Is the West in denial about its antisemitism?

Of all the reverberations, large and small, from the Hamas massacres of 7 October last year, one took me by surprise; another did not.

The surprise was how quickly the near-universal sympathy for Israel was eclipsed by militant expressions of support for Palestinians. In the UK, or so it seemed to me, popular sentiment had turned against Israel within 24 hours – almost as soon as its prime minister vowed to destroy Hamas, but long before Israel mounted its first military assault on Gaza.

The Israeli flag, hoisted on UK government buildings just hours after the Hamas killings, was lowered within a day, in favour of the Ukraine flag it had displaced.

For years, the cause of Palestinian statehood seemed to have been forgotten internationally, along with the murderous spectaculars mounted by the PLO. Yet here it was, being espoused by whole new generations of demonstrators, not just in the occupied West Bank, but in many parts of Europe and the United States.

Condemnation of Israel solidified when it launched its military attack – but much sympathy had evaporated long before. That was the biggest surprise.

What surprised me perhaps least are the knots that Keir Starmer and the Labour Party have tied themselves into as a result of the coincidence of a Middle East war and preparations for elections. There are constituencies – local and national – with sufficient numbers of Muslim voters, most of Pakistani heritage, to influence the result. They have traditionally voted Labour, and Labour has been out to please them.

But in all its efforts to root out antisemitism, the party has never openly acknowledged how far this problem is less about Jeremy Corbyn – an old-style, pro-Palestinian internationalist – than about ingrained anti-Israel, and anti-Jewish, sentiment among some of its Muslim voters.

A number of Labour’s candidates, it would appear, pander to that constituency, wittingly or not. Don’t tell me that a would-be MP who suggests that Israel turned a blind eye to Hamas preparations for its killing spree made a “slip of the tongue”. That is no slip of the tongue – it’s a glimpse of a certain world view that the party hierarchs would prefer to hide, lest it alienate whole other groups of voters. It is also, given the demographics of the UK, a tendency unlikely to go away.

Which leads me on to a third reverberation from the events of 7 October that has only partially surprised me: figures just released by a Jewish charity, the Community Security Trust, reported a record 4,103 antisemitic incidents last year, almost double the then record number reported in 2021. 

Two-thirds of the reports come on or after 7 October, and many took place in the vicinity of schools. All right, the incidents are self-reported, but the trend is backed up by police reports, which also show a sharp increase.

A resurgence of antisemitism has also been seen across much of Europe in recent years. Yes, there are pointers in the opposite direction. Ukraine’s 2019 presidential election suggested that voters had turned their back on the long-standing strain of antisemitism in their past. There is also a question about how far the appeal of right-wing politicians in many parts of Europe reflects a revival of old antisemitism or a more general xenophobia, now more likely to have an anti-Muslim tinge. But it is hard to gainsay the trend.

The UK has traded on its part-mythical welcome for Jewish children in the Kindertransport, by the enthusiasm of some politicians, chief among them Margaret Thatcher, for the entrepreneurial and intellectual success of Jews in the UK, and – though less so as the years have gone by – for Britain’s role in the creation of the state of Israel.

At the same time, I would say that it is not quite as easy as some maintain, to separate anti-Israel sentiment from antisemitism. By all means, you can condemn the policy and actions of a government of Israel without being antisemitic – as seen by the number of Jews who willingly do so. But the one may cloak the other more often than it is comfortable to admit, and there must surely be questions about how much longer the mere mention of the Holocaust will serve to protect and defend Jews and the state of Israel even to the extent that it does now.

As it happens, two recent films prompt thoughts on this theme, but in slightly different directions. Jonathan Glazer’s Zone of Interest has rightly attracted plaudits across the film-going spectrum. To an extent, though, it depends for its effect on a great deal of iconography. You need to know what the name Auschwitz denotes, to recognise the shape of the camp tower, to know that the gas chambers were used for mass killing, and it is an iconography that, with the passing of generations, may be less and less shared. A pile of shoes then becomes just that; the tower of Auschwitz just a tower.

I am not Jewish, but I grew up with these images, as most of the immediate post-war generations probably did. I have visited a handful of concentration camp sites, including Auschwitz, which has increasingly become emblematic of them all.

But I wonder. Even if you were to go on a school trip to Auschwitz now, as many do, how much of a connection is there now, especially for children brought up outside the Jewish or Christian traditions?

The other film illustrates just how far memory has been erased. Steve McQueen’s Occupied City is an unrelenting, four-hour tour of Amsterdam during and after the Covid pandemic, with a voiceover that identifies the sites by their function during the German occupation. Among the most piquant is a girls’ school that had been used as an interrogation and torture centre. His film showed today’s pupils joshing around the lockers like school children anywhere.

The history of those years in the Netherlands is now confined largely to formal memorials. But as someone asked McQueen after the screening, with a history like that, how could the party of Geert Wilders (far-right, anti-Islam) have garnered more votes than any other party in last year’s Dutch election. It is a good question. But the occupation ended more than 75 years ago. The times just do not translate.

On the edge of Jerusalem, the Yad Vashem complex enshrines the Holocaust as a founding pillar of the state of Israel, and with it, some might say, the victimhood of Jews. Israel’s schoolchildren are brought here, as a rite of belonging. It is also an attempt to ensure that the memories of the Holocaust, and its lessons, are not lost, as those who remember pass into history themselves.

This is a concern of Jews everywhere, and it will only have been heightened by the speed with which the experience of the 7 October killings was drowned out in so many countries by those speaking for the suffering of Palestinians. And it leaves questions about how much longer the Holocaust will continue to stand, among non-Jews, as justification for the state of Israel and the survival of Jews worldwide.

There may be no answer to this, as there may be no way to eliminate antisemitism. But I would submit that erecting a vast Holocaust memorial in London is not the way to go. On the other hand, for Israel to continue its progress as a thriving modern democracy, with a high-tech economy, could be part of the way, as would be meticulous observance of all international agreements, to include an end to the settlements in occupied land.

It would be a country that was ready to talk about coexisting with a Palestinian state, subject to security guarantees for both. An exemplary state might in turn help to combat antisemitism. There have been times when something like this has seemed possible. Alas, the combination of the Hamas attacks and Israel’s response has probably set the cause back many, many years.

As for the UK, something will have to change. In a democratic country, a growing Muslim minority cannot be ignored. Those who decide foreign policy, the school curriculum and the wars we fight will have to take account of demographic shifts, while standing firm by the principles embraced by the majority.

The Labour Party, for all its many missteps, is showing how difficult that will be.