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THE CHOSEN PAPER 15 October 2026 • 4 Cheshvan 5787 • Issue No.1493 •
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Reel landmark The ones
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THE CHOSEN PAPER 15 October 2026 • 4 Cheshvan 5787 • Issue No.1493 •
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Oldest hate in a digital world
Sir Simon Schama on when lies hijack the truth
Pages 10-11
Their vote, our future
Celebrate in style! Party guide inside
Israel’s election result will affect us all VOICE OF THE JEWISH NEWS Since 7 October 2023, a primary focus of both Israelis and Diaspora Jews has understandably been on the horrors perpetrated by Hamas, and Israel’s subsequent campaign to uproot that terrorist Islamist dictatorship from Gaza, with the destruction that has entailed. So some may have forgotten that prior to that dark day, Israel was convulsed by protests in response to attempts by the Israeli government to do everything it could to strip the Supreme Court – the only
significant check and balance to the power wielded by the country’s legislature – of its oversight powers. Four years ago this newspaper used its front page to list some of the repulsive statements made by Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir. In the wake of that election, when they joined the new coalition government led by Benjamin Netanyahu, a Jewish News front page headline read: “Our Worst Fears”. But little could have prepared us for what was to follow. Let us consider the ‘achieve-
Netanyahu with Itamar Ben-Gvir
ments’ of the 2022-2026 coalition government. It attempted to undermine the Supreme Court, a
step which looked set to split Israeli civil society before events overtook it. It presided over the catastrophic security and intelligence breach which enabled Hamas to perpetrate the horrors of 7 October. Despite its stated aims of uprooting Hamas from Gaza – and the destruction which has occurred in the pursuit of that aim – three years later, Hamas is still very much present in the Strip. The West Bank has become a tinderbox, with settler youths rampaging with impunity, and the actions of extremist
ministers preventing a desperately needed crackdown on such terror. Furthermore, backing for Israel has plummeted worldwide, including in the United States, traditionally its most powerful supporter. Last month, Israel’s Central Elections Committee voted to block every significant Arab party from standing in the country’s general election. This is not the first time the committee has voted to block some Arab political parties from standing, Continued on page 20
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News / Heaton Park / J7 ‘concern’ / Schoolboy killed
Public inquiry into Heaton Park attack by Lee Harpin lee@jewishnews.co.uk
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood this week announced a public inquiry into the deaths of Melvin Cravitz and Adrian Daulby, who were killed during the terror attack at Manchester’s Heaton Park Synagogue last October. She told the Commons: “On that awful day last year, as our Jewish community celebrated Yom Kippur, two brave men, Melvin Cravitz and Adrian Daulby, lost their lives, and three others were seriously injured. “What happened that day must be fully understood. So, as requested by the coroner, I can today announce a public inquiry into the deaths. “This will ensure that all evidence can be heard, including any sensitive national security material that could not otherwise be fully heard in the coroner’s court.”
Andy Burnham with Shabana Mahmood
She told MPs: “Tragically, Heaton Park was just one of a series of attacks on our Jewish community.” She said these had included the stabbing of two Jewish men in Golders Green, with a trial now set for March 2027; a failed attack on
the Israeli Embassy, for which the attacker was last week jailed for 20 years, and a spate of arson attacks across north London. Last month, “just hours before Yom Kippur began”, there had also been a foiled but potentially lethal
plot on the Jewish community in Manchester for which two men, both Iranian nationals, had now been charged with terrorism offences. Mahmood continued: “Faced with the threat posed to our Jewish community, we have increased funding to the police by an additional £250m to boost police presence in key Jewish areas and tackle antisemitism on our streets. “But I know we cannot simply build higher walls around our Jewish community and expect them to live in fear ... we must root out the evil of antisemitism wherever it lurks. “This government is committed to that effort, tackling antisemitism wherever it is found: be it online, in our schools and universities, in our public services, or on our streets. ” Shadow home secretary Chris Philp told MPs: “It is more important than ever that we double our efforts to fight antisemitism and Islamist extremism.”
England and Wales chief coroner Judge Alexia Durran said last month she was writing to the home secretary to recommend the inquests be converted into a public inquiry. This was followed by a hearing earlier this month at which Home Office lawyers applied for certain information from MI5 to be withheld at a future inquest on national security grounds. Daulby, 53, and Cravitz, 66, died after the Heaton Park synagogue was attacked by Jihad al-Shamie, 35, a Syrian-born British citizen. Al-Shamie launched the assault on 2 October last year by driving into the perimeter gates of the synagogue then attacking worshippers with a knife while wearing a fake suicide belt. He was shot dead by police shortly after the incident. Cravitz died from multiple knife wounds, while Daulby was killed by a bullet fired by armed officers who had been scrambled to the scene.
J7 ‘serious concern’ at UK actions over Israel The J7 Global Task Force has expressed “serious concern” about recent UK government measures and rhetoric targeting Israel claiming they have had a “detrimental impact in their own countries and communities”. The group, which includes the UK and six other countries with the largest Jewish communities, were at a meeting in London attended by Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband and chaired by the Board of Deputies. In a statement they said: “Representatives discussed the sharp rise in global antisemitism, the threat posed by the Iranian regime and its proxies, the growing proliferation of online hate, and the continued demonisation of Israel, including in rhetoric from many of those in elected office and public life, which all too often serves as a vehicle for antisemitic rhetoric, incitement and behaviour.”
Members at the J7 task force meeting
Participants discussed practical ways to tackle antisemitism, strengthen international coordination and share effective approaches to protecting Jewish communities. The meeting coincided with the release of the J7’s latest annual report, which revealed 2025 was the deadliest year for Jews living outside Israel since 1994.
HEZBOLLAH BOMB KILLS TEEN An explosion during a school hiking trip killed a teenage boy on Monday and injured 24 others in northern Israel, Magen David Adom, Israel’s emergency medical service, said. Rescue teams were dispatched to the scene, and the injured were evacuated to hospitals in northern Israel. “An initial investigation by IDF forces at the site indicates that it was likely a cluster bomb belonging to the Hezbollah terror organisation that had been left in the area and exploded,” the military said in a statement.
“The injured were scattered along the route, some trying to help their wounded friends,” explained David Radko, an MDA medic who said he was the first to arrive on the scene. ““Despite the horrific scenes and distress, the injured cooperated with me exceptionally well. Everyone tried to help their friends as much as they could. Some even applied tourniquets to their friends to stop the bleeding.” Police commissioner Danny Levy visited the scene and said authorities may ban similar school trips in the near future.
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Hackney failure / PM on Greens / News
Hackney fails to come clean on cost of cutting Haifa ties Hackney Council has failed to provide information about the cost of its review regarding de-twinning from Haifa – despite a Freedom of Information request deadline ending two weeks ago, and the council’s public ‘consultation’ into ending the agreement with the Israeli city now over, writes Daniel Sugarman. The council’s failure to respond means residents do not know how much efforts to de-twin have cost – in contrast with the twinning itself, which a previous mayor informed the council was costing the borough nothing at all. Following the Green Party winning control of Hackney in the local elections in May, the council voted in July to break the twinning agreement, which has existed since 1968. Subsequently, elected mayor Zoe Garbett of the Green Party wrote to Haifa mayor Yona Yahav informing him of the intention to break the link between the two cities.
Describing how “maintaining a civic connection in Israel is at odds with our anti-racist values”, Garbett told Yahav she was “writing to formally invite the views of your administration on the proposal to terminate the twinning agreement. “I’d be grateful if you could send me any views on this matter by e-mail … by 7 October 2026.” After widespread disgust over the choice of date, given the 7 October 2023 massacre by Hamas, Garbett issued a follow-up letter in which she described the date as “a deeply regretful oversight”. Jewish News submitted a Freedom of Information request to the council for any emails, Whatsapp messages or other communications between council employees, councillors or any others on three issues. These were the letter sent to mayor Yahav, the deadline of 7 October included in the official letter from mayor Garbett to mayor Yahav, and the decision for the consultation
into the detwinning process ending on 7 October. Despite the council legally extending the deadline by which it had to respond, it subsequently failed to meet the new deadline. Jewish News has since learned a similar request was made to the council at around the same time. This one asked Hackney what its Haifa twinning review has cost: including spending by supplier, legal advice, any extra security for the 28 July full council meeting, the budget line used, officer time records and forecast costs for the equalities assessment, the consultation and the new cross-party working group. As with Jewish News, Hackney Council extended its deadline by citing section 36 of the Freedom of Information Act, although it reportedly did not respond to questions as to why the information requested fell under that section of the Act. Similarly, Hackney Council has yet to respond to that Freedom of
Hackney Mayor Zoe Garbett addressing fellow councillors
Information request, which is now two weeks overdue. The individual who submitted the FOI request concerning the council’s expenses over the detwinning motion told Jewish News: “I’m not a Hackney resident but my wife’s parents live in Haifa and I’ve visited many times. “It’s one of the most tolerant and diverse cities I know, which is why
Hackney chose it as a twin in 1968. Cutting that tie was a Green manifesto pledge, and this month the party voted that Zionism is racism. “You can see where this has been heading. “All I’ve asked is what it’s costing Hackney taxpayers, and the council has missed every deadline to tell me. Invoices and timesheets are not state secrets.”
BURNHAM RULES OUT ANY FUTURE DEAL WITH GREENS Andy Burnham has ruled out any “partnership” with Zack Polanski’s Green Party after condemning the Zionism is racism motion passed at their conference as “antisemitic.” The prime minister was asked by Conservative MP Dame Harriett Baldwin during PMQs on Wednesday to confirm he will “rule out co-operating with them” following the passing of the “abhorrent” motion. He responded: “Can I condemn the motion that was passed unequivocally. It is wrong, it is antisemitic. And this side of the House will have nothing to do with it. “ He added: “We will always take the right response when it comes to any partnerships we have with other parties. We cannot support a partnership with a party that holds the position that has recently been adopted.”
Dame Harriet pointed out that Tory leader Kemi Badenoch had ruled out any deal with Reform UK after she had branded their comments on Englishness racist. The prime minister’s comments followed earlier criticism from Jewish News after he appeared to refuse to rule out a Labour Party coalition with the Green Party in a future hung parliament. Asked by reporters in Berlin about the prospect of a Labour-Green coalition, the prime minister had said: “I’m not getting into any business about what might or might not happen in the future. I’m clearly setting out this Government’s view in relation to the wrongness of that resolution and the importance of the two-state solution.”
Two accused of spying on community for Iran A car salesman and barber have denied spying on members of the Israeli and Jewish communities in the UK on behalf of Iran. Nematollah Shahsavani, 41, and Alireza Farasati, 23, are charged with engaging in conduct likely to assist a foreign intelligence service under the National Security Act 2023. They are alleged to have gathered information and carried out reconnaissance in the UK between 9 July and 15 August 2025 on behalf of Iranian intelligence services. The defendants have pleaded not guilty and face a trial at the Old Bailey from 26 April
2027, with a further pre-trial hearing set by the judge for 12 February. The court heard how Farasati had his electronic devices seized during a police stop on 14 August last year after he had been tasked by Shahsavani to conduct surveillance and gather information on the Israeli and Jewish communities in the UK. It is alleged that car salesman and delivery driver Shahsavani was being instructed by the Iranian intelligence service with targets allegedly including the Israeli embassy and consulate and Britain’s oldest synagogue.
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News / Anti-Israel protest/ Thameslink complaint
Six arrested for criminal damage to war memorial
Twenty anti-Israel activists were arrested during protests in central London last weekend, including six for criminal damage to the monument commemorating Britain’s air victory against the Nazis, writes Joy Falk. Demonstrators waving “Revolutionary Communist Party” flags climbed on the Battle of Britain monument on Whitehall during the weekend’s protest, leading antipolice chants. Pictures in the aftermath saw memorial wreaths which had been laid at the site trampled and broken. Politicians responded with anger at how the memorial had been treated by pro-Palestinian protestors. Conservative MP Nick Timothy said: “There is no word for these people but scum”, while Lord Hannan, director of the Institute for Economic Affairs, said: “What exactly have they got against the Battle of Britain pilots? Would they rather the other side had won?” In a statement from the Met police, the force confirmed “a total of 20 arrests have so far been made during the protest: six for criminal damage after climbing onto the Battle of Britain memorial, seven
Twenty people were arrested at the protest on Saturday
Thameslink supervisor accused of 7/10 denial A Thameslink supervisor has been accused of denying Hamas’s responsibility for the 7 October massacre and threatening to throw a Jewish passenger out of a London railway station, writes Annabel Sinclair. The confrontation allegedly took place at Farringdon Station last Friday after the passenger questioned why staff wore a pro-Palestinian badge while working. According to UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), the badge featured a Palestinian flag, the words “Palestine Solidarity” and the initials for the RMT rail union. Another employee, who identified himself as “Simon” and said he was in charge, reportedly said it was a “human rights badge”. He allegedly told the passenger he did not support Israeli human rights because Israelis were “busy slaughtering civilians”. The supervisor then claimed that most Israelis killed during the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023 had actually died at the hands of Israeli forces under the “Hannibal Directive”. He also alleged that Israel’s prime minister had received advance warning of the attacks but deliberately failed to act. The passenger said the supervisor subsequently tried to remove him from the station. A Transport for London employee later intervened and told the passenger that staff
Staff are not to wear political badges
should not be displaying political badges, according to UKLFI. The passenger filmed part of the exchange. A UKLFI spokesperson said: “Railway staff are there to serve passengers, not to promote political causes or subject customers to hostile political lectures.” The organisation also called for disciplinary action if misconduct is established and wants Thameslink to explain whether managers have allowed staff to wear political badges. Thameslink confirmed it was investigating the allegations. A spokesperson told Jewish News: “We are aware of the allegations and investigating.” Transport for London has also been approached for comment.
for breach of conditions, two of those for also refusing to remove their face coverings when asked by police. Two for displaying placards supporting proscribed organisation Palestine Action. Two for a Section 5 Public Order offence – one racially aggravated, after a woman was seen earlier in the day making a Nazi salute. One for assault on police as officers made arrests on Victoria Embankment. One for breach of the peace. One for threats to kill in relation to an incident on 1 October.” Video footage of a woman making a Nazi salute was posted by the Stop the Hate group, who held a static counter-protest next to New Scotland Yard, on Victoria Embankment. On a statement, the group said: “This was a day of chaos and hate in London. Enough is enough, Met Police. It’s time to act against those inciting hate. No more two-tier policing.” The Met imposed conditions on the event, which was organised by the Palestine Coalition, and the counterprotest, to “minimise the risk of serious disruption to communities”. The Palestine Coalition includes
Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War, CND, Muslim Association of Britain, Friends of Al Aqsa and Palestinian Forum in Britain. Protesters were warned that they could be arrested if they refuse to remove face masks, and officers were seen asking demonstrators to take off face coverings. In a statement prior to the event, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Carl Galvin said: “We know Saturday’s event, so close to the third anniversary of the terror attack on Israel, has the potential to have a greater impact on communities than the previous national marches. “We will also be using powers under the Public Order Act requiring anyone in the protest area wearing face coverings to deliberately conceal their identity to remove them.” He added: “And we will do so if we see groups of people who refuse and are covering their faces with the intention to hide their identity, intimidate and commit offences. That is unacceptable. “But for individual cases, officers must carefully assess why a person is wearing a mask and respond in a measured way.”
KEMI BADENOCH BLAMES ‘MOB MENTALITY’ FOR ANTISEMITISM Tribalism and trust in national institutions were among the themes explored on a distinctly political first day of the Cliveden Literary Festival, writes Beatrice Sayers. The Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch spoke about growing up without the rule of law, under military dictatorship in Nigeria. “I saw real lynch mobs,” she said. “I saw people killed.” In a discussion with the author and festival co-founder Simon Sebag Montefiore, she likened the cancel culture that we see in the west today to those lynchings. “Someone says something, everybody joins in. The person, sometimes innocent, says, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong.’ They start begging, but people join in, and you can never actually pinpoint who has committed the crime. It’s a group activity.” Politicians in the UK, as well as in Europe and the US, are terrified of the mob, she said. “Those ‘free Palestine’ activists harass Labour MPs – even the ones who agree with them – they push into more and more extremism.” For Labour to have a “symbolic spat with Israel just to manage your party won’t end well”, she said, describing Israel as one of the UK’s most important security partners. When the historian and former US antisemitism envoy Deborah Lipstadt asked Badenoch from the audience about the rise in Jew
Kemi Badenoch at Cliveden Literary Festival
hatred, Badenoch attributed it to humans’ innate tribalism. We were now “retreating more and more into tribes”, she said, and hateful views were not getting challenged from within those tribes, leading to ever more violence toward the other. Later at a ‘State of the Nation’ panel chaired by journalist Emily Maitlis, Labour MP Jess Phillips, Reform UK member Matt Goodwin, Labour peer Maurice Glasman and the Conservatives Alex Burghart MP and Baroness (Joanne) Cash, discussed illegal migration. Lord Glasman, who had recently returned from Berlin, said on 7 October, said “a rally of the Die Linke party, essentially the Green Party, sort of Islamists and Corbynite nutcases”, were in the city centre shouting “death to the Jews”. He went on to predict that the AfD would be the largest party at the next election and that Marine Le Pen would win in France.
15 October 2026 Jewish News
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Three years after 7 October / News
Israeli Muslim’s defiant message on 7 October An Israeli Arab Muslim teenager spoke on the third anniversary of Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel of her determination to fight global anti-Israel attitudes and antisemitism, writes Jonathan Baz. Lourd Atia addressed a vigil organised by Stop The Hate at South Hampstead Synagogue with prominent activists, campaigners and relatives of hostages. Having “grown up in Jerusalem, surrounded by a Jewish religious society”, Atia spoke of her personal sense of shame as news broke of the 7 October invasion. She told the congregation of her determination to “fight the advocacy of war that is going on right now around the world”, speaking out against rising antisemitism and hostility towards Israel. The 90-minute ceremony featured speakers, many non-Jewish, drawn from the front lines of prominent activism and campaigning, with several flying in from Israel. The occasion marked the unimaginable loss and trauma 7 October heralded, while also carrying messages of hope and belief in the future.
Those present were welcomed on the shul’s bimah, adorned with the Israeli flag, by South Hampstead’s emeritus minister Rabbi Shlomo Levin. Arriving straight from speaking outside Downing Street earlier that evening, Sharone Lifshcitz spoke of her father Oded’s heroism. Oded, who was taken hostage by Hamas on 7 October 2023, died while held captive in Gaza. His daughter noted he was 83 years old when he was abducted. Liftschitz reflected on the significance of this year’s anniversary, the first many freed hostages were able to mark outside captivity. Another prominent Israeli to speak was Yoseph Haddad, an Arab Christian activist, who spoke passionately of his Muslim teenager Lourd Atia. Pic: Phil Harris reaction to the IDF’s 45-minute film documenting the atrocities of 7 October and achievements across seven fronts since the his burning desire to free Israel from its con- devastation and destruction of 7 October. At times drawing on the words of Winston tinued threats of terror. Former British Army commander Colonel Churchill, he said: “There’s a lot of fighting to Richard Kemp spoke of Israel’s military go, but things are looking extremely prom-
ising for Israel.” Along with others present, he ended his speech with words of encouragement and hope. “We can honour our brothers and sisters who were murdered, raped, tortured and kidnapped on 7 October,” he declared. “We can follow Israel’s example. “We can each do what we can to stand up for the state of Israel, for the wonderful Jewish community here in the UK, and for all civilised people who are fighting the same fight that Israel and the Jews are fighting.” The evening also featured speeches from members of London’s Israeli Embassy team. They included its defence attaché, whose identity was not disclosed, alongside musical contributions suitable for the occasion from singers Pini Brown, Aliana and Brady Isaacs Pearce. The vigil brought together remembrance of all those murdered and taken hostage on 7 October linked with messages of hope for a peaceful future for Israel.
KHAN’S ANNIVERSARY WORDS ‘REVOLTING’
reflect on the unfathomable suffering Deborah Lipstadt has described and killing of Palestinians over the London mayor Sadiq Khan’s statelast three years, both in Gaza and in ment on the third anniversary of the West Bank”. the 7 October attacks as “revolting’. He added the “UK government The former US antisemitism is right to call out the reprehensible envoy, one of the foremost authoriactions of the Israeli government” and ties on Holocaust history, expressed says the “prospect of a two-state soludisgust after Khan used the occasion to Deborah tion” is “critical not only for upholding call out the “reprehensible actions of Lipstadt Palestinian human rights but ending the Israeli government”. In his statement, Khan initially acknowl- the cycle of killing and bloodshed”. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani has edged “all the innocent victims whose lives were cruelly taken and unimaginably also been condemned for his statement on the anniversary, which accused Israel of prechanged on October 7”. But he added the day is “also a moment to sided over an “ongoing genocide in Gaza”.
King ’s 7/10 ‘sadness’ The King has expressed “heartfelt good wishes” to the Jewish community, with officials saying he “recalls with great emotion and sadness the events of 7 October 2023”. The message was in response to a message King Charles in Golders Green from the Board of Deputies, saying: “As we mark wished to bring these comthe third anniversary of the memorations to The King’s 7 October 2023 attacks in attention and, in so doing, Israel, a range of events are assure His Majesty of the taking place across the UK to loyalty and affection of the mark this sombre anniversary. Jewish community together “The Board of Deputies with their profound gratitude
for his acts of solidarity.” The King’s private secretary responded: ““His Majesty recalls with great emotion and sadness the events of 7 October 2023. His Majesty has asked me to express his heartfelt good wishes and respect to the Jewish community, who play such an important role in our Nation’s life.” The King has regularly expressed support for the Jewish community and has remained a patron of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust.
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Jewish News 15 October 2026
News / Greens condemned / ‘Censorship’ claim
Barnet MPs condemn Green Party over Zionism motion Barnet’s three Labour MPs have written to the local Green Party and its one elected councillor, warning that support for the inflammatory ‘Zionism is racism’ motion runs contrary to their duty to represent the borough’s tolerant community, writes Lee Harpin. In their letter, MPs Sarah Sackman, Dan Tomlinson and David Pinto-Duschinsky wrote: “Other Green MPs and councillors have rightly disavowed the motion. To us, your public support raises serious questions and is at odds with the values of our borough.” They further asked: “Please explain
how you can reconcile your position with your duty to represent our diverse and tolerant community.” The MPs also highlighted “the decision to define Zionism as racism has alienated Jewish residents”. The letter followed a statement from Barnet Greens attempting to justify the passage of last week’s motion, as well as the decision by Woodhouse ward councillor Charli Thompson to put her name forward as a supporter. Thompson’s name appears in both the motion’s printed lists of supporters – the spring 2026 version (A105) and the autumn 2026 version (E02). She told the Barnet Post: “I support the decision. I understand Zionism as an ethnonationalist political project, and my opposition
SENIOR GREEN MEMBER OPENLY BACKS HAMAS A Green member newly elected to the party’s disciplinary committee has previously said she was “naïve” to oppose Hamas and shared material referring to Israelis as “international thieves and murderers”. As revealed by the Daily Mail, Halima Brewer has previously written on social media that “I used to oppose Hamas because I thought their strategy for freeing Palestine was counterproductive. “I have dropped that naïve view and now think the only thing Palestinians have left is
violent resistance against the bigger terrorist – the biggest of all now – Israel.” In another post, Brewer said: “I’m sorry, but it’s just plain hilarious that we’re still expected to hate Hamas after spending two years being shown exactly what it was that Hamas has been fighting.” Brewer also shared a number of images, including one with a caption reading: “There is no country called ‘Israel’. There is only Palestine, which is currently occupied by an army of international thieves and murderers.”
to it is rooted in a simple principle: equal rights for everyone, regardless of ethnicity or religion. I oppose political ideologies which privilege the rights of one ethnic or religious group over another.” In another statement, Barnet Greens said: “Following the decision of Green Party members at our party conference to pass the ‘Zionism is Racism’ motion, we would like to clarify the scope of this policy and address any potential concerns residents may have. “We want to be absolutely clear: this Green Party policy concerns Zionism as a political ideology. “The party’s opposition to Zionism is consistent with our commitment to equal rights – regardless of ethnicity, religious belief, or gender. “No religious or ethnic group should have privilege or special rights over others, or the ability to dispossess and subjugate people
with different religious, racial, or cultural identities.” The statement added: “AntiZionism is not the same as antisemitism, and Zionism is not synonymous with Judaism. Supporters of Zionism include people of many religions and none.” Meanwhile, Hastings Jewish community has written to the Green Party accusing it of being no better than Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists. In a furious letter sent to the Green councillors, who control the local council, Hastings and District Jewish Community said the policy placed the party alongside what it called Britain’s most notorious extremist movements. The intervention follows similar concerns raised by the Jewish community in Highgate. The London borough saw a local synagogue reject attempts by the Green council leadership to reas-
MP: We were warned not to oppose motion Further questions about the Green Party’s “Zionism is Racism” motion have been raised after a former leader claimed she and “many of us” had been persuaded “not to campaign publicly” against it. Brighton Pavilion MP Sian Berry issued the statement after the Holborn & St Pancras by-election, which Green Party leader Zack Polanski lost. The defeat came a few
days after the controversial motion was passed at the Green Party conference. Berry said she had opposed it because “I felt it needed serious amendment... but the clash of conference with an exciting and mobilising by-election campaign meant many of us were persuaded not to campaign publicly for these ends, while proposers were very organised and remained intent upon no changes.” Sian Berry
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The final event of Cable Street 90 saw Tracy-Ann Oberman, Howard Jacobson and Brigid Larmour join Trevor Phillips at St George’s in the East to discuss Oberman’s play The Merchant of Venice 1936.
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sure congregants the party does not pose a threat to Jewish life. “We are distressed, disbelieving and shocked at the new Green policy that Zionism is apparently racism,” the Hastings letter states. “This is blatantly antisemitic and puts the Green party in the company of the National Front, the British Union of Fascists, the Imperial Fascist League, the Communist Party of Great Britain, the Socialist Workers Party and the Workers Revolutionary Party. “In other words, the Green Party can now fairly be called an institutionally antisemitic party with policy in common with fascists.” The community said it had warned Green councillors about discrimination experienced by Jewish residents, but claimed its complaints had been repeatedly ignored. The organisation said it had referred councillors to the Standards Committee.
A TRANSFORMATIVE TIME FOR EARLY PROSTATE CANCER - WHAT’S NEXT? Keynote Speaker: Professor Mark Emberton, Professor of Interventional Oncology at UCL In the Chair: Dr Adrian Tookman Date: Tuesday 27th October 2026 Doors open: 7.30pm Lecture begins: 8pm There will be a Q&A session following the lecture To register your interest, please email jamieherz@chaicancercare.org
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Special Report / Simon Schama
‘Jew hatred feeds on lies. The antidote is the truth.’ In a new essay published this week in the Jewish Quarterly, Sir Simon Schama analyses the bigotry Jews face and the falsehoods powering it
A
Aftermath of the arson attack on four vehicles operated by Hatzola in Golders Green. Four men pleaded guilty and are expected to be sentenced next spring
ntisemitism is now the fastest metastasising race hatred in the Western world. Eighty years after the end of the war that exterminated two-thirds of their European population, Jews are experiencing a drastic contraction of citizenship. They no longer enjoy the assumed right, for instance, to wear in public what clothing when and where they wish; to gather for prayer or weddings or bar mitzvahs without the necessity of armed guards in front of their place of worship. Should Jews have the temerity to show up near a pro-Palestinian demonstration carrying a sign indicating their allegiance, they are the ones threatened with arrest unless they remain silent or, preferably, remove themselves altogether from the scene. In April 2024, the head of the Campaign Against
Antisemitism was told that looking “quite openly Jewish” near to a demonstration (he was wearing a kippah) constituted “a breach of the peace”. Never mind that this dramatic loss of security in the Diaspora makes the case for Zionism more effectively than anything Herzl or Ben-Gurion wrote (though in many ways it rehearses their prophecies and warnings); the pile-on continues unabated. College faculties are commanded by student demonstrators to cleanse themselves of suspect – or, worse, professed – Zionists. An undergraduate leader of marches and rallies at my own Columbia University in New York excitedly proclaimed on video that he would like to go out and murder as many Zionists as he could. A British government review in June 2026 revealed National Health Service workers saying they would refuse to treat Israeli patients, even if they
❝ THE ROAD TO SOCIAL MEDIA REVENUE IS LINED WITH LIES – JEWS ARE ITS RUNOVER CASUALTIES
were on the verge of death. Medical staff at a hospital in Bankstown, Australia, were filmed performing a throat-slitting gesture, indicating how much they looked forward to prime opportunities to hasten the death of any Israeli patients. Everywhere, Jews have been instructed
that they cannot expect to remain in cultural or social institutions in which they have participated, should they not publicly and vehemently repudiate their ancestral homeland. Installed on this cultural and social selection ramp are the arbitrators of which Jews may pass this acceptability test and which not. In Italy, Keshet Italia and Keshet Europe, Jewish LGBTQ organisations, were forbidden from joining a Pride march in Rome for insufficiently denouncing Israeli genocide. The Israeli presence at the Eurovision Song Contest was enough for Spain, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Iceland and Ireland to pull out of the event, claiming in high dudgeon that it would be morally tainted. Purges and exclusions, active or passive, are now the norm. On a New York subway car in 2024, a shouty pro-Palestine militant demanded to know whether there were any
15 October 2026 Jewish News
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Simon Schama / Special Report and vocally. “Hey, Professor, Zionists aboard, as they would have to exit you can’t hide, we accuse before the train could proceed. In November you of genocide.” Does the following year, supporters of the Maca supermarket sell cabi Tel Aviv football team were banned by Israeli avocados? Birmingham City Council from attending a That makes it comEuropa League match against Aston Villa on plicit in genocide; the grounds that they had demonstrated a off the shelf with it! thirst for exceptional violence at an earlier Was the baked goods match in Amsterdam. The council acted on chain Gail’s founded information supplied by the West Midlands many years ago by an Police; the fact that the information turned Israeli? Then heedout to be false did not prevent the chief less eaters of its carrot constable from repeating it to Parliament. In cake are party to the January 2026 it was revealed that the WMP had had intelligence about local groups planning to arm themselves and target Maccabi fans but failed to disclose this to the MPs. Lies are the nourishment of Jew-hatred and have been for millennia. On 3 June 2026, an unhinged woman on the C train subway in New York shouted that “Jews are eating kids”, adding that she could smell the children on a nearby Orthodox woman whom she went on to assault. Appearing at an antiIsrael rally in the heart of a conspicuously Jewish district of Toronto, Abbas Hamze genocide. Do the vast majority of Diaspora – who has been an instructor at Canadian Jews wish Israel to endure? That is enough, colleges, including the University of Niagara Falls – spoke of Jews “practising black magic” these days, to be told that you endorse genocide. For those accosting Israelis at airports, and raping and eating children. The fleeting cancelling hotel reservations or howling at period when social media platforms made an Israeli singers, being an Israeli is, by definiostensible effort to block evidently harmful tion, to commit genocide. That the word was lies from multiplying has given way to the coined by a Jew, Raphael Lemkin, only makes higher imperative of clicks, triggered not by the rightness of this claim more powerful. conscientious resistance to conspiracy and Did Israel’s Minister of Defense, Yoav Galmalevolent fantasy but by encouraging its lant, not call Palestinians “human animals” profitable sensationalism. and wish out loud for their extermination? The road to revenue is lined with lies and No, he did not. On 9 October 2023, as Jews are its run-over casualties. details of unspeakable atrocities were In the digital universe, the revelation of outlandish falsehoods is no guarantee of their becoming known, Gallant used the phrase when speaking of the Hamas terrorists who impotence, much less their disappearance. had planned and executed the horrific masLong gone are the times when John Milton, sacre, whose power – and, if necessary, whose arguing in Areopagitica for an unlicensed press, could write, “Let her [Truth] and False- lives – he wished to see ended. Therein lies the difference between war and genocide. hood grapple; whoever knew Truth put to the But did not the International Court of worse in a free and open encounter?” UnhapJustice rule that Israel had indeed compily, a habitual liar sits in the White House, mitted genocide? No, it did not. It ruled that his falsehoods not incidental but constitutive the Palestinians have “a plausible right to be to his power, for he discovered early on the protected from genocide” (as indeed they liberty they gave him to excite and entertain. do) and that Israel should take all possible Truth is a brake; lies are rocket fuel. Accordsteps to prevent one. From even that limited ingly, whoppers must be freely and regularly ruling, Julia Sebutinde of Uganda dissented, scattered like Domitian throwing buns to the stating that the Republic of South Africa, Colosseum mob. There is no longer any solid which had brought the case claiming Israel ground on which fact may stand; only the was breaching the convention of genocide, world wide web of opinion. had not produced evidence The most consequential of falsehoods that Israel’s actions were – because it has become the great stoker of “committed with . . . genoJew-hatred; the engine of our dehumanisacidal intent”. tion – is that the Israel Defense Forces set Jew-hatred (and out to commit the genocide of the Palestinian Islamophobia) feeds on people in Gaza; indeed that the aim, from the lies. The antidote is the outset, was always total annihilation. truth. So, what are the It follows, then, that the massacres and truths of Gaza? hostage-taking of 7 October were merely a pretext for carrying out this calculated Have Gazans suffered horrific ordeals, the extermination and, therefore, it is not at all deaths and wounding improbable, according to some sources, that of tens of thousands the attack on the Nova festival-goers was of innocent civilians, actually an Israeli project. What could posincluding children, as sibly explain the deafness of Mossad to intela result of the Israeli ligence of an impending Hamas action, the offensive? Yes. Could removal of troops from the south to the West war crimes be among Bank, or the long delay before the IDF went those acts? Yes. Did into action, other than that Israel planned Hamas commit crimes the massacre of its own people? Whatever else is shouted on anti-Israeli marches and demonstrations, whatever Front cover of latest else is scrawled on walls, the accusation of issue of the Jewish genocide is invariably present – graphically Quarterly
against humanity on October 7, including torture, rape, sexual mutilation, and the murder of children after forcing them to witness the killing of their parents? Incontrovertibly. Is it possible – in fact, morally necessary – to grieve and rage about both Palestinian and Israeli deaths and suf-
❝ THE CHARGE OF GENOCIDE IS BEING PINNED ON A PEOPLE NOT WHITE ENOUGH FOR THE RIGHT, NOR BROWN ENOUGH FOR THE LEFT
fering? Surely it is. Did Hamas knowingly invite the suffering of Palestinians by siting missile launchers and munitions in schools, mosques, hospitals, apartment blocks and houses while their fighters were protected in tunnels, so that Israel would be seen as the murderer of civilians? Yes. When was the last time that a military warned a civilian population of where and when it would strike? Never. Have comparable – or worse – catastrophic tragedies happened amid the carnage of urban war? See Dresden, Hiroshima, the US bombing campaign on Iraq. Are Russians inflicting targeted massacres on Ukrainian civilians from the skies almost every day, and have they abducted 35,000 Ukrainian children, whose parents will never see them again? Yes. Does this trigger marches of protest? No. (And do not let me hear the fatuous retort of “whataboutery”.) Are there Jewish supremacistfascists in the Israeli government who are enthusiasts for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza (including encouragement of “emigration” and persuasion by killing)? Yes. Are they enabling repeated, vicious, often murderous settler pogroms against Palestinians in the West Bank? Yes. Is the claim that a “secular democratic state” of Palestine would welcome Jews as co-citizens disingenuous (or absurd), given that Hamas is neither secular not democratic, but rather a theocratic tyranny? Yes. Do they inculcate the killing of Jews in their schools? Yes. Does “from the river to the sea” (whatever the transparently insincere pieties uttered for the sake of credulous Western supporters) mean the death of half of the world’s Jews? Of course! To be sure, the world brims with bloody cruelty and the slaughter of civilians. Yet, somehow, there are no marches grieving and raging against the massacre of Ukrainians; of the African Sudanese by the Arab RSF; the slaughter of tens
of thousands of Iranian protesters by their theocratic despots. There is no boycotting of Chinese restaurants to show solidarity with Uyghurs facing cultural annihilation. It requires less homework to pin genocide on a people not white enough for the right and not brown enough for the left. So, for all the chants, this paroxysm of rage is, at its psychological core, not about Palestine, Israel or even the Jews. The hatred is about the haters: a failure of self-recognition; a displacement of the obligation to make amends. The Nazification of Israel and the morally squalid, historically preposterous equating of Gaza with Auschwitz act as a reprieve from failing to do much about saving the Jewish victims even after the facts of their annihilation were known. Likewise, framing the Jews as history’s paradigmatic imperialist oppressors spares the descendants of actual colonisers from too much critical self-examination. Put the Jews in the dock rather than your great-grandparents, for we are the folk to whom culpability can be easily transferred, and the means by which to indict us, collectively, is readily available, as it has been for centuries. We are equal-opportunity culprits. Hence the infuriated obsession, especially by self-designated white progressives yearning to be forgiven for a colonial past, with demonising a people who had nothing to do with their ancestors’ bloody freebooting. Hence, also, the rage of the descendants of immigrants from those empires for whom any gestures of penance are unassuageable, though white comrades in keffiyehs urging intifada on the Jews seem to help. Honestly, all we are asking for is to be left alone; to be able to send our children and grandchildren to a Jewish school in their uniforms, maybe with a kippah on their heads, without their being screamed at and being made to feel frightened and ashamed; to be able to ride public transport without being spat at or assaulted; to go to synagogue without having to pass through protecting men with guns; for our Israeli friends and family to be able to speak Hebrew between themselves and still get a hotel reservation, or an entry to a song competition or seats at a football match. And maybe, if it’s not too much trouble, we might ask that the chanters take the trouble to read a little history – if they can find it, since only anti-Zionist histories get prominent display in the Middle East sections of bookstores. Some book (and there are plenty) that does not presume that Zionism has been racist and imperialist from the outset; that bloodshed has been one way; that Gaza deaths must be spoken of and those of 7 October not at all. For our tragedies and toils are, and this bears repeating over and over, shared, and unless we are prepared to listen to that shared history, we are doomed to an endless tournament of lethal aversion. And should we, Jews and non-Jews, Israelis and Palestinians, fail to listen to each other with respectful attention, informed by the truth, the unhappy victims of such deafness will, in the end, be all of us. Sir Simon Schama is professor of history and art history at Columbia University. He was the presenter of the BBC’s Story of the Jews. This is an extract from his Jewish Quarterly essay Jew-Hatred: The Latest Edition, published this week
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News / Jewish News-Wohl Legacy 40 Under 40
40 Under 40 is back! Nominate community’s top young leaders A search for the under-40s set to lead the community over the coming decades is launched today by Jewish News in partnership with the Wohl Legacy. While record levels of antisemitism have led to questions over the future of Anglo-Jewry, this project will identify and celebrate some of the young people whose leadership, innovation and commitment are making a difference to Jewish life and helping to shape its future. Nominees can be professionals working within communal organisations, lay leaders, trustees, innovators or donors and the final list of 40 – selected by an esteemed panel of judges – will be drawn from across religious and political affiliations. They will need not to have had their 40th birthday by the closing date. JN co-publishers Richard Ferrer and Justin Cohen said: “Our community has enough to worry about in 2026 but you don’t have to look beyond our pages to be reminded that there’s still much to be proud of about Anglo-Jewry. We are determined to remind our community and beyond of this at every opportunity.” Nominations will be open for the next six weeks until 20 November, when the focus will turn to our panel of judges, chaired by public affairs consultant Andrew Gilbert, to select the top 40 names to be revealed in the
Nominate
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Jewish News reception for its recent Property 40 Under 40 List
spring. We will then be bringing the listees together for a celebratory reception. Wohl Legacy chair Prof David Latchman, said: “We’re committed to supporting the development of the next generation of leadership within the community. Through our support of this initiative, alongside the launch of the Wohl Legacy Leadership Fel-
lows this year, we are reaffirming our belief in the importance of identifying, encouraging and nurturing emerging talent.” Gilbert added: “This is the fifth time Jewish News has done such a list and each time the project depends on nominations. If you think or know people who should be on the list don’t rely on others. Please nominate them.”
Nominate rising young talent for the Jewish News 40 Under 40 list (nominees must be under that age on 30 November 2026)
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MEET OUR JUDGES ADAM ROSE Solicitor, Trustee of UJS and the Jewish Youth Fund and former trustee of Masorti Judaism and former Chair of SACSJ ALAN MENDOZA Founder and Executive Director of the Henry Jackson Society and President of JNF UK AMANDA BOWMAN Co-Chair of London Jewish Forum and CSR & employee engagement consultant ANDREW GILBERT Chair European Board, Global Jewry; CEO, Cohesion Chemistry; Chair, Jewish News 40 Under 40 ASHLEY LERNER CEO of Maccabi GB AVI LAZARUS CEO of Kehillas Federation, an organisation with 45 member synagogues, a Burial Society, Beth Din and Kashrut licensing authority BEN CROWNE Treasurer of the Board of Deputies and Bevis Marks Foundation COUNCILLOR DEAN COHEN MBE Entrepreneur, Barnet Tory cllr and Founder of the Jewish Conservative Alliance DAN SACKER A strategic communications consultant, a former advisor to Rabbi Sacks zt"l, and a trustee of the Rabbi Sacks Legacy CARMEL BROWN CEO at Jewish Care, Europe’s largest Jewish not for profit. A previous member of the 40 under 40 cohort DAVID DANGOOR CBE DL Started as an IBM systems engineer then 50 years in the family property business - believes we should all contribute to a strong Jewish
community as one of the most important legacies we can leave the next generation DAVID DAVIDI BROWN CEO of New Israel Fund UK and has many years experience supporting younger leadership across the community DAVID EREIRA Founder of Ereira Mendoza , NED at Dooa Capital, Chair of JPR, Life President of Norwood DR BENJAMIN ELLIS MBE Chair of Trustees, Limmud; former Chair/ co-founding Trustee, KeshetUK; Consultant Rheumatologist at Imperial College Healthcare GAVIN STOLLAR OBE Honorary Chair of the Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel, and is a leading global corporate strategist with a specialism in real estate and infrastructure GIDEON FALTER Chief Executive, Campaign Against Antisemitism, fighting for British Jews through litigation, media, policy and education. HANNAH WEISFELD Executive Director, Yachad HELEN LEWIS Chair of Leeds Jewish Welfare Board and Director of Leeds Kosher Kitchen CIC. Recently retired as a Director for the NHS in Leeds JO GREENAWAY Rabbanit and former LSJS CEO and host of the Women’s Gallery podcast JUSTIN COHEN MBE The co-publisher and news editor of Jewish News LEO PEARLMAN Co-CEO of Fulwell Entertainment and a NonExec Director of Sunderland Football Club An Associate of Pelham Street, a Trustee of
Saracens Multi Academy Trust and the Chelsea Football Club Foundation and Vice Chair of the Jewish Leadership Council
PROFESSOR DAVID LATCHMAN CBE Vice Chancellor of the University of London and Chairman of the Wohl Legacy
MANDIE WINSTON Chief Executive, UJIA
RABBI DOVID LICHTIG Chief Executive of Interlink Foundation, working with Jewish organisations on charity support, policy and advocacy, and strengthening communities.
MARC LEVY Chief Executive of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester & Region MERVYN KAYE CEO Union of Jewish Students and youth leader with extensive national and international experience. MICHAEL LIVINGSTON OBE Director, Major Sporting Projects & Senior Faith and Belief Champion at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in the UK Government. Senior Sponsor of the CrossGovernment Network for Holocaust Memorial Day Commemoration MICHAL NOE Trustee of the Family Fund and One Great Day NEIL MARTIN CBE Chief Executive of JLGB, Chair of Yom HaShoah UK and the Interfaith Youth Trust, Trustee of the Youth United Foundation, and previously ranked No. 3 in the 2015 Jewish News 40 Under 40. NICKY GOLDMAN Chief Executive, Jewish Volunteering Network NIVI FELDMAN Former UK Hostages and Missing Families Forum leader, community strategist and advocate NOELEEN COHEN Chair of the Movement for Progressive Judaism and Chair of the New Israel Fund PAM GOLDSMITH Joint Chief Executive at the Wohl Legacy
RABBI PROFESSOR DEBORAH KAHN HARRIS Principal of Leo Baeck and Professor of Hebrew Bible RAY SIMONSON MBE Chief Executive, JW3 and communal charity trustee RICHARD FERRER Editor and co-publisher, Jewish News SAM CLIFFORD CEO of Jewish Women’s Aid and has worked in the Jewish community for over 20 years. SARAH SACKMAN MP MP for Finchley & Golders Green and a proud champion of Jewish leaders of today and for the future. SAUL TAYLOR President of the United Synagogue and Managing Director of Dalkeith Brokerage Ltd SHARON RADLEY PaJeS Director of Education SHELLEY MARSH Advisor to Children's Aid Committee Charitable Fund - investing in Jewish Youth STUART RODEN Financier and active philanthropist across a broad range of areas including many Jewish community related causes
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15 October 2026 Jewish News
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Honouring generations of Jewish men and women who served and fought for our freedom. Marking 90 years since the Battle of Cable Street and standing proud against antisemitism. HONOURING OUR PAST. STRENGTHENING OUR FUTURE.
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Webinar: Aliyah and your financial future Raymond James, Golders Green invites you to explore the financial planning, tax incentives and opportunities of making Aliyah. MONDAY 2 NOV EMB ER 2026 | ZOOM W EB IN A R , 4 PM GMT Visit our website at GoldersGreen.RaymondJames.uk.com or scan the QR code to register. For more information, call 020 8202 1944 or email us at GoldersGreen@RaymondJames.com
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One year after Heaton Park attack / Special Report
Truth behind Manchester’s empty interfaith promises BACK IN November 2024, the thenmayor of Manchester, Andy Burnham, signed the Faith, Belief and Interfaith Covenant, alongside representatives of different communities in the city, writes Anna Stanley. In his statement alongside the signing, the mayor – now prime minister – said: “Greater Manchester prides itself on the cohesion between our different communities... there is no room for discrimination anywhere. The joint signing sends the clearest of messages... that this is what our city-region is about.” Eleven months later, a terrorist attacked Heaton Park Synagogue on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. Raphi Bloom was on his way to the synagogue when the attack occurred. As a management board member of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester, he is well aware that despite warm words for the cameras and press releases, dialogue between Manchester’s Jewish and Muslim communities has, to a large extent, broken down. He described how “for years, we’ve been reaching out to the Muslim community in Greater Manchester to ask for dialogue”, to find a way for the two communities to acknowledge each other’s concerns despite profound disagreements over the conflict. But those approaches, Bloom said, were met with “resounding rejection and refusal.” The meetings that did take place were only in secret, as those involved on the Muslim side did not want their contact with Jewish representatives to become public. “It cannot come out,” Bloom recalled being told. He said one meeting request with a Muslim representative body was rejected because the Jewish representatives were regarded as “Ultra Zionists.” “What does that mean?” Bloom said. “The representative Muslim bodies in Greater Manchester will not meet 95 percent of British Jews who are Zionists because we believe in the right of Israel to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people and for Jews to have self-determination in their ancestral homeland.” Part of the issue, Bloom suggested, was that “the moderate Muslims, of which I believe there are many,” feared publicly engaging due to the potential reaction from extremists within their own communities. For him, the failure of dialogue sits alongside a failure to confront Islamist extremism and antisemitic incitement. despite warnings from Jewish community leaders. “If they continue to let hate marches up and down our street every week, if you continue to have people scream ‘globalise the intifada’ every week for two years, then somebody will — and somebody did at Heaton Park synagogue,” Bloom said. He also pointed to antisemitic rhetoric in recordings of sermons, including references to Jews as “sons of monkeys” and “usurpers” and calls for Zionists to be “smashed.” He cited the case of Kuwaiti cleric Sheikh Mishary Alafasy, who appeared at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall in January 2025
King Charles and Rabbi Daniel Walker look at floral tributes during his visit to Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Manchester
❝ MUSLIM BODIES IN
MANCHESTER WILL NOT MEET 95 PERCENT OF JEWS WHO ARE ZIONISTS despite his statements about Jews. “We pleaded with city council and Bridgewater Hall to cancel; they refused,” he said. Alafasy’s social-media account was subsequently found to be among the few followed by Al-Shamie. If Al-Shamie attended the Bridgewater Hall event, Bloom speculated it would be “entirely possible” he could have been further radicalised by what he heard. For Bloom, such cases bolster his argument; the response to the threat British Jews face cannot end with physical security. “There is an absolute lack of desire on behalf of the government, both national and local, to tackle Islamist extremists, to identify hate preachers in these mosques, to kick them out of the country, to remove them from the posts, to sanction these organisations as charities for spreading hate and inciting murder and violence and acknowledge the problem of Islamic extremism” he said. “We’ve been saying this for three years and still nobody is listening to us.” Bloom questioned whether the relatively small size of the Jewish community affected the political attention its concerns received. “Are we not electorally valuable? Are we politically expedient? It makes you wonder.” He acknowledged the substantial govern-
ment funding allocated to protecting Jewish institutions, but argued that greater spending on security could not substitute for confronting the causes of the threat. As a representative of Manchester’s Jewish community, he has been involved in meetings with the prime minister in which Jewish representatives raised concerns about the domestic consequences of growing hostility towards Israel and British Jews. A year after Heaton Park Synagogue attack, though, he draws a distinction between what he describes as the “acute” problem of physically protecting Jewish institutions and the “chronic” problem of extremism and deteriorating relations between communities. “At the moment all we’re doing is, with more gates and more cameras and more guards, is tackling the acute nature of the problem,” Bloom said. “We’re not tackling the chronic nature.” “And until we do that, we will never get a grip of it.” “Can we ever get to grips with it?” he asked. “Have we let the genie out of the bottle? “I don’t know the answer to that.”
16 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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Bondi arrest / Amazon deal / World News
Charge over ‘shooting gestures’ at Bondi site A man has been charged after allegedly making shooting gestures while displaying a Palestinian flag on the bridge used by terrorists during the Bondi Beach Chanukah massacre. The 53-year-old was arrested after police received complaints about a man hanging a flag from the Campbell Parade footbridge in Sydney, where gunmen killed 15 people at a celebration last December. New South Wales Police said officers began investigating after receiving reports of offensive hand gestures at around 3pm. The man was taken to Surry Hills Police Station and charged with behaving in an offensive manner in or near a public place. He was refused bail by police and is due to appear before Bail Division Court 7. Police did not specify what gestures were allegedly made, but a witness told Australian outlet News24 that the man had mimicked firing a shotgun from the bridge. “The most galling part was when I walked past him, he made shotgun gestures with his hands off the side of the bridge,” the witness said. “He did three motions of shooting a gun with his hands.” Jewish community leaders condemned the incident, with Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Alex Ryvchin warning
Jewish leaders condemned the incident on the bridge where terrorists murdered 15 people
that it highlighted the continued hostility faced by Australian Jews. “Whether this is an act of evil or deep mental sickness, it serves to remind the nation that there are people out there who delight in the torment and pain of our community,” he said. Australian Jewish Association president Robert Gregory described the incident as a “sickening insult” to the victims and their families. “Jewish Australians were slaughtered by terrorists at Bondi Beach, and now, just two days after the anniversary of 7 October, someone has unfurled a Palestinian flag at the very site of that massacre. “It is a sickening insult to the victims, their families and the entire Jewish commu-
nity. Even in death, it seems Australian Jews cannot be afforded dignity and respect.” It is not the first time someone has been prosecuted over offensive behaviour on the bridge. In April, Zayne Jason William McMillan was sentenced to 12 months in prison, with a nine-month non-parole period, after mimicking shooting gestures and shouting abuse at passers-by. He pleaded guilty to three counts of offensive behaviour and two counts of intimidation. The bridge was used by father and son Sajid and Naveed Akram during the 14 December 2025 terror attack, when they opened fire on families celebrating Chanukah at Bondi Beach. Fifteen people were killed.
AMAZON IN TALKS FOR $7BN DECART BUY Amazon is reportedly in talks to buy Israelifounded artificial intelligence company Decart in a deal worth around $7bn, putting the fast-growing startup at the centre of another potential multibillion-dollar technology takeover, writes Candice Krieger. Founded in 2023, Decart’s co-founders include Israeli entrepreneurs Dean Leitersdorf and Moshe Shalev, former colleagues in Israel’s Unit 8200 intelligence division. The company develops technology designed to improve the speed and efficiency of AI systems. The potential deal was reported by The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the company, though no agreement has been announced. Earlier this year, Decart raised $300m at a $4bn valuation in a round led by Radical Ventures. The potential takeover follows an earlier approach by Anthropic, the developer of the Claude AI assistant. Jewish News covered those discussions in August, when a possible $6bn acquisition was being explored.
Moshe Shalev and Dean Leitersdorf
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Gryn grandson’s tragedy set for TV by Beattie Sayers
The American author of this summer’s hit book London Falling has revealed that it is being developed as a “British-style” miniseries, with the production company currently in talks with writers. The book, written by Patrick Radden Keefe, a staff writer at The New Yorker, tells the true story of Zac Brettler ((pictured), the 19-year-old grandson of Rabbi Hugo Gryn, who fell to his death in 2019 from a block of flats overlooking the Thames, and the family secrets it explores. Keefe, whose other books include the acclaimed Say Nothing, was conversation with journalist Misha Glenny on the second day of the Cliveden Literary Festival in Buckinghamshire He said producers expressed immediate interest after the initial article about Zac’s mysterious death, but he put them off because he wanted to complete the book. Zac’s parents, Matthew and Rachelle Brettler, spoke at length with Keefe following a chance introduction in 2023 that came after an inconclusive police inquiry. He went on to investigate Zac’s life and death in detail, which revealled that he would tell new people he was the son of an oli-
garch, his mother was dead, and that he lived in a huge house in St John’s Wood. These elaborate lies ultimately drew him into the murky world of London gangland deals. Keefe said he was struck by the parallels between the double life Zac led as a teenager and the secrets kept by the late Rabbi Gryn, an Auschwitz survivor who arrived in the UK speaking no English. One of them, Keefe said, “and it’s not even the big one”, was the lie that he had studied at Cambridge. The future leading Reform rabbi thought “if I want to have the life that I want to have, I’m going to have to build a little bridge between where I am now and where I want to be, and that bridge will be a degree from Cambridge”, Keefe said: “The amazing thing was, Hugo died without anybody knowing.” The author thought it was no coincidence that Zac was at the impressionable age of 16 and entering the sixth form at a new school when Donald Trump was first elected president. “In 2016, you look around and you see certain people who fake it til they make it. They lie. They’ve been bad at everything they’ve done, but are constantly telling people they’re a success. And when people don’t believe them, they lie harder. “In 2016, I think you probably felt like you could do that, and you could go all the way to the top… This personality type, the kind of chancer who makes it, is very prevalent... here and in the US.” Keefe also spoke about the open and trusting
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relationship he developed with Zac’s parents. He said that while the book might read like a mystery thriller, it was also very much a story about parenting and grief. “I’m working in what I think of as a kind of literary idiom, but everything is factual, and it’s important for me to maintain my objectivity. But objectivity doesn’t mean that you bring your emotional temperature down below zero. If I’m listening to the Brettlers talk, I feel my heart wrenching. I want to feel that.” He added that towards the end of his work on the book, he met Matthew and Rachelle for dinner in Maida Vale. They mentioned they had recently returned from a concert in Las Vegas. “And I said, ‘How are you able to do that? I think if I were you, I wouldn’t have gotten out of bed since 2019.’ “Simultaneously, they both said, ‘Oh, it’s our fathers. We grew up with these fathers who survived the Holocaust as boys.’ Both of them lost virtually their whole families. Both arrived in the UK as teenagers solo. “They both, in a way they probably never realised they would need, grew up with this astonishing example of fathers who had learned to live, and live joyously, in the face of catastrophic loss.”
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Editorial comment and letters to the editor
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
(it has also previously voted to block some Jewish ones), but it was the first time that they were all treated in this way. As in previous instances, Israel’s Supreme Court has stepped in to strike down the ban. But what if the Supreme Court had been unable to reverse the Election Committee decision? If it had not stepped in, and every single Arab political party had indeed been banned from standing for election, Israel could have become the very thing some of its bitterest critics claim it to be. In the entirety of Jewish scripture, there is one person above all who exemplifies wisdom. King Solomon built the Temple in Jerusalem and ushered in a golden age for the Kingdom of Israel. And yet, the sages tell us that over the many years of his reign, Solomon allowed his glory to dwindle into nothingness, convincing himself that his personal discernment made him immune to the temptations and greed which would overwhelm lesser men. The actions of his feckless son subsequently split the nation in two. There is no king in Israel now – no throne in Jerusalem. But there is a leader who has led for far too long, and, refusing to give way despite endless corruption trials, clearly has come to believe that his own personal wellbeing is identical to that of the country he leads. Which it is not. It is clear to this newspaper that the best thing that could happen to Israel now is for Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right coalition partners to lose this month’s election and have no involvement in the next Israeli government. Many people here, including a percentage of our readers, may be asking ‘why is a British Jewish newspaper venturing an opinion on another country’s election’? The answer to that is simple. The British Jewish community – and every other Diaspora community – is deeply connected to Israel, via spiritual, emotional and familial ties. The situation in Israel affects us here; antisemites use it as an excuse to target us, and when Israel is under attack, our friends and family members are the ones huddled in shelters. We also, it should be said, have readers who are Israeli citizens living in Britain – and who will be travelling back to Israel in the coming weeks to vote. We are not naïve. Those who hate Israel will hate it whomever is in charge. The campaign to delegitimise the world’s only Jewish state will continue regardless of who leads its government; the only difference is likely to be a change in the politicians depicted as blood-sucking monsters at “anti-Israel” rallies. But that does not mean that a change is not required in Israel; it is desperately needed. We hope that those entering the polling booths on 27 October will reflect on the last four years and choose a different course.
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sonal and political courage in advocating for the cause of peace and reconciliation. It shouldn’t have been beyond the wit and imagination of the Green Party to have arrived at a stance that better reflects our shared humanity. We further acknowledge and celebrate the enormous contribution made by British Jews to their country, including to many left wing and humanitarian organisations, and commit ourselves to helping create a politics and a wider society safe for Jewish people. We do so with the same passion, and for the same reasons, as we advocate for an end to hatred and violence against the Palestinian people. We opposed this motion [and] we will continue to do so until it is reversed. We stand against hate, and we stand with people of goodwill everywhere, whatever their religion or ethnicity.
Hilary Grandey and John Tipper Green Party councillors
NATION-STATE LAW DEBATE NOT ANTISEMITISM Alex Brummer (“Israel is anything but a monochrome Jewish state”, 7 October) is right that Israel’s two million Palestinian citizens vote, staff its hospitals and may help decide its next government. He is also right that declaring “Zionism is racism” is no substitute for argument. But diversity of population is not equality of status. The 2018 Nation-State Law provides, in the Knesset’s translation, that the realisation of national self-determination in Israel is “exclusive to the Jewish People”. Israel’s Supreme Court upheld the law while reaffirming equality as a fundamental constitutional principle. Yet a citizen can vote, heal and govern while being told that the state’s national
self-determination belongs to another people. Mr Brummer’s mosaic describes Israeli society; the Nation-State Law defines the Israeli state. The test is reciprocity. A Palestinian state that reserved national self-determination exclusively to Palestinians, while granting Jewish citizens equal individual rights, could not plausibly claim full political equality. The same standard should apply. Mr Brummer champions an organisation seeking equality for Arab citizens. That goal deserves pursuit in the constitution. Debating the Nation-State Law is not antisemitism; refusing to distinguish the two makes antisemitism harder to confront.
Walter Brown, Basildon
RIYADH ATTACKS MET WITH SILENCE Given the British media’s relentless preoccupation with the Middle East, it is extraordinary how selectively its attention is applied. Two devastating attacks on Riyadh’s airport reportedly left 14 people dead and more than 300 injured. The Houthis claimed responsibility, openly threatening further attacks across Saudi Arabia. Where is the outrage? Where are the rolling news bulletins, the anguished editorials, the demands for international condemnation and the protests?
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27 May 2020
Imagine the reaction had missiles struck Heathrow on consecutive days? The coverage would be deafening. Instead, the apparent indifference to Saudi civilian casualties exposes an uncomfortable truth about our national conversation. For all the professed concern about suffering in the Middle East, some victims command vastly more attention than others.
Val Symons, By email
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The motion passed by our party was racist and based on a deliberate oversimplification of the term ‘Zionism’. Clearly it’s an ideologically loaded and contested term, but of course a belief in a Jewish state as a home and safe haven isn’t inherently racist, just as the murder and displacement of Palestinians isn’t an inevitable corollary, either. We recognise you can’t meaningfully assuage the profound pain experienced by one community by causing gratuitous insult to another one. All that achieves is to push people to the extremes, making it less likely that Jews and Palestinians collectively can live with the dignity, security and justice that is their absolute right. We also recognise that all of this is profoundly unhelpful to those who identify as Zionists but nonetheless stand in solidarity with Palestinians who are suffering, as well as the human rights groups within Israel who have shown huge per-
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HAS KHAN FULFILLED HIS EARLY PROMISES?
22 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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Opinion
LGBT+ Jews should not have to choose identity ARIEL CHAPMAN KESHET UK
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ext year marks 13 years of KeshetUK, the Jewish community’s LGBT+ education and training charity. Our mission is to ensure that LGBT+ Jews and their families are included throughout UK Jewish life, and in the past 13 years, we have seen enormous change when it comes to inclusion. Across different denominations and communities, there is a growing willingness to talk about LGBT+ inclusion. Synagogues are looking for ways to better include LGBT+ Jews; our schools are thinking about how to support LGBT+ young people, and more LGBT+ Jews are able to see themselves represented in Jewish life. There is genuine progress to celebrate. But we know there is still much to do. Too many people are forced to choose between the Jewish and LGBT+ identities. We cannot shape a better future if we do not understand the present.
That is why KeshetUK has launched the UK’s first National Jewish LGBT+ Survey, to better understand the experiences of LGBT+ Jews across the UK, the barriers they still face and what we can do differently to make Jewish life more inclusive. The timing matters. Since 7 October, we have heard from LGBT+ Jews who have experienced antisemitism and exclusion in LGBT+ spaces where they once felt safe and accepted, as so many Jews have felt in nonJewish spaces. People have told us about feeling uncomfortable wearing Jewish symbols, questioning whether they can attend LGBT+ events, losing friendships and becoming reluctant to ask for support from organisations they previously trusted. And we now have some indication of just how profound this experience can be. A 2024 US survey by Eshel and A Wider Bridge found that 82 percent of LGBT+ Jews who used LGBT+ online spaces had been kicked out, blocked, verbally harassed or made to feel uncomfortable. Among those surveyed, 43 percent had completely
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Jewish life than they were five years ago? Do disengaged from LGBT+ online spaces, people feel comfortable in synagogue? And while 30 percent reported harassment, what has happened to their relationships threats of violence or being kicked out of with LGBT+ spaces since 7 October? friendship groups. KeshetUK is asking if These are not questions we can answer that’s reflected in the UK. through anecdotes alone. This research Because what happens when someone will allow us to measure the progress that feels pushed away from one community? has been made, identify where inclusion Often, they turn towards the other. For LGBT+ Jews who have found LGBT+ spaces is still falling short and understand where KeshetUK and the wider Jewish community increasingly difficult since October 7th, need to focus our efforts next. their Jewish community may become even If you are an LGBT+ Jew living in the UK, more important as a source of connection, please complete the survey. Whether you are identity and belonging. That makes the progress we have made on LGBT+ inclusion deeply involved in Jewish life, rarely attend a synagogue or sit somewhere in between, in Jewish life more important than ever, your experience matters. And if you are even if there is still a way to go. not LGBT+ yourself, please share it with I know something of this myself. Over the someone who is. past three years, my experience of being Jewish We have spent 13 years working to make in non-Jewish spaces has changed, and I know Jewish life more inclusive. Now we have an I am not alone in having to navigate questions opportunity to listen, measure our progress about where I feel comfortable and where I can and understand what needs to happen next. be my whole self. But those experiences have Because belonging should never depend on also reinforced for me how important it is to which part of yourself you bring into the room. have Jewish spaces where being LGBT+ is not u The survey is open now at something you have to explain or set aside. ai178972617119_bumblebee newspaper advert september 2026- jewish news (quarter page).pdf 1 18/09/2026 11:09:31 www.research.net/r/KeshetUK Are LGBT+ Jews feeling more included in
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Opinion
The book I never meant to write about antisemitism DAVID RICH
DIRECTOR OF POLICY, CST
T
his is the book that I wasn’t supposed to write. When I finished my previous book, Everyday Hate, in February 2023, I promised myself that I was done with writing about antisemites. Enough of focusing on the people who spread hateful lies about Jews, I thought: they aren’t worthy of more attention. Instead, I decided to find a more positive story to tell about Jews who fought back, that might provide an example of pride and defiance. There are plenty of inspiring options, incredible stories of Jewish resistance that deserve a wider audience. I even started researching a story that I still hope to write one day. Eight months later, on 7 October, Hamas attacked Israel, and as we all witnessed the atrocities and felt the trauma of that day, I began to write this book instead. Not that I realised that was what I was doing at the time.
I was just writing an article about some of the nauseating responses to the 7 October attack, denouncing the immediate and celebratory demonstrations across the Western world at the slaughter of Jews in Israel. This was less an act of writing, more a cathartic effort to process the horror of that day. I was in shock at what had happened, felt deep foreboding at what was to come, and was angered by the sight of people actually celebrating the mass murder, rape and hostage taking of Israeli civilians. Three years later, I’ve had unwelcome reasons to write many more such articles, and together, they now form my latest book. Titled From Be’eri to Bondi: Global Antisemitism after October 7, it is not a chronology of events so much as a chance to pause and reflect: hopefully, looking at the past three years from a fresh angle may generate fresh insights and new understandings about what we have been through. The public, media and political discussion of antisemitism and Israel has felt unrelenting at times, as if we are all walking round with a target on our backs and a blinding spotlight
shining over our heads. The effect this has had on our own identities as Jews, on our relationships with Israel, and on our cohesion as a community, is complex and fluid. It is hard enough for Jews to work this out for ourselves, without Jewish identity being placed front and centre of national debate, inviting incessant and insensitive hectoring about what we should think, say and feel from social media figures whose huge followings are matched in size only by their vast ignorance of all things Jewish. The rise in anti-Jewish terrorism, with Jews murdered on multiple continents, is the most striking and deadly manifestation of antisemitism today. The failure to tackle the global rise in anti-Jewish hatred and extremism made it entirely predictable. This terrorism is the product of an atmosphere in which violent rhetoric has become normalised and hate towards anything deemed ‘Zionist’ is welcomed. This is how terrorism always works: political violence and racist attacks do not emerge from a vacuum but rely on a body of ideas and a flow of incitement. In this context, the
spread of Islamist extremism and the unacceptably high degree of antisemitic attitudes within Muslim communities are fuelling the flow of anti-Jewish violence. In intellectual circles, the legacy and meaning of Holocaust commemoration is under attack, as is the fundamental connection that Jews have to the land of Israel, with history itself being rewritten in pursuit of both these dishonourable goals. Running beneath all of it is a fervent hatred of Israel that transcends regular political campaigning and has become a movement of faith and belonging, in which any connection at all to Israel and Zionism is treated as a form of impurity and reason for disgust. From Be’eri to Bondi doesn’t promise to solve these problems, but it does offer some practical suggestions for government, civil society, and for the Jewish community. I hope it offers a path forward for all of us. u Dr Dave Rich’s new book, From Be’eri to Bondi: Global Antisemitism after October 7, is published by Routledge and out now
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24 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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Opinion
The inconvenient truth about Israel’s diversity ALEX BRUMMER
CITY EDITOR, THE DAILY MAIL
C
riticism of Israel as a sovereign, democratic nation is of course legitimate. In the current climate, when Britain’s Greens propagate Jew-hate by declaring Zionism is racism, it is totally unacceptable. In my local town centre, in upmarket Richmond-upon-Thames, one must navigate on a Shabbat or Yom stroll a pro-Palestinian stand claiming genocide. The ignorance and appropriation of the language of the Shoah on our quiet, supposedly civilised streets provokes profound alienation and nausea. There is an unchallenged view in much of the media that Israel is a monochrome Jewish state. This is a total misconception. Despite the claims often made for the Nakba (catastrophe) in 1948 when, allegedly, 700,000 Palestinians were driven from their homes, Israel is home to more than two million Palestinians – voting citizens. The Palestinian minority itself has a
complex makeup of Bedouin in the south, Druze in the north and is multi-denominational. Yet, the degree of social cohesion in many of the mixed cities, notably Haifa, is remarkable. Due to the work of the Abraham Initiatives (TAI), a non-governmental organisation (NGO) which seeks equality for Israeli Arabs, the tensions which followed 7 October and Netanyahu’s Gaza campaign have been remarkably subdued. TAI has worked tirelessly with Arab social activists, communities and elected and local representative to calm friction. Among Palestinian Israelis there are deep pockets of poverty, notably in the ‘unauthorised’ Bedouin towns in the south. There is also a dangerously high level of domestic crime in some Arab villages and towns – another issue TAI is addressing. The organisation is also involved in ending educational disparities between Israeli-Jewish and Israeli-Arab schools and seeks to bridge the gap, with programmes encouraging much more interaction between students and faculties. In healthcare, Palestinian Israelis are vital, providing almost half the colleagues involved in
hospitals and pharmacies. Some 25 percent of the nation’s physicians are of Arab origin. The Irish football team seems blissfully unaware at least 20 percent of Israel’s national squad, treated so disrespectfully, are drawn from Muslim, Arab-Christian and Druze minorities. The very notion of Israel as a right-wing nation populated by European and American extremist colonialists is rubbish. Jews from Arab lands – ranging from Iraq to Morocco and Egypt – expelled from Israel’s neighbouring home countries form a substantial minority. They, together with communities from wartorn Yemen, Ethiopia and Uganda, mean a rich mosaic population. In the coming elections, a leading power broker is likely to be Mansour Abbas, who already has served in government and is the main mover behind the United Arab List. None of this is to suggest broadcasters, social media influencers, Labour party activists and the mixed-up Greens leader Zack Polanski should be silenced when addressing bad behaviours by West Bank settlers. But if they insist on bringing Middle East politics to Britain – in
search of the Islamic vote – one could at least expect a more informed knowledge base rather than grotesque anti-Zionism and antisemitism. Events in Gaza, where Israel’s military machine has sought to root out and destroy an entrenched enemy responsible for a horrible massacre in Israel, are nothing like the organised industrial killing perpetrated by the Nazis in the second world war. Nor do they compare in scale to the killing and suffering in Sudan or the ongoing killing and dispersal of the minority – largely Muslim – Rohingya population from Myanmar. The latter has resulted in the deaths of 100,000 adults and children and the creation of 3.7 million refugees. Yet the word genocide is lightly glossed over when it is uttered by advocates for the Palestinian cause. It is deeply disturbing, especially when the broadcaster concerned, the BBC, is wholly funded by ordinary citizens through the licence fee. The free ride given to ill-informed users of such language is an abomination. It infects the public discourse and has seeped into the sinews of Israel’s most voluble haters. That can never be right.
As a Soviet Jew, I have seen this hatred before MARINA BRADFORD FOUNDER OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANCY EVERLOOP
I
always felt I was a little out of place. I was born in Russia, but was different because my mum is Jewish. Now I am here, but sometimes still feel like a foreigner in the UK. Not quite Jewish because I wasn’t raised to keep the traditions, and not quite in the right part of London because I lived south of the river. In the past three years I’ve also at time felt like I was not quite the right kind of environmentalist – the overriding sentiment in certain circles being that if you’re Jewish you should be anti-Israel, support specific causes and proudly express all that on LinkedIn in an “As a Jew…” post. The most recent test has been whether to support the “Zionism is racism” policy passed by the Green party, that officially legitimised Jew-hatred. Well, I quite like to be out of place. “Zionism is racism” is something that was first coined in the Soviet Union. This exact narrative, with its slogans and campaign of hate, was engineered in the 1960s and 70s. It was state sponsored at first and picked up by
people second, then subsequently exported globally. It has now been reinvigorated in the UK and many European countries, as well as the USA and Australia. It doesn’t even matter what people think they mean by Zionism when they redefine it – the playbook works in a very specific way and it is effective. We have seen this movie before and know how it ends. This is how I know that none of what is going on now is about humanitarian issues or even just not knowing the facts: not a single person has ever asked me to feel personal accountability for what Russia is doing in Ukraine. I have not seen a single debate on the rights of Russians to travel, have a country, or need to state their political position on my social media feed or climate events I attended. As a Soviet-born Jew, a lot of what we are experiencing now is almost normal to me – either through family stories or own memory. The coded language, that if something goes wrong and the powers don’t want to deal with it then “the Jews are behind it”, the knowledge that you cannot become too successful if you have the wrong name. I was always taught not to highlight my identity in unfamiliar settings – why draw attention to something that may put you in danger? It is a sort of an “if you know – you know” situation. I never expected to experience this in
❝ I NEVER EXPECTED TO EXPERIENCE SUCH DARKNESS HERE IN THE UK
the UK and definitely not in the climate community. Somehow the conversations and attention have shifted away from the “green” matters to a populist narrative. Nobody would dream of defining any other minority’s beliefs, interests or acceptable opinions for them. With Jews, everyone’s suddenly fluent. Antisemitism never led to anything good for anyone, including antisemites themselves. What does it actually achieve? Regardless of their political views, when the only party that seemingly advocated for environmental protections chooses division and age-old hatred as its core platform, they are basically saying that they can’t win votes otherwise. This tells those who are yet to be convinced – the people climate action actually needs – that this is a movement run on tribal feeling, not evidence. If the Greens don’t believe that
their own policies can bring people on board, what hope does anyone else have? This puts the climate movement back decades and makes it look unserious and less trustworthy. I’d assumed that by working in sustainability I was simply part of the progressive tribe that wanted to do better for the environment and people. Turns out, in the past few years, I have had to find my tribe again – as well as cleanse my LinkedIn feed, contacts list and decide on my red lines – so as not to allow people to make their ignorance my problem. Like many others, I have been brought closer into the Jewish circles that I would not have found otherwise, including the Jewish Climate Professionals Network (JCPN) that focuses on constructive conversations and tikkun olam actions. Ironically, when someone is trying to cause division, the Jewish community pulls closer together. The level of resilience I have seen is amazing despite what many have experienced – from personal attacks, job losses and safety threats to simply being cut off and losing friends and family. The work continues, the innovation and ideas thrive, smiles get wider, no victim Olympics. “Pessimism is a luxury that a Jew can never afford” (as attributed to Golda Meir) – holds just as true for climate work.
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15 October 2026 Jewish News
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26 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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DON’T JUST COPE,
FLOURISH
A FOUR-PART JOURNEY INTO THE SCIENCE OF LIVING WELL.
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Flourishing. Her longstanding interest in helping people not simply cope, but flourish, brings together positive psychology, coaching, lifestyle and behaviour change. Suzanne holds an MSc in Applied Positive Psychology and Coaching Psychology and a Diploma in Health, Nutrition and Lifestyle Coaching. She has over ten years’ coaching experience and loves applying ideas from psychology and wellbeing research to everyday life.
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27
Community / Scene & Be Seen
Remembering 7 October Jewish communities from Borehamwood to Melbourne have come together in the past week to commemorate the third anniversary of the 7 October Hamas attack. Speaking at the London vigil, Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis said: “We shall not only remember them but also honour the victims in everything we do – in the Jewish values we uphold, in the courage with which we live our Jewish lives, and in our refusal to let darkness have the final word.”
Community vigil, Primrose Hill Borehamwood Voices of the Vigil
Interfaith Cornwall Friends of Israel
Leeds Jewish Community
Jewish students at Leeds University pay tribute Councillors and faith leaders at Hertsmere Borough Council
Campaign group ‘Stop the Hate’
Manchester Jewish Museum, North West Friends of Israel and the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester
Rabbi Daniel and Rebbetzen Ilana Epstein, with the Beth Weitzmann community, Melbourne, Australia
JW3 hosted a commemorative evening with UJIA, the Jewish Agency, JLC and Board of Deputies
Menorah Synagogue
University College Jewish Society
Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate is lit with the blue and white Israeli flag in memory of 7 October
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Grinbox has opened offices in London!
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15 October 2026 Jewish News
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29
Inside A look
What to see at the UK Jewish Film Festival
Sombre notes
Daniel Krikler takes on the role made famous by Adrien Brody in a new stage production of The Pianist. By Jenni Frazer
Y
ou might be familiar with Adrien Brody’s Oscar-winning film turn in The Pianist as the Polish musician Wladyslaw Szpilman and the almost unbelievable story of how he was saved by a Nazi officer while hiding in the ruins of wartime Warsaw. Now, however, there is a treat in store, as young Jewish actor Daniel Krikler takes on Szpilman’s role in the world premiere of the pianist’s landmark memoir, featuring his original musical compositions and with input from Szpilman’s son, Andreas. The man they called “the Polish Gershwin” was once the most recognisable voice on his country’s national radio, playing both his own compositions and those of classical names. But when the Nazis rolled in to Poland – and after his entire family was deported to Treblinka and murdered – Szpilman hid in what had been the Warsaw Ghetto. After the war, Szpilman wrote the memoirs, which told of his extraordinary discovery by the German officer Wilm Hosenfeld, who – in director Roman Polanski’s film version – found him in a
burnt-out building and asked him to play the piano. In London, after a brief try-out in Southampton, audiences will see Krikler talking through the memoir, in a new production written by acclaimed adaptor and director Thom Southerland. This approach means Krikler, who played guitar and trombone in his youth, has neither to play virtuoso piano – most of that will be played by musical director Malcolm Forbes-Peckham – nor, unlike Brody, have to lose considerable amounts of weight. Birmingham-born Krikler has a quiverful of South African relations on his father’s side of the family, including a couple he thinks might have been his greatgrandparents, who ran a kosher hotel in the resort town of Muizenberg outside Cape Town. When he was six, because of his father’s work as a consultant surgeon, the family moved to Kenilworth, in the West Midlands. He says his theatrical impulse came from his mother, who encouraged Krikler and his older brother to take ballet and music classes – and all such training took place in Coventry. “I was very shy, but when I was
Krikler makes no secret of his affection and respect for his hero Wladyslaw Szpilman
around 14, I got some forms for the weekend school Stagecoach [aimed at kids aged four to 18] and asked my mum if I could sign up for it.” From that moment on, Krikler says: “I knew I had found my people.” He and the theatre were hooked, particularly on the dance side. Krikler jokes that the family were the only Jews in their village. “On my mother’s side, both her parents survived the Holocaust. My grandfather came over on the Kindertransport, my grandmother escaped from Germany through Switzerland. “Her oldest sister and her mother were murdered in Auschwitz. So the heritage side was something that I have always known, was always aware of.” In Birmingham, he spent one year in the city’s Jewish school, King David, before the family move to Kenilworth. Once there, the Kriklers would go to Friday night services in the Coventry synagogue, and the brothers attended Sunday cheder. His mother, he says, lived in Israel for five years as a young woman — so being Jewish was a large part of Krikler’s identity. “It was a big part of my life,” he says, but admits that he was “embarrassed” about being Jewish, and felt that it “othered” him in his cohort of friends. “I desperately wanted to fit in. I don’t feel the same now.” He’s obviously very aware of the recent debate about who can play what part – that is, whether only a Jewish actor can play a Jewish role. Krikler, who last year could be seen as Perchik in the Regent’s Park production of Fiddler on the Roof, has a nuanced take. He says: “[When there is a Jewish role], it’s really important to have those voices in the room, whether that is the writing, the directing or the acting. But do I think all the actors playing Jewish roles have to be Jewish? I don’t think I do. “Fiddler was a great example.
Daniel Krikler plays Wladyslaw Szpilman in The Pianist. Right, in action on stage during rehearsal
Everyone who played Jewish roles was either Jewish or had Jewish heritage; the director was Jewish and that was very important to him.” The Fiddler cast, he says, “covered the whole gamut” of Jewish observance and the rehearsal discussions were “really beautiful. But I don’t want only to play Jewish roles – and I don’t think being Jewish necessarily makes me better at playing these roles.” Krikler studied at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama before becoming a fulltime professional actor. Now, in the role of Szpilman, he admits he has found the rehearsals for this weighty production “very upsetting and very triggering”. Perhaps that is because of the intimate knowledge of the Holocaust in his family. The rehearsal space has been filled with pictures of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto and Krikler sighs at “the sheer amount of loss… you’re doing a job you
love in a creative space, and I am very thankful for this role. But a lot of the time, it’s not enjoyable, though I do think that’s right, and that it has to be like that.” Szpilman’s story is the more remarkable, because after the war he became one of Poland’s bestknown composers whose work in popular song still resonates today. You can tell, talking to Daniel Krikler, how much affection and respect he has for the unlikely hero.
• The Pianist runs at the Park Theatre from 15 October to 28 November
30 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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LIFE
Thirty years of r
As the UK Jewish Film Festival celebrates its 30th anniversary, these are the stars and storyteller
The Courage to Disobey Actor Daniel Auteuil has turned a remarkable true story of Jewish rescue and French resistance into a powerful new film, writes Brigit Grant Daniel Auteuil in the 2026 French historical drama film When the Night Falls
There are actors whose names you know and faces you recognise, and for British audiences, Daniel Auteuil is both, while remaining unmistakably French. If you saw Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources – and in the 1980s it seemed everybody did – you’ll remember him as Ugolin, the tragic farmer in Claude Berri’s films – a role that transformed Auteuil from popular comic actor to César-winning star. At 76, after more than half a century on stage and screen, he has long since earned the cliché “legend of French cinema” – and in his case, it fits. But Auteuil is not interested in looking backwards. “I know I’m 75, but I don’t know who that 75-year-old guy is,” he said last year. And rather than settle into elder-statesman roles, he has moved behind the camera. His latest film, When the Night Falls (La Troisième Nuit), which he co-wrote and directed, takes him into one of the darkest chapters of French history and it’s a story many French people don’t know. Set in August 1942 when France was under occupation and the Vichy government was rounding up foreign Jews at Vénissieux, hundreds of men, women and children were detained while a commission decided their fate. Among those trying to save them were Gilbert Lesage, a civil servant (Antoine Reinartz) and Father Alexandre Glasberg, played by Auteuil. Glasberg was
Our pick of what els Shalom: A film about the current state of Israel, told from the perspective of the Jerusalem Biblical Zoo. As war breaks out, the zookeepers must decide the fate of their ancient and ailing white rhino, Shalom. The zoo staff are a diverse group of Israelis and Palestinians whose discussions about the political situation take place within the peaceful island of the zoo. The Last Concert: A thrilling catand-mouse psychological drama from legendary director Alexandre Arcady. Renowned but tyrannical orchestral conductor Alexandre Miller (Benoit Poelvoorde), performs a farewell concert at the iconic Opera-Comique in Paris. After the performance, a super-fan of Miller insists on a private audience with his hero. As he relentlessly pursues Miller through the labyrinthine corridors of the opera house, dark secrets from their past begin to emerge.
Daniel Auteuil and Yves Montand in the 1986 film Jean de Florette
a Catholic priest born Jewish in Ukraine who had experienced pogroms before converting to Christianity – a history Auteuil believes was crucial. “He recognises what is happening and knows what will follow,” says Auteuil, who made the priest’s Jewish past one of the film’s most affecting moments. “He, as a Jew who converted, rediscovers his old prayer, the one he grew up with,” says Auteuil. “He lives with that ambivalence. These are his people.” For Auteuil, what happened at Vénissieux is not safely confined to history. Speaking to the French newspaper Corse-Matin, he said: “I don’t think there is a resurgence of antisemitism; it has always existed.” He was profoundly affected by discovering as a teenager that France had participated in the elimination of Jews but appreciates there was another France too. “We must recognise that in France, anonymous women and men were everyday heroes
without knowing it and saved Jews who were victims of these despicable laws. You can resist without a weapon. That form of resistance appealed to me.” At Vénissieux, parents faced unimaginable choices as they tried to save their children from deportation. It raises the question, what would we have done? “We’ve all asked ourselves the question – would I have collaborated or resisted?” says Auteuil. For him, the distinction is clear. “When it comes to a genuine moral duty, we must resist.” And he is adamant that When the Night Falls should not be filed away as history. “This isn’t a period film,” he says. “It’s a modern-day film that uses a moment in history to tell the story of today.” When the Night Falls is UKJFF’s Opening Night Gala film at the BFI Southbank on Thursday 5 November. For tickets to this and all films visit: ukjewishfilm.org
The Righteous Road Trip: An extraordinarily emotional and physical journey, with Jewish humanitarian activist Jonny Daniels, directed by Oscar-winning filmmaker Vanessa Roth. We follow Jonny as he travels Poland, Slovakia and Hungary at Christmastime, bringing gifts to surviving members of the Righteous Among the Nations and encouraging them to recount their stories. Girls Like Us: A gritty, moving Israeli drama about 17-year-old Shahar (Hili Yosef Zada), who must care for her younger sister while coping with an absent father and alcoholic mother. At a school for at-risk girls, she finds friendship and forms a powerful bond with soldier-counsellor Perry (Hadar Dror) through their shared trauma. Lansky The Jewish Godfather: Documentary looking at notorious Jewish gangster Meyer Lansky – Lansky The Jewish Godfather
Girls Like Us
Tell Me Everything
from his humble origins as a Jewish immigrant to New York, through his meteoric rise within the world of prohibition-era organised crime, up to his anti-Nazi street fighting activities in the lead up to World War Two. Featuring interviews with Lansky’s descendants, this is a captivating portrait of a complex Jewish man. Cancelled: A shocking documentary exposing the horrific rise in violent antisemitism in Australia, particularly in the arts sector. Featuring interviews with Jewish -Australian artists who’ve found themselves cancelled, abused and attacked, the film offers a prescient warning about the consequences of letting such anti-Jewish hatred fester. Tell Me Everything: A wonderfully nuanced coming-of-age story and the second feature from hotshot Israeli director Moshe Rosenthal). Rose
15 October 2026 Jewish News
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LIFE
eel Jewish magic
rs bringing laughter, drama and extraordinary Jewish lives to the screen from 5- 15 of November
se to watch
A funny thing happened at a Jewish wedding
Elon Gold as the flashy entertainer Meshulam
Elon Gold brings laughter, Yiddish and some unexpected dance moves to Gidi Dar’s The Wedding Entertainer
Oslo Court
Boaz (Yair Mazor as a child, and Ido Tako as an adult) is a pop-music-obsessed 12-year-old, who idolises his father, Meir (Assi Cohen). But Boaz soon discovers a devastating secret about his dad that shakes the very foundations of his Iife. Oslo Court: A short film about the 1970sstyle London restaurant Oslo Court and its cultural importance to the Jewish community, with waiter Neil at its beating heart. Rose: Françoise Fabian (Call My Agent), Grégory Montel (Call My Agent) and Aure Atika (The Night Manager) star in this warm-hearted Parisian Jewish family drama. Widowed Rose rediscovers her joie de vivre after a chance dinner party, much to the discomfort of her three dysfunctional children. Beautifully observed and enriched by Yiddish and Mizrahi songs, Aurélie Saada’s debut is a life-affirming celebration of new beginnings. Louisa Walters The Righteous Road Trip
It wouldn’t be a conversation about a Jewish film without a healthy dose of misery. We do sorrow exceptionally well, but it’s hard not to laugh when you’re talking to Elon Gold, writes Brigit Grant. The American comedian and actor has made a career out of finding the funny side of Jewish life, and now he’s bringing that talent to Gidi Dar’s The Wedding Entertainer (The Tale of Moishe Badhan), which he also co-produced. Chosen as the UKJFF’s mid-festival gala film, it’s a very funny movie that is sad too, of course. We’re Jews. We can’t help ourselves. Gold plays Meshulam Kalicker, a flamboyant American wedding entertainer (badhan) whose arrival threatens the livelihood of Moishe, a traditional badhan played by Israeli actor Shuli Rand. The result is a wonderfully entertaining clash of personalities, generations and approaches to Jewish performance, with romance and some gloriously ridiculous dancing. For Gold, whose television credits include Stacked opposite Pamela Anderson and Curb Your Enthusiasm with Larry David, the role demanded almost everything he had spent a lifetime learning – along with several skills he hadn’t. “It was a combination of everything I ever sort of studied and worked on, from the acting craft to learning Yiddish. I don’t want to say singing because I’m barely a singer, and I know I’m not a dancer.” This is a modest assessment from a man whose dance routine is one of the film’s comic highlights.
“I worked with an actual choreographer, and he was pretty much giving up and going, ‘I don’t know. What do you want to do?’ And I was like, ‘Can I just do this?’ “And he goes, ‘Okay, memorise it and just get it down.’” Gold laughs at the memory. “Luckily, there were all those cut-aways.” The singing was marginally less daunting. Coming from a musical family, he knew how to carry a tune, but the combination of demands was unlike anything he’d previously attempted. “It was really weird. Here’s a role where you’re mostly speaking Yiddish and Hebrew, which I don’t do. You’re going to sing, which I don’t do, and you’re going to dance, which I don’t do. Enjoy!” Preparing for the part, Gold worked with a Yiddish coach over Zoom every week, mastering not just the dialogue but the pronunciation, inflections and regional differences to make his performance convincing. “There are different variations of Yiddish. It’s very annoying. You would think we all just have the one way to say it, but no. If you’re from Poland, you say it this way. It’s a lot.” And then there was the physical transformation. Gold is Modern Orthodox, but Meshulam belongs to a very different Jewish world, complete with traditional dress and peyot. “I’m so not that guy,” he says. “Every morning I got peyot glued to my sides. They pasted them on, and every night they would rip them off. It was like you’ve been waxed. It’s not fun, I’ll tell you that.”
Yet the effort was worthwhile because, for Gold, the challenge was to inhabit a character rather than simply turn up and be funny. “It was really about becoming that dude.” What makes The Wedding Entertainer particularly appealing is that beneath the comedy lies a story about disappointment, reinvention and finding happiness when life has not gone according to plan. It’s also a film with an unusually broad appeal. It’s for young couples contemplating marriage and older audiences with the fear of being left behind. There is something for everyone. Gold has already tested its crossgenerational appeal on his own family. “My kids loved it, which I couldn’t believe,” he says, referring to his children, whose ages range from their late teens to their 20s, including a married daughter. “That enthusiasm is encouraging as it’s a film rooted in a very particular Jewish tradition but with emotions that require no translation.” Unusually for Jewish cinema, there is the promise of happiness. “Thank God, at the end it’s happy,” says Gold and I concur, as bouncy endings are hardly our speciality. “We specialise in misery,” he agrees. And we both laugh. The Wedding Entertainer (The Tale of Moishe Badhan) is the Centrepiece Gala at the Festival on 12 November (ukjewishfilm.org)
Gold (left) and Shuli Rand Elon Gold without peyot
32 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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Business / Breast Cancer Awareness
candicekrieger@googlemail.com
With Candice Krieger
HARNESSING ISRAELI TECH TO HELP CURE CANCER During Breast Cancer Awareness Month, two-time survivor Gal Avital and her husband Idan Megidish share how Tech4Cancer brings Israel’s leading scientists, clinicians and tech talent together to tackle cancer
A
fter surviving breast cancer twice, entrepreneur and mother-of-three Gal Avital and her husband Idan Megidish set out to mobilise Israel’s technology industry around an ambitious goal: curing cancer. Their not-for-profit organisation Tech4Cancer connects cancer researchers and clinicians with engineers, data scientists and AI specialists who develop tools to overcome obstacles holding back their work. Initially focused on breast cancer, Tech4Cancer’s mission targets all cancers, supporting early laboratory research to projects intended to inform better treatment decisions. “Our vision is to cure cancer,” Gal told Jewish News. “Israel has a strong combination of healthcare institutions, leading research and technological expertise. “Our ambition is to connect those capabilities more systematically, so that promising cancer research is not slowed down simply because the right data, technology or connection is missing.” Speaking during Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the couple’s work comes amid growing concern about cancer in younger adults. Analysis published by the World Cancer Research Fund earlier this month found rising rates of several cancers among under-50s. In England, cases of breast cancer in this age group increased from 42 to 47.5 cases per 100,000 between 2001 and 2023. Cancer remains more common in older adults, but researchers say further work is needed to understand the increases. Launched in 2023, Tech4Cancer is supporting 26 ongoing projects involving more than 40 researchers and clinicians. Around 170 technology professionals have joined its community from major companies including Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Wix, monday.com and Salesforce. Tech entrepreneur Maor Shlomo, whose AI platform Base44 was acquired by Wix for around $80m last year, has joined the advisory board. “For and me, this is deeply personal,” Idan says. “Gal’s experience is a major part of why we believe awareness alone is not enough.” Gal was first diagnosed with breast cancer around six and a half years ago, a few months after the birth of their son, now seven. She was diagnosed again in her other breast four years ago, a month after giving birth to their twin daughters. She underwent chemotherapy, mastectomy, reconstruction and radiotherapy. “I’m doing well,” she says.
Gal Avital and Idal Megdilish
Both founders brought professional experience from outside medicine. Avital worked in venture capital and strategic partnerships, including roles at Microsoft’s venture fund M12 and Oracle. Idan’s career spans government, philanthropy and technology, including at the prominent Israeli tech unicorn Lightricks where he managed the Haifa and Be’er Sheva sites. After Gal’s first diagnosis, the couple established Green Wave, helping cancer patients access their entitlements, including tax relief, and then Halas-Tech, which helps self-employed cancer patients and survivors rebuild businesses affected by their illness, through practical support from technology professionals and companies. With Tech4Cancer, they turned their attention to accelerating research and more targeted treatment. “Of course, for us, it was important to start with breast cancer,” Gal says. One of its earliest projects brought together a breast cancer researcher at Sheba Medical Center and experts from Google. Their image-processing and analysis work supported research on breast cancer organoids, which was published in Frontiers in Oncology. Tech4Cancer is also Maor Shlomo, chief executive and founder of Base44, joined Tech4Cancer’s advisory board
Some of the Tech4Cancer team (left to right): Gal Avital, Idan Megidish, Gil Eisen and Yair Uziel
working with the Hadassah oncology team led by Shani Paluch-Shimon, together with the Ministry of Health and other partners, to develop the foundations for a breast cancer recurrence and outcomes registry. “The aim is to follow what happens after diagnosis, including recurrence or progression, treatments and outcomes, with a view to expanding across medical centres,” explains Gal. The initiative has expanded across institutions including Sheba, Weizmann, Technion, Tel Aviv University, the Hebrew University, Hadassah, Rambam, Soroka and Schneider. Other projects include work relating to pancreatic cancer, childhood brain cancer and lung cancer. Tech4Cancer is also working on an initiative to explore how AI-assisted tools can help doctors and research coordinators identify potentially suitable clinical trials for individual patients. “Some of the Tech4Cancer projects
address immediate needs while others support research whose potential benefits may take longer to reach patients,” says Idan. “The biggest evolution in the mission is that we are now looking beyond individual projects and asking how some of these gaps can be addressed at an ecosystem level.” “Everyone is affected by cancer,” adds Gal. “Either themselves or they know someone with it.” Maor Shlomo’s involvement has a personal motivation. After losing his mother to cancer, he established Second Light, a personally-funded oncology fund backing early-stage companies and providing grants to researchers whose ideas are not yet ready to become businesses. When he wrote publicly about his interest in cancer research on LinkedIn, Avital and Idan contacted him. An initial meeting led to further conversations and Shlomo joined the advisory board. “He’s a real mensch,” says Idan. Base44 is also providing tools, cloud infrastructure and other technical resources to help build a digital map of Israel’s cancer ecosystem. According to Tech4Cancer, it already covers nearly 600 researchers and professionals, more than 600 clinical trials, 55 institutions and over 190 datasets. It is designed to help researchers identify collaborators, startups find relevant expertise and data, and funders see where support is needed. Tech4Cancer has also submitted a joint proposal with NVIDIA to a national AI challenge, focused on using AI, computing and data infrastructure to better connect cancer data, research and capabilities. Its preliminary mapping covers nearly 600 researchers and professionals, around 600 clinical trials and 55 institutions, alongside more than 190 potential data sources identified for further review. Gal says: “Together with NVIDIA, we submitted a proposal in response to Israel’s National AI Directorate’s request for information on national AI challenges, outlining how AI and shared data infrastructure could address gaps in cancer research.” Funded through philanthropic donations, Tech4Cancer is pursuing further grants and support. Members of its core team worked for months without salaries while establishing the organisation. “We are confident that bringing technology and research together can help accelerate breakthroughs towards cures. “Everyone understands the urgency. Within a few years, we want the world to look to Israel and recognise the global impact we are making in the fight against cancer. “We are confident that the cure for cancer will come from Israel and we want that expertise to benefit researchers and patients worldwide.” tech4cancer.org
15 October 2026 Jewish News
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33
Orthodox Judaism
MAKING SENSE OF THE SEDRA In our thought-provoking series, rabbis, rebbetzins and educators relate the week’s parsha to the way we live today RABBI BRENDAN STERN HENDON UNITED SYNAGOGUE
Use the past to create the future For much of the 20th century, Kodak was one of the biggest names in photography. And in 1975, a Kodak engineer, Steven Sasson, developed one of the world’s first digital cameras. In other words, Kodak had the future sitting in its own building. But the company had become so successful through traditional photographic film that it struggled to adapt to the digital revolution. Eventually, in 2012, Kodak filed for bankruptcy. There is something ironic about a company whose business was preserving memories being so tied to the past that it struggled to prepare for the future. Perhaps this gives us an insight into a puzzling episode in this week’s parsha.
“Noach became a master of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk” (Bereishit 9:20–21). Rashi explains that Noah profaned himself by making his first act after leaving the Ark the planting of a vineyard. Chazal (Bereishit Rabbah 36:3) add that he should have planted something else first, such as wheat. But why did it matter what Noah planted first? He had just emerged from the Ark into a world that needed to be rebuilt from scratch. Presumably, both wheat and grapes would eventually be necessary. And why specifically should wheat have taken priority? Rabbi Simcha Wasserman explains that wine and wheat represent two very different attitudes. Wine is generally enjoyed in a social setting, often while people reminisce about the past and the “good old days”. Chazal say: “Remember it over wine”
(Pesachim 106a). Wine itself improves with age. It represents looking backwards. Wheat is the opposite. Bread is best when it is fresh. Leave it too long and it quickly deteriorates. Wheat therefore represents freshness and a focus on the future. This was the problem with Noah’s vineyard. Noah had just watched an entire world disappear. There was certainly plenty to remember. But at that moment, his primary task was not to look back at the world that had been. It was to build the world that would be. As Jews, we have an illustrious past which we should never forget. We look back to learn, to remember and to draw inspiration from those who came before us. But we cannot become so busy preserving yesterday that we forget to build tomorrow. The past must always be part of who we are – but its real value is when we use it as a building block to create an even greater future.
Why specifically should wheat take priority
RABBI AND REBBETZIN Rabbinic leadership couple
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Sydney, Australia
Lead, build and inspire the next chapter of a vibrant Modern Orthodox Zionist community
Kehillat Masada, located in St Ives on Sydney’s Upper North Shore, is seeking an exceptional Rabbi and Rebbetzin to provide spiritual, pastoral and communal leadership and help shape the future of our Kehillah. YOUR OPPORTUNITY Build & grow our Kehillah through relationships, new initiatives and engagement. Bring an entrepreneurial spirit to attract, engage and connect new people and families. Focus on kiruv with welcoming pathways for all ages and levels of observance. Strengthen Jewish learning, communal participation and connection to Israel. Develop the relationship between Kehillat Masada and Masada College. WE ARE LOOKING FOR LEADERS WHO Are committed to Modern Orthodox Judaism and Zionism, with recognised semicha (for the Rabbi) and Halachic authority. Have a deep commitment to serious Torah learning and a Torah-centred lifestyle. Have a proven record of community-building and relationship development. Are energetic, creative and proactive, with an entrepreneurial mindset. Are passionate about kiruv and Jewish engagement. Can engage children, teenagers, young adults and families. Are warm, approachable and inspiring teachers and communicators. Bring sound pastoral judgement, empathy, discretion and integrity. If you are excited by the opportunity to lead, build and inspire, we would like to hear from you.
applications@masada.org.au 30th November 2026
34 Jewish News 15 October 2026
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Progressive Judaism
LEAP OF FAITH RABBI GERSHON SILINS
HERTFORDSHIRE PROGRESSIVE SYNAGOGUE
The Greens have ‘jumped the shark’ The phrase ‘jumping the shark’ – coined in response to the creative downfall of the American sitcom Happy Days after the character of Fonzie did just that – means that a work or entity has reached a point at which it has exhausted its core intent and is introducing new ideas that are discordant with its original theme or purpose. This is what the Green Party of England and Wales has managed to do in passing its ‘Zionism is Racism’ resolution. The ideology of the Green Party could once be described as combining environmentalism with left-wing economic policies. It has now totally transformed: the formerly left-wing party has become the party of anti-Zionism. The Greens have become fanboys of
Hamas, which only supports one policy – the murder of Jews wherever they find them, ironically including Jews who might be members of the Green Party and committed anti-Zionists at that. In 1945, George Orwell wrote: “A communist is one who looks upon the USSR as his Fatherland and feels it his duty to justify Russian policy and advance Russian interests at all costs.” Substitute “anti-Zionist” for communist, and “Palestine” for the USSR, and you have today’s Green Party. The party rejected an amendment that would have graciously allowed Jewish members of the Green Party to retain their Green credentials, even though they might go to a synagogue that failed in its moral duty to denounce Zionism. This was a favour to Jews in the Green Party, making it an easy choice: be a Green or be a Jew. You can’t be both. You could try to maintain your Green credentials by being plus royaliste que le roi
OU R B U IL DIN G ON T H E Z U IDE L IJ K E WA N DE L W E G , A M S T E R DA M
Would you like to help build liberal Jewish life in Amsterdam? The Liberal Jewish Congregation Amsterdam is looking for a
RABBI (m/f) P R A CT ICA L
· Full-time, in principle; the position requires flexibility. · Initial appointment for one year, with the intention to extend. · International applicants actively sought. · The rabbi is expected to settle in or near Amsterdam. Closing date for applications: 8 November 2026
After more than 30 years with the congregation, one of our rabbis is retiring. This opens the way for a new rabbi, who will work alongside our other rabbi and the rabbinic team of the largest Progressive Jewish congregation in the Netherlands. We are looking for a rabbi who inspires and connects. A spiritual leader who feels at home in a congregation where religion, education, pastoral care, encounter and social engagement are inseparably connected. W E A R E L O O KING F O R A R A BBI
· With an ordination from a seminary recognised by the EUPJ/ERA, or equivalent standing; · With a good command of Hebrew and of the liturgical tradition of the Liberal Jewish congregations; · Who is rooted in the liberal Jewish tradition and endorses the principles of the World Union for Progressive Judaism; · With a vision of Jewish education and experience in teaching children, teenagers and adults; · Who can represent our congregation with conviction and nuance. WA N T T O K N OW M O R E ?
Download our brochure at ljgamsterdam.nl/vacancy-rabbi. For more information, please contact Tom de Swaan, chair of the LJG Amsterdam and of the selection committee, at werving@ljg.nl.
We look forward to hearing from you!
Zack Polanski, Green Party leader
–more antisemitic than a Green antisemite. But just as Jews in Germany in 1939 could attempt to abandon their Jewish identity, it failed to save them from destruction, and this is likely to be true in the Green Party as well. A Jew in the Green Party will now be forever tainted by his or her unfortunate origins in Judaism. Can a Green really trust a Jew?
A stimulating series where our progressive rabbis consider Judaism in the face of 21stcentury issues The Greens have also managed to move the argument away from “is it possible to be an anti-Zionist without being antisemitic?” The Green Party is perfectly happy to be antisemitic. The party is now on the same page as the unabashedly antisemitic former USSR in the 1970s, when it put forward its own ‘Zionism is Racism’ allegation. It is hard to see much air between the USSR then and the Green Party now. Happy Days dragged on after Fonzie jumped the shark, and no doubt the Green Party will continue to be something, if nothing like what used to be Green. But the resolution has brought together, in their rejection of it, Jews of a wide variety of beliefs and opinions about Israel and Zionism. Whether you support or protest against the Israeli Government, whether you love Benjamin Netanyahu or hate him, if you’re a Jew, the Greens hate you. Now we have it in writing.
15 October 2026 Jewish News
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Business Services Directory WANTED
ANTIQUES
HOUSE CLEARANCE
ARTICLES WANTED
Top prices paid
Furs, Jewellery, Old Costume Jewellery, Watches, Silver, Designer Bags, anything vintage.
Antique – Reproduction – Retro Furniture (any condition)
Epstein, Archie Shine, Hille, G Plan, etc. Dining Suites, Lounges Suites, Bookcases, Desks, Cabinets, Mirrors, Lights, etc.
Friendly Family Company established for 30 years
01277 352560
House clearances
STONEMASON
Single items to complete homes MARYLEBONE ANTIQUES - 8 CHURCH STREET NW8 8ED
07866 614 744 (ANYTIME) 0207 723 7415 (SHOP) closed Sunday & Monday
The specialist masons in creating bespoke Granite and Marble Memorials for all Cemeteries.
STUART SHUSTER - e-mail - info@maryleboneantiques.co.uk
Clayhall Showroom 14 Claybury Broadway Ilford. IG5 0LQ T: 0208 551 6866
MAKE SURE YOU CONTACT US BEFORE SELLING
Edgware Showroom 41 Manor Park Crescent Edgware. HA8 7LY T: 0208 381 1525
Email : info@garygreenmemorials.co.uk
www.garygreenmemorials.co.uk
CHARITY & WELFARE
LEGACY Gary Green ad 84 x 40mm JM Group v2.indd 1
18/03/2019 12:50:51
ARE YOU BEREAVED? Confidential Bereavement Counselling for adults and children individually. Support Groups available. We offer in person, online and telephone counselling. Contact Jewish Bereavement Counselling Service in confidence. 0208 951 3881 enquiries@jbcs.org.uk | www.jbcs.org.uk
Dave & Eve House Clearance
Leaving Your Legacy At Beit Halochem UK we help to rebuild the lives of the 67,400 brave IDF veterans and victims of terror daily www.bhuk.org | info@bhuk.org | 020 8458 2455 | Charity Number 1146950
We clear houses, flats, sheds, garages etc. No job too big or too small! Rubbish cleared as part of a full clearance. We have a waste licence. We buy items including furniture bric a brac. For a free quote please phone Dave on 07913405315 any time.
ADVERTISE IN THE UK’S BIGGEST JEWISH NEWSPAPER FOR LESS THAN £24 A WEEK Email Sales today at sales@jewishnews.co.uk or call 020 8142 8611
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15 October 2026 Jewish News
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SEVEN STARS JEWELLERY AND PIERCINGS
Elevated jewellery, gorgeous stacks, statement pieces and feel-good piercings to make you and your party shine. sevenstarsjewellery.com
SHARKY AND GEORGE
Experience creators and joy makers who plan and run legendary parties, immersive events and unforgettable adventures for children and adults. sharkyandgeorge.com
Israeli Dance Institute
HERMOLIS
Exceptional kosher catering for events of every size, from intimate celebrations to large gatherings. Delicious, chef-prepared meals with elegant presentation. hermolis.com
INSIDE OUT HOLISTIC WELLNESS
How do you know if your nutrition and supplements are working? Prysm iO is a 15-second non-invasive fingertip scan that measures your carotenoid antioxidant score. insideoutholisticwellness.co.uk
ISRAELI DANCE INSTITUTE
Charity dedicated to promoting Jewish identity, and physical and mental well-being, through a connection with Israeli dance by participation and performance. idi.org.uk
METROPOLITAN BUSHEY
Versatile venue set within 36 acres of grounds in Hertfordshire, with a large high-spec ballroom, three additional function rooms, flexible catering or dry hire and ample parking. metropolitanbushey.co.uk
NOVELTIES DIRECT
Party supplies and accessories for all occasions, from children’s birthday parties, stag nights and hen parties to themed parties and weddings including balloons, wedding decorations, bunting, flags, fancy dress costumes and wigs. novelties-direct.co.uk
SIGNED, SEALED AND DELIVERED
Personalised, lockable Royal Mail post boxes for keeping gifts and cards safe, beautiful candle holders for Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, weddings and milestone celebrations plus unique audio guest books exclusively for weddings. facebook.com/signed88, @signed_sealed_
SIMCHA PRINT
Choose from beautiful stationery designs, personalise them online and preview before ordering — with Tova Catering benschers, invitations, menus and more all in one place. simchaprint.co.uk
SUGARSHACK
JACK REITMAN
Twisted Fork Magic
TODAY TOMORROW FOREVER
Contemporary Jewish art for life’s most meaningful moments and simchas, including hand-painted ketubot, chuppah covers, ceramics, mezuzot houses, wedding stationery and original artworks for the Jewish home. todaytomorrowforever.com.au
TOVA CATERING AND EVENTS
Exceptional kosher catering for memorable weddings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, private celebrations, corporate events and charity events. tovaeventcatering.com
Treasure trove for bakers and cake decoraTWISTED FORK MAGIC tors, packed with specialist equipTop-tier professional magicians ment, sugarcraft supplies and edible for Bar Mitzvahs, Bat Mitzvahs, Waffleicious decorations, alongside expert advice, weddings and corporate events classes and everything needed to across the UK. twistedcreate showstopping cakes for forkmagic.com your parties. sugarshack.co.uk
London-based wedding and function singer specialising in Jewish weddings, chuppahs, parties and Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, combining beautiful live vocals, a contemporary style and professional experience to create memorable, modern celebrations. jackreitmanmusic.com
WA CARR AND SON
SVS PRODUCTIONS
Build the perfect event with a wide range of furniture, tableware, linen, bars, dancefloors, AV production, staging, marquees and complete event hire solutions. wacarrandsons.co.uk
London-based full-scale event company creating events that soar beyond expectations. svsprod.co.uk
THE ACNE BRAND
Oli’s Kitchen
OLI’S KITCHEN
Exceptional catering for weddings, celebrations, corporate events and simchas, combining delicious, beautifully presented food with warm service. olis-kitchen.co.uk
PHOTOTHEATRE
Jack Reitman
JOANNE DAVIDSON PHOTOGRAPHY
WALLER’S
One-stop shop (literally) in Golders Green for all your event attire, with a wide range of suits, jackets, trousers, coats, shirts, knitwear and accessories. wallersclothing.com
REBECCA RINDER
MERIDIAN GRAND
Luxury north London venue for spectacular weddings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs and simchas, with space for 800 guests and 300 cars. It has a retractable chuppah roof. meridiangrand.co.uk
THE STAGE AT LUMIERE
Spectacular new premium event venue in Elstree offering versatile spaces, state-ofthe-art production and exceptional hospitality for celebrations, corporate events, live entertainment, parties and unforgettable occasions. thestageatlumiere.com
WAFFELICIOUS
Freshly-made waffle sticks, mini pancakes, crepes, candy floss and pick ‘n’ mix, with delicious toppings and treats for every occasion. wafflelicious.co.uk
Joanne Davidson Photography
Affordable luxury bespoke dresses for tweens for all occasions that make every girl feel like a princess. Beautiful designs made with love in Rebecca’s north London showroom. Make sure to take your seat at the fashion show to see them in real life! @rebeccarinder1
The Stage at Lumiere
Photo by Claire Jonas Photography
With more than 20 years’ experience in fast-paced entertainment and editorial photography, Joanne is your go-to for beautifully captured, professional coverage tailored to you and your occasion. joannedavidson.net
Dynamic, immersive event photography concept. On a customised stage, your guests become the players in a fantasy while the expert team elicits larger-than-life performances via choreography and the handling of authentic props. phototheatre.co.uk
Look your best for your event with specialised cost-effective vegan skincare created by dermatology specialists to target acne, hyperpigmentation and skin sensitivity. theacnebrand.com
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Jewish News 15 October 2026
Fash ion Show by Re b ecca Rind er Open e
by Ro b
d Rinde r!
Jewish News presents
The Big Event Wedding, Bar & Bat Mitzvah Show SUNDAY
OCT
18 2026
11AM to 4PM
The Stage, Lumiere Studios, 5 Elstree Way, Herts WD6 1SF
Show sponsors
Fashion Show