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Jon Sopel, host of The News Agents podcast joins Shelagh Fogarty to discuss yet another antisemitic attack in north London. After the Hatzolah attack a couple of weeks ago, two people were stabbed in Golders Green, a primarily Jewish area of the city. On his arrival in the area, Prime Minister Keir Starmer was booed and jeered, including with a chant branding him a 'Jew harmer' following the uptick in antisemitic rhetoric and action since Labour took control of Parliament. Listen to the full show on the all-new LBC App: https://app.af.lbc.co.uk/btnc/thenewlbcapp #shelaghfogarty #jonsopel #london #antisemitism #judaism #crime #terrorism #terror #terrorattack #stabbing #police #politics #ukpolitics #LBC LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK. Join in the conversation and listen at https://www.lbc.co.uk/ Sign up to LBC’s weekly newsletter here: https://l-bc.co/signup
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0:00
John, yesterday we heard the head of the Met and the local MP Sarah Sackman being heckled in Golders Green
0:07
Lunchtime, the Prime Minister heckled in a really, you know, to the bone, close to the bone kind of way
0:15
Starmer, Jew harmer, traitor. This is dreadful, all of it, isn't it
0:21
The whole thing is ghastly. The whole thing is ghastly. I don't think that, you know, I think that Starmer's probably thinking he's doing all that he can do
0:29
given the circumstances, but the Jewish community is feeling raw, vulnerable, at risk, depressed
0:39
scared, all of those things because of the confluence of attacks that have taken place
0:45
Not just one isolated attack, but a whole series of attacks and the community feels that it's
0:52
vulnerable. And you can't have a situation where you just build the wall around the synagogue
0:58
another foot higher or the razor wire another foot deeper um that's no way to live and it is
1:07
the targeting we are seeing now of one religious group small minority in this country the jewish
1:15
community some 300 000 people maybe across britain who identify as jewish who feel in terror
1:24
lives, a lot of them. And they've got evidence that gives them reason to
1:29
And you list the number of attacks on the Kenton United Synagogue
1:34
the Finchley Reform Synagogue, the Golders Green Ambulances, the Memorial War to October the 7th, the stabbing of attacks
1:42
yesterday. You know, that's just in the last month, and I've left out a number of them
1:46
as well there. And that just begins to feel like, OK, we keep hearing the government say
1:52
this is not who we are. and this is not acceptable and our thoughts and prayers and it just starts to feel like hollow
1:59
rhetoric to those in the community and you know i'm don't live a million miles away from gold
2:05
and i am part of that community um where you just think well hang on a minute enough surely what can
2:12
be done yeah well i wanted to come on to that because i'm i'm a great believer that yes legislation
2:17
yes police judiciary political reaction has to be strong and it does we saw that after the south
2:23
rights and we need to see it here i think but but i think when when you're talking about something
2:27
like this social change is what helps you know social attitudes are what help if you see what i
2:35
mean so certain things need to be regarded as beyond the pale this is one of them there are
2:41
others but this is definitely one of them and i think it's fair to say that since october the 7th
2:46
certain actions certain groups certain certain i think government failures to respond to things
2:52
police failures to respond to things have created space for stuff that should never have been given space That what I mean when I say shove it back beyond the pail I agree And you know the guy who was there with the knife the other day
3:06
was he saying, are you a Zionist Jew or a non-Zionist? Do you support the state of Israel or not before plunging a knife in
3:12
You were just a Jew. You were just a Jew. And so there's been a total breakdown of any difference
3:18
And, you know, I kind of remember after October the 7th feeling, you know
3:22
For God's sake, don't blame the guy who's got the kosher butcher shop in Golders Green Road for the way the Netanyahu government has responded
3:33
And equally, don't blame the guy who's got the halal butcher shop for the actions of Hamas on October 7th
3:39
Absolutely, and remember we saw that dreadful case of a man who drove, an extremist white supremacist
3:45
drove from Wales to Finsbury Park Mosque to kill people and managed to kill one elderly man
3:51
a peaceable, law-abiding, lovely father and grandfather. And, you know, it's that. We need
3:58
to get all of that beyond the pale again. And I'm not sure how we do it. Yeah, I think it's going to
4:02
be really difficult. And I think that there are things that, you know, you talk about the far
4:08
right. The far right, there has always been a xenophobia. That is part of the attraction
4:13
if you are on the far right. And at the moment, it seems to be targeted at Muslims
4:19
but in the past, it has been targeted at Jews, and you just have to go back into history
4:24
and the British Union of Fascists, and the Battle of Cable Street
4:28
and that was all about tackling the Jewish population in London. But I think what you need to see is on the progressive wing of politics
4:39
the people who kind of you know parade themselves as these great anti-fascists anti-racists all the
4:48
rest of it where are you where are they where are they saying there needs to be a mass protest this
4:53
weekend you know the answer to that john yeah i know because i think and it's a very sad answer
4:58
that the people don't seem to care as much when it's jews and they think that well they had it
5:04
coming to them to some extent or whatever it happens to be i've got texts here today i had
5:08
them yesterday constantly making that conflation between i don't like what netanyahu did in x y or
5:15
z event therefore i don't like jews in britain yeah well constant well let me tell you kind of
5:21
exclusively i don't like what netanyahu has done in israel and there are huge numbers in the jewish
5:25
community who absolutely abhor what netanyahu has done but you know i'm british and what feels to
5:33
me and let me not speak as a jew here let me speak as someone who's british which is it just
5:37
feel so damnedly un-British that people can't go to practice their religion
5:44
calmly, quietly, without feeling the need for people wearing stab vests or police
5:50
protection and that just ain't normal. And what is going on in our country? Because
5:55
I think the overwhelming majority of people in this country just want to live peacefully with each other with the communities alongside them And the Jewish community is incredibly patriotic It all about king and country
6:09
And, you know, the idea that they are being blamed in this kind of rather spurious way
6:15
And I think there are elements of it, I'm sure, that are genuine. But there's also for others, it's an excuse to attack the Jewish community
6:21
and you know there have been you'll have read them seen them heard them thought about them
6:26
yourself there's been endless books films documentaries debates about the history of
6:32
anti-semitism the nature of it what it does to nations in which it gets out of control because
6:38
it's always there um that's where we are now aren't we as a nation we're at the point where
6:43
we have to say i mean primarily the safety of the of all people is what matters but but we have to
6:50
say i think to ourselves at this point if yesterday i think there were other tipping points but if
6:57
yesterday isn't a tipping point what is are you waiting for a bigger version are you waiting for
7:02
a bondi are you waiting for a bomb are you waiting for a school to be attacked what are you waiting
7:06
for well we've already had the heat and park attacks that took place you know in manchester
7:10
in manchester so it's this is becoming a pattern it's becoming routinized now who knows whether it
7:17
It's, you know, another state actor is inciting this and just kind of employing rent-a-thug policies
7:25
where here's 100 quid, go down Golders Green High Road with a knife
7:29
I mean, that matters, but it only matters to a degree, I think, because you still have to have a population among whom that will work
7:38
And it wouldn't work on you, it wouldn't work on me, it wouldn't work on any of the Muslims I know
7:43
So, you know, the state actor bit, of course it's important because you have to know what's happening
7:48
You have to know what's driving these things. But as important as that, surely
7:52
is the country we are building from the ground up. There's a hope that I have, and it's probably naive
7:58
And for someone who spends his life reporting politics and has spent decades reporting politics
8:04
you know, for me to say, oh, can we just take the politics out of this
8:08
But, you know, for example, I think that Kemi Badenok has talked a whole lot of sense
8:11
about the fears being felt in the Jewish community and very astute in the comments that she has made
8:20
And I hope that Starmer would invite her in and say, right, we need to work on this
8:24
But at the moment, you know, I know from a story that the mayoral candidate, the reformed mayoral candidate
8:32
wanted a film outside a Jewish school to talk about how Sadiq Khan had let down the Jewish community
8:38
And the school said, please don't film here because we don't want to be part of the political dogfight
8:43
The campaigning. Could you go and film outside? And so, this person moved across the road and eventually the film, the video was put up
8:49
and they eventually was persuaded to take it down. But that is where you trying to politicise and I know it a week away from local council elections and sure you trying to maximise votes in that time But I would just hope that people could try and take the politics out of this and say right as a society we need to come together left or right
9:09
And I think you're right to talk about the way, to characterise Kenny Baden-Ock's comments the way you do
9:14
Swella Braverman, former Home Secretary, was on LBC this morning with Nick as well
9:18
Now, she was punchier in terms of the politics of it, not playing politics, but doing politics
9:24
and yet she landed on some points i felt that that are too often ignored what's happening in
9:29
happening in our universities what's happening in some of our six forms and six form colleges
9:33
what's happening in our nhs what's happening in our in our arts organizations and the like
9:38
there hasn't been a a bright enough light shone on that people aren't talking about it enough and
9:43
when you do talk about it you're told to shush yes i think i think that's i think that's absolutely
9:48
right. I think that, look, just let people go about, you can, you know, I fully support free
9:54
speech for people to say that Netanyahu has got policies completely wrong in Israel. That's
10:01
of course, we're a liberal democracy. We must be allowed to criticise governments. But don't start
10:06
taking it out on a Jew who's on campus, who is too fearful now to wear a Star of David or wear a
10:13
skullcap because they feel they might be attacked or abused or vilified for it and that's just not
10:20
right and the interesting thing is and i think you said this yesterday on your podcast actually
10:24
um the interesting thing is the people who do that to the jew who's have to who's having to
10:30
take his skullcap off aren't doing it to americans because of trump they're not doing it to russians
10:34
on the same campus because of putin or finding a sudanese student that they want to pick on or a
10:40
Yemeni student that they want to pick on. That's not happening. It's happening uniquely because
10:45
I think a great deal of it is backed up by pre-existing anti-Semitism
10:49
And it's also been made... Anti-Israel sentiment. Yes. And it's also been made somehow permissible that the climate is that because we've had these
10:58
endless marches and calls for, you know, internationalise the intifada and jihad and
11:05
all the rest of it that's been going on, then people think it's okay. It's okay to attack
11:09
and therefore I've got fire cover. And I think that is particularly noticeable
11:14
on the wing of politics that would describe itself as the progressive liberal wing
11:21
And I'd love to hear those voices come out and say, this is not acceptable
11:26
This is a line too far. And you've taken us back to where we began, really
11:29
which is the socialise it out as much as legislate it out
11:34
Yes, because I think that, you know, you can have as much legislation as you want, But if a guy wants to pick up a knife from a hardware store and run down Golders Green Road, there's not a whole, you know, sure, you can put in a lot of police in place and you can put more and more people outside a Jewish school or more and more people outside a synagogue that will act as guardians of it
11:53
But that's not dealing, that's, you know, that's protective. Better still create a set of conditions where it doesn't happen
11:58
Well, it doesn't happen and it's just not seen as acceptable
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