The Specter of Hate: Anti-Semitism Triples in the UK, Reaches New Heights in France
Since 7 October 2023, the date of the unprecedented Hamas attack in Israel, anti-Semitic acts have seen an alarming resurgence in both the United Kingdom and France, triggering a wave of concern across Europe. According to a report published on Wednesday by the Community Security Trust (CST), a British community association, more than 5000 anti-Semitic incidents have been recorded in the United Kingdom over the past 12 months. This figure is three times higher than the previous year and constitutes an all-time record. London concentrates the majority of these incidents, mainly verbal attacks, threats, and some acts of extreme violence. A quarter of these attacks were committed in the month following the attack of 7 October, which left more than 1200 civilians dead in Israel.
At the same time, France has not been spared from this rise in anti-Semitism. Figures collected by the National Directorate of Territorial Intelligence (DNRT) for the Ministry of the Interior reveal a 192% increase in anti-Semitic acts for the first half of 2024 compared to the previous year. In just six months, 887 anti-Semitic acts were recorded, including 563 physical attacks. These figures highlight a worrying trend where, although Jews represent less than 1% of the French population, they are the target of 57% of racist and anti-religious attacks. Racist and anti-Muslim acts have also increased, although less pronounced than that of anti-Semitism.
The situation is all the more worrying because these acts are often linked to the geopolitical situation in the Middle East. In France, several anti-Semitic incidents are motivated by resentment expressed towards Palestine and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The attackers, often radicalized or influenced by Islamist discourse, establish a direct link between Jewish communities and Israeli policy, which fuels growing Judeophobia. Violent attacks, such as that of a man attacked as he left a synagogue in Paris last March, demonstrate the danger of this confusion between Israelis, Jews and Zionists.
In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Keir Starmer has strongly condemned this resurgence of anti-Semitism, promising concrete actions to curb this hatred. In France, the situation is more complex, with a political debate struggling to find effective solutions to the rise in violence. Emmanuel Macron announced in 2019 an audit on the number of Jewish children leaving public schools, but to date, this study has still not been carried out, revealing the inertia of the authorities in the face of this growing scourge.
The explosion of anti-Semitism in France and the United Kingdom since October 7 highlights the community tensions exacerbated by international events, raising fears of an even more marked deterioration of the situation in the months to come.