Absolutely zero talk from corporate about the terrorist attacks against Jewish people

[seasmussealife1]

We have an awareness calendar at work. Mundane stuff but also Eid/Easter. I live in Manchester so it would be very hard not to know it's Easter.

Also no other religions are on the awareness calendar.

However zero talk about the terrorist attacks and no saying "if you need support talk to manager, hr or employee assistance" etc.

Zero.

It's also social housing.

Aibu that we are all ignoring the terrorism against Jews

imagine if they had to also acknowledge the children dying in Gaza and offer support, The email and post would be daily!!
Having a chip on your shoulder is not a nice look!
All corporate companies don’t engage in politics or religion so I would they this is normal.
With regards to religious celebrations and the awareness calendar, have you disclosed you are jewish? As Easter is a national known event and with regards to Eid, muslims don’t shy away from expressing they are muslims. Perhaps you should too. Your company is not gonna know it has practicing jews as staff if you don’t tell them. Common sense!!!

Then they would also need daily posts about the children being starved in Sudan, and murdered in Nigeria, by Islamist groups. Israel tried harder than any other country at war (one they didn’t start btw) to minimise civilian casualties and bring food into the country. Why don’t you stop parroting the propaganda that is contributing to the rise in antisemitism against people who have NOTHING TO DO WITH the wars in the Middle East anyway?!!

Israel tried harder than any other country at war (one they didn’t start btw) to minimise civilian casualties and bring food into the country

We have very very different ideas on what try harder means. Very.

Wow. This thread really illustrates how people know so little about the Jewish community and how they have been feeling since Oct 7th 2023.

The Jewish population is tiny. 0.49 % of the UK population, yet receives around a third of all hate crime.

The Jewish population is largely concentrated in two population, London ( Golders Green has a big population) Manchester.

Since Oct 7th there have been continual attacks on Jewish people, harassment in healthcare, education, attacks on Jewish businesses, attempts to cancel Jewish artists and bands, online attacks. People may not be aware, but simply being openly Jewish, even if not talking about anything political, is enough to get hate and vitriol online. I know people with an online e presence, and when they ‘come out’ as Jewish, have lost huge numbers of followers. As well as getting abuse. Honestly. Look into this. The open racism is appalling.

And since Oct last year it’s escalated to murderous violence. There was the fatal attack at Manchester synagogue and shortly after the police foiled what they stated would have been the largest terrorist massacre ever in Britain if it had gone ahead. That was Muslim origin men who were acquiring military grade weapons to infiltrate a March against anti-Semitism and open fire, murdering as many Jews and their allies as possible, becore going to the Jewish neighbourhood in Manchester to continue killing.

Jewish people feel utterly abandoned as people are not speaking up for them. Where is the outrage at this violent racism against our one of our smallest minorities? Why are the anti-racist organisations not speaking out? Why are they not on the anti-Semitism marches, let alone organizing their own marches in solidarity with Jews.

So yes, for a Manchester business to recognize the hurt and fear of our Jewish citizens would mean the world. It would be appreciated.

The othering of British citizens here is appalling. British Jews are British citizens. They are fellow British compatriots being murdered here. They are employees and customers of the business.

The minimization of murder here is appalling. To dismiss the cold hearted murder of Jews as ‘politics’ that businesses should not get involved in is appalling. The racist murder and terrorisation of Jews is not politics. It’s crime. It’s racially motivated crime.

The dehumanizing of Jews and othering of British Jews in this post reveals deep underlying anti-Semitic thinking.

And many businesses did put out statements offering comfort to trans identified people after the Supreme Court ruling clarified the rights of trans people and women. But when Jews are being racist murdered in the UK for being murdered, nothing.

These are not isolated hate crimes. Jews are being attacked and murdered across the Western world, USA, Australia, UK, Europe. This is massive movement of violent racist hatred to Jews. Yes, a movement of that size and severity against a tiny minority should be recognized. And the population subject to it should be supported.

What other country is expected to provide aid to a hostile attacker? What other country sends evacuation warnings to civilians? Comments like
yours are meaningless and just show that Israel is held to an entirely different standard than any other country.

Spot on. Thanks for saying it so eloquently.

@seasmussealife1 - my workplace leadership did acknowledge the attack in Golders Green and it did the one in Manchester. It also acknowledged the Air India plane crash, and events in Iran. They obviously don’t want to ‘take a side’ or appear political, but acknowledged that staff members will be affected. It acknowledged October 7th and the resulting Gaza War but not repeatedly.

There are very few Jewish people in the UK.

Religious Composition in England and Wales (2021 Census):
Christian: 46.2% (27.5 million)
No Religion: 37.2% (22.2 million)
Muslim: 6.5% (3.9 million)
Hindu: 1.7% (1.0 million)
Sikh: 0.9% (524,000)
Buddhist: 0.5% (273,000)
Jewish: 0.5% (271,000)Other religions: 0.6% (348,000)

On an awareness calendar there should be all major religions or none. We have all on ours and intranet messages for all major celebrations and awareness days. I would complain OP as it's not inclusive.

We have an internal awareness Callander for standard holidays for all religions it’s very useful as we all know when major festivals are. The terrorist attack is obviously awful but at the last place I worked there ended up a horrible muddle by management about how to navigate the Middle East issues. We have people whose families are in Lebanon , Iran and some Palestinians as well. I cannot put into words how absolutely awful the emotional toll some of them are under. Antisemitism is not justified in any way but the elephant in the room that no one talks about is that a lot of this is triggered by Israel’s actions. It feels to me if you look at the perpetrators of these awful acts of terror in the uk it is basically the Middle East war being played out on our shores. I can’t explain it properly and have Jewish friends who condemn Israel’s actions. We need to find a way to be supportive and considerate of all.

I don't think it would be appropriate. I mean where would it end? There's terrible things happening virtually daily across the UK.

The calendar surely is for holidays/ festivals (they should have other religions as well as Christian/Muslim) and maybe things like 'international womens day' etc.

Seems to me that it's all everyone's talking about. All the time.

Maybe you need to start leaving your politics and religious views at home and focus on your work.

Yep..I was at a big private sector international company, multiple employee nationalties and religions and the rule was religion and politics was to stay out of the work environment in the interests of team work..

What people discussed outside of working hours was their own business but the company certainly wouldn't spend money or administration time facilitating discussion groups or similar.

Antisemitism is not justified in any way but the elephant in the room that no one talks about is that a lot of this is triggered by Israel’s actions

What you are saying here is ‘anti-Semitism is not justified, but when British people who are Jews are subject to racist attacks for being Jewish, we should not stand with them, because I see Jews, uniquely among ethnicities, as being collectively responsible for the actions of any Jew. Obviously, I didn’t feel like this during the Islamophobia arising from the Islamic state inspired terror attacks, that was just wrong and I did think it was right to stand beside British Muslims, but it’s different for Jews isn’t it?’

Murdering British Jews for being Jews is not politics. It’s racist crime.

What would you write about it on an awareness calendar? They seem to be more about significant planned events in the year, religious events, pride, mental health campaigns, etc, etc. Are you based in Golders Green so are specifically impacted by the attacks? I'm sure everyone is aware that there have been attacks on Jewish people and property, what purpose would putting it on a calendar serve?

Without knowing exactly what is and wha t isn't included on your calendar, it's difficult to know whether it us unreasonable to not have anything about this.

In my mind, an awareness calendar is about future events so you can see before they occur that they are upcoming - perfectly reasonable to know that some of your colleagues / client may be fasting for Ramadan etc. This should include all major religions / festivals / celebrations etc.

If there are notices on it about major events & incidents then perhaps it is unreasonable to not have anything. If it was only for the Manchester attack and you are in Manchester I don't think they are being unreasonable - the proximity and scale makes it more likely that colleagues and clients may have been directly affected.

💯

If it's the other end of the country Two Jewish men died last year IN MANCHESTER due to terrorism. Did you really miss that?

OP, out of interest, Is your work doing anything to support people affected by the genocide in Palestine and the murder and occupation in Lebanon?

My work hasn’t, but many employees are sadly affected by it.