It would have also been accompanied by a systematic appraisal of collateral damage. I'm afraid that what we are seeing here looks more like a race based wiping out of an entire group of people. Ie a genocide. Very different from state on state warfare.

If they'd stuck to destroying the tunnels and killing Hamas fighters, that would probably have been acceptable to most of the international community. But that clearly isn't what's happened. If it was a normal war, journalists would be allowed in and allowed to report on it normally, but that wasn't allowed because Israel didn't want the world to see what was really going on - meaning everyone has had to rely on what Gazans report back, which Israel then immediately dismisses as Hamas propaganda and lies. Plus you've got the likes of Smotrich openly saying it's "justified and moral" to starve 2 million Gazans to death. Israel looks just as guilty of wanting to kill all Gazans as Hamas is guilty of wanting to destroy Israel.

If you care to start a thread, I'll happily join you.

The near wholesale slaughter of peaceful protesters in Iran was utterly horrific.

Again, I don't know the answer to this, but again killing tens of thousands of innocent civilians is not it.

There is no point you can make that will ever get me to agree that the slaughter of thousands upon thousands of innocent women, children, and aid workers is ever acceptable or excusable.

If Israel is unable to target Hamas without "accidentally" slaughtering civilians en masse, then yes, they should do nothing. Doing nothing is more acceptable than genocide. And, no, that would lead to more Israelis being killed, unless you also want to try to convince me that the Israeli military, one of the largest, best-funded, most technologically advanced military forces in the world, is unable to defend Israel's borders against a few thousand underfunded militants?

This is all very well, but it's straying very far from the original OP. It's not a thread about the rights and wrongs of the situation in Israel and Gaza, of which there are very, very many other threads ongoing, over on the CITME board. We have enough of those already, no need to rehash the arguments here.

This is a thread about intimidation of people in the UK, by activists who are seeking to pressure the public to ascribe to a certain political viewpoint.

For my part, I am very concerned about the rise in anti-semitism in the UK - as evidenced by polls - and the fact that many Jewish people in the UK are feeling unwanted here and under threat. And ARE under actual threat.

We should be taking this seriously and not condoning anything that encourages more of it.

It is perfectly ok to take a stance that you want to boycott Israeli goods, and that you want to encourage others to follow suit. I personally think it will make no difference whatsoever to Israel's actions, but I get others may disagree, and/or just feel as a matter of principle that they do not wish to spend money that may end up in Israel. That is their right. It's perfectly ok to publicise that in the usual channels, and engage in polite and respectful debate.

It is NOT ok to door-step people aggressively, knocking on their doors uninvited, pressuring them to agree with a particular stance, and then taking note of their personal details if they don't. This would be unacceptable under any circumstances, but in the current climate of increased harassment, attacks and racial hatred towards Jewish people, it really cannot be stood for and must not be tolerated.

Let's not forget this is all happening in a climate where a celebrity known to be Jewish has been accosted and harassed just going about his business on the Tube, purely for being Jewish. That the pillock doing that felt emboldened and justified to target him because of the religious/ethnic group he belongs to is frightening. And it's just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the anti-semitic under-current that seems to be strengthening daily in the UK.

But you think Israel did the wrong thing - so what's the right thing? What's the alternative - do nothing and wait for Hamas to maim, rape, torture, murder and kidnap hundreds or thousands more Israeli citizens and residents?

Not much point talking to them or negotiating with them - their start point is "Israel shouldn't exist and we want to kill all Jews", not sure how much common ground is to be found there.

The only realistic post-attack option was to try and destroy Hamas. Who had deliberately embedded themselves within the civilian population. I know the endless pro-Palestinian propaganda denies it, but the IDF did a great deal to minimise civilian casualties (and actually, when you look at the number of dead vs the infrastructure destruction you can see that is the case). They dropped leaflets, they gave plenty of advance warning to allow evacuations before a particular area was bombarded. Hamas on the other hand shot the fleeing civilians, or blew them up on the road. Literally Israel has more care for Gazan civilians than Hamas does.

I feel the same. I have no ill-feeling towards either side, but I’m too busy clinging on to what is left of my own identity to worry about other people’s. The Left care so deeply about the Palestinians, yet when I complain that mass immigration is changing my identity, that the countryside is being destroyed by new housing, that my history and culture and national heroes are being ridiculed and demonised, or that I no longer feel British, I’m called a gammon and a NIMBY and told to shut

Leftists like to pose as morally superior. In reality, they are most spiteful, cruel, hate-filled people you’ll ever meet. But because their hatred is directed towards middle-class Brexit voters and Dail Mail readers, somehow it’s OK.

You avoid my question, what did the Palestinians/Hamas expect to happen after their murder spree in October? They poked Israel and are now complaining that Israel responded. BTW, I've never been a great fan of Israel, they have used the events of WWII as their reason for violence before in the ME.

Fully agree.

If we're going to be reposting posts, how about this:
All this except I’m an immigrant and moved to Scotland 20 years ago. I never thought of myself as Jewish first but after the last few years it’s absolutely how many others see me. My daughter has been attacked at school, my workplace is papered with globalise my death posters and my centre of town is a no go zone for me on weekends. I have never considered immigrating to Israel until this last year - at least in Israel I have some sort of group, I’m all alone here and I have no idea how to keep my kids safe.

Anyone who comes on this thread posting whataboutery or "they're not antisemitic, they're antizionist!" should read this post. People like you have produced a country where Jews feel so frightened and intimidated that they consider emigrating. It's utterly shameful.

Antisemitism was traditionally right wing. Now it's the left wing's racism of choice.

Act in a proportionate manner that respects international law whilst minimising collateral damage. Can you not see the wider implications of Israel disregarding international law? Might it be a bit of a slippery slope?

We both know 7/10 didn't happen in a vacuum. Israel has controlled Gaza's borders and effectively oppressed its citizens for decades, meaning it's had no realistic prospect of self-determination. It was, as I've said earlier, a pressure cooker that was always going to blow at some point. It's really not as simple as Israel retaliating to 7/10. The hatred on both sides has been fomenting for decades, and the events of the last three years are going to make things worse, not better. Unless, of course, there are no Palestinians left to continue the hate on that side, which is pretty much what the Israeli unofficial position looks like at this point.

I also struggle with the idea that Israel, with its mega-sophisticated military, really did need to kill upwards of 70,000 people and prevent food and medical access to Gaza, thus absolutely guaranteeing the indirect deaths of thousands more women and children, in order to smoke out Hamas. It's also easy to label the dead 'Hamas' to justify the bodies in the ground when they're not exactly in a position to argue about it, and there are no international journalists allowed in to report the actual truth.

But can you also not see that the likes of Jean Hatchet - a 'feminist' agitator who could start a fight in an empty room - is likely to make people doubt the veracity of antisemitism, rather than be shocked at how much worse it's getting? That video looked pretty disingenuous tbh and also having encountered her formerly in feminist circles, I'd be 'hmmmm' about basically anything she said. With friends like that, etc etc.

Israel withdrew from Gaza more than twenty years ago. The borders were controlled for the exact reason we all saw on 7 October.
How could there have been any steps taken towards self-determination under Hamas? Their key manifesto is literally to wipe out Israel?

War is shit, the deaths of those civilians are an absolute tragedy, but the blame lies firmly with Hamas, who welcome as many civilian casualties as possible as it's useful propaganda.
The food aid is another thing that gets used as propaganda - Israel and it's partner took over aid distribution exactly because it was being taken by Hamas and resold, the profits from that were propping them up. It wasn't some sort of evil plot to be cruel and starve people.

Ultimately, it's people cheering from the sidelines that keep emboldening this - Israel isn't going to take being attacked, or stop existing. The kindest, most loving thing supporters of Palestinians could do is to urge acceptance of that.

No, I really don't see how one person's take on something can really, in all seriousness, undermine the whole concept of racism in the mind of any reasonable person, who does any thinking at all. Even if I might not agree with her.

I was about to go on to say - surely no thinking person would ever just dismiss every other piece of evidence, just because one person they happen not to agree with happens to have the same opinion on it? That would be nuts!

But then I remembered that in fact there are people -typically on the left, frustratingly - who do just that, aren't there? That whole childish thing of 'you're aligning yourself with so and so, who I've decided is beyond the pale - because I can't cope with the fact that they have a different opinion to me - and therefore you're tarred with the same brush', sort of thing.

Is that what you're alluding to? If so, hugely baffling and frustrating, isnt' it? I'm not sure where that sprung up from, but I do despair of what younger people are being taught if they can't think critically and debate constructively without smearing their opponent.

Well, this whole thread is about one person's take on something, as it's about that Jean Hatchet video. And Jean Hatchet is an unreliable witness of anything. So if we're using this as an example of how antisemitic the UK has become, it isn't that. That's not to say of course that there isn't antisemitism in the UK, but the video that was literally what this thread is about is not credible evidence of it.