Anti Semitism in the UK

[Oakmaiden]

This is in the news a lot at the moment.

I have never, to my knowledge, heard anyone make anti-Semitic remarks. Anti Islam, yes. Anti "them Polish people coming over here and taking our very badly paid jobs", yes. Anti Semitic, no. Am I just very lucky/ sheltered?

Also, OP, it would be like a white person saying they have not experienced any anti-black racism so therefore it can't exist. If you are not black you are hardly going to be on the receiving end of anti-black racism.

If anyone's interested there's a showing of Shoah on BBC4 at 7 O'clock.It's over 4 hours long but worth watching and guaranteed to make the most ardent anti Semite think < provided that their not dumb enough to be a holocaust denier >.

Jew hate in action;

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2926724/I-m-going-Jew-bashing-teenage-thug-texted-friend-thugs-beat-Orthodox-Jewish-man-protest-against-conflict-Palestine.html

Just one of many accounts. Most of the time they don't even make the press.

Based on the glares I got this morning at the train station when I (mistakenly I might add) told my son that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel (it's not, it's actually Tel Aviv which I remembered half a second later) after he asked me loudly where it is, I think it is.

I think there are a number of factors involved. Traditional antisemitism of the neo-nazi variety, antisemitism from some immigrant communities, a lot of anger over foreign policy and the perceived Jewish influence with that, nativist anger over immigration, not a little hubris on the part of certain people who think the holocaust means they can do whatever they want. I definitely think everything could blow up all over again.

Ghostland - I am not Muslim or Polish either, and I have heard plenty of anti-Islamist/Polish comments. And I DIDN'T say it didn't exist. I asked about other people's experiences, because I was aware that mine might be unusual/unique. And I was interested by the fact I had never witnessed/overheard anything of the sort, and yet some people felt it was bad enough that the UK was no longer a safe place for Jews to live. It was a comment that shocked me, so I thought I would ask other people's experiences.

It is very sad when an attempt to widen my knowledge and understanding gets twisted into me being derided for "claiming it doesn't exist".

I am of Jewish descent (family converted when they came over here). Dsis is Semetic in appearance and I get really teary thinking about the bile she's had spewed at her.

Through primary school she got called Jew nose (she's now getting a nose job as she's got no self-esteem) and got told hitler would have gassed her.

Secondary school she was Jew nose and a dirty yid.

As an adult she's had patients refuse to bee seen by her and there has been several incidents where she's been told she's not English she's a Jew.

Oakmaiden - likewise. I have never heard any racism against black people (and I live in London where there are lots). However, I know it exists and I would never doubt it exists in droves. I apologise for claiming that you said it doesn't exist but it very much does and Jews have a very long history of being persecuted (long before Israel existed) so they are very aware of the stirrings when it starts and things that can seem innocuous to non-Jews are very clear to Jews (and this is why they are often accused of paranoia about racism too).

Wannabestepfordwife - this is incredibly sad.

mimmishimi - the Israeli capital is Jerusalem - that's where the Knesset and government sit. Most foreign embassies are in Tel Aviv, but that doesn't make it the capital.

What we don't seem to getting to the bottom of is: is this from white British people, or in the majority of cases from people from muslim backgrounds? To lay out my stall, i am english, white, had a jewish grandfather and grew up in Algeria. Over there, casual anti semitism was not unusual from the French (comments usch as: they stick together, they are good with money) I can't rememember anything more unpleasant than that. I was sensitive to what people said because of my grandfather. From Algerians, much more aggressive stuff was fairly common: they are dirty, ugly, they kill palestinians etc, and of course virtually all jews left Algeria when it got its independence from France (basically they weren't safe to stay). Algeria had a large jewish population, now the only jews left are crypto jews, just like spain after the reconquista. And just about all jewish cemtaries have been vandalised. Anti semitism has grown amongst the north african/ muslim population in France and we have seen an extreme expression of this in several incidents: the jewish school killings 2 years ago, the attack on the Jewish museum in Brussels (both by french men of Algerian descent0 and recently the kosher supermarket attack in Paris (a Malian). It has been known to be at a very uncomfortable level there for some time.
Ironically, the only person in England I have heard articulate Jewish stereotypes is my father (grandfather's son in law) also of the "they stick together etc" variety. I've never heard it off any other white english person. My DH is from a white northern working class background and I know it just wouldn't occur to him to be anti semitic. My feeling is that the rise in antisemitism in the UK is strongly due to antisocial behaviour by young british muslims, stoked by an islamist discourse and anti israel sentiment. I fear that wider british society is being squeamish (as usual) about facing up to antisocial behaviour from its muslim population.

whataboutbob, unfortunately I think you have hit the nail on the head. The problem is that nobody wants to say who the perpetrators of Jew hate are in 99% of cases since they will probably be accused of being racist (even though Muslims are not a race). It's sad as there is so much that is similar between Jews and Muslims but it seems this has been going on since the times of Abraham, Isaac and Ishmael.

jews and muslims are very similar (religion in some ways and culturally) which makes it all the more sad. my closest friend is muslim, i am jewish, we laugh about it, she told me when we first met that her father hated jews which is pretty grim as i wasn't brought up to hate anyone, ho hum. when i was younger and lived in israel i had alot of israeli arab friends, totally different vibe over there, people don't seem to care about religion, then you read the wests media....fwiw i think the israelis and arabs are as bad as each other but i can't imagine it any other way

I personally think that antisemitism is pretty ingrained and is on the increase.

Low level remarks very common.

If not mentioned, doesn't mean it's not happening.

i don't look 'typically' jewish/have many jewish friends and sadly on a regular basis get comments. standard ones are always with reference as to how wealthy all jews are (yeah right...). it really hurts and my natural reaction is to fall into a deep hole (and say nothing) but my pride always wins, i cringe and tell them that i am a jew, not because i want to make them feel uncomfortable but because i would feel ashamed of myself if i let it go. the thing that really hurts is that quite a few of the comments are from work aquaintances that i get on well with/have known for years but they don't know i am jewish, even the parents of two of dh's good friends have grilled me (more than once) as to 'why are all jews so rich'......what the fuck do i say to that, it's a load of old bollocks. for every rich jew there will be hundreds who aren't

Same here in that I've never heard anti semitec talk.

But then I haven't really been looking for it and I have a feeling it may not be as blatant as anti islam or anti (insert eu nationality here) talk.

One other thing to consider is how many fewer Jews there are than other groups. I live in a (wealthy) area of West London where there are more than 10 times as many Muslims, and Jews are outnumbered by Sikhs and Buddhists according to the last census.

I'm an atheist personally, but my Mum's Jewish by birth (Dad CofE) so technically I'm Jewish. I put down that I'm Jewish just to bump up the numbers a bit, but tbh the last time I visited a synagogue was on a school trip with my son's primary school to learn about Judaism.

I have blue eyes, fair-ish hair and pale skin and don't look very Jewish, so I've always heard all the anti-Semitic jokes because people just don't think I am. Not sure why you haven't Oakmaiden, they seem quite prevalent to me, but maybe I'm more sensitive to them. I pull people up on them when I hear them, but the same people would be horrified to hear other types of racist jokes - they just don't consider antisemitism to be racism (because of totally unconnected Israeli foreign/domestic policy which makes it all OK I suppose)

The main point I'm making is that even though there is Islamophobia as well, antisemitism is concentrated on a very small minority, as opposed to what I assume to be an equal amount given to ten times the amount of Muslims.

I've also heard some things from Muslims about how much they hate Jews. One of my son's 7 year old friends (moderate Muslim) came over once and talked about how his father hated and wanted to kill all Jews. He didn't know we were in any way Jewish, but he was 7, saying that to my 7 year old, who shouldn't have to learn about a grown man who wanted to kill him because of his background.

That was kind of a wake up call for me, as we know and are friends with a lot more Muslims than Jews, and now we feel we have to be careful what we say and what we tell our children. It's a shame as a lot of them are lovely people who I doubt would ever think like that.

We also have a guy who has been a friend for years, became very active politically in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict - fair enough - (armchair only though - he lives in the heart of middle England) and is now via Facebook getting into Holocaust denial and a conspiracy of Jewish bankers planning to take over the world. OK, he's nuts, but he came to our wedding...

If Jews in Europe have to be worried about where they shop or what they wear or what language they speak in the streets, if the rhetoric of political discourse so easily becomes anti-semitic, if Jews in even North American, to say nothing of European, college campusses have to endure abuse and feel unable to stand up for their beliefs because bullying and thuggery rule the debates, then has anything really been learnt from the holocaust?

Pasteurella I find the emergence of the Holocaust deniers and Jewish conspiracy theorists hard to believe.

I'm late 40s and grew up hearing mention of the atrocities - we had a neighbour who during war service had had to go into Belsen after liberation. Then there has been layer upon layer of testimony I have heard and read through the decades. It scares me that there are young people being told a new story through the prism of an anti-Israeli agenda.

I don't hear it now I have to admit, but absolutely 20 years ago. I attended a secondary school that had a high percentage of Jewish girls (many of whom did happen to be wealthy) and there were definitely comments made on a daily basis.

Most of us live in areas where there are no Jews. Lack of Jews is the reason for lack of anti semitism. We are not virtous, in that in my area islamophobia is strong. Sadly the holocost did an extremely effective job of wiping out Jews in Europe.

I think that Jews in Europe have plenty to be scared about. I only takes one butter with gun to wipe out an entire family.

Reallytired - you don't need Jews to have anti-semitism. Recently, Poland, Hungary Greece and Spain have been hotbeds of anti-semitism, even though there are very few Jews there. Whenever you have economic or other turmoil, people turn on the Jews, whether or not there are any in the vicinity. And anti-semitism is pretty much ubiquitous in the Arab world, even though the Jews were kicked out many years ago.