Antisemitism in the United Kingdom reached its highest recorded levels in the years following the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel and the subsequent Israeli military campaign in Gaza. The Community Security Trust, the organisation that records antisemitic incidents in the UK, reported figures that were without precedent in its thirty-year history. The surge reflected a pattern seen across Western Europe and North America: conflict in the Middle East generating spikes in domestic antisemitism directed at Jewish communities with no connection to the conflict.
What the data shows
The Community Security Trust recorded 4,103 antisemitic incidents in the United Kingdom in 2023, the highest total since records began in 1984. The figure was more than double the total for 2022. The surge began in October 2023 and continued through 2024. The incidents ranged from verbal abuse and online harassment to physical attacks, vandalism, and threats. London, with the largest Jewish population in the UK, accounted for the majority of incidents, but every region of the country recorded increased numbers.
The patterns showed a consistent feature of contemporary antisemitism: the use of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a vehicle for hostility that extended well beyond criticism of Israeli policy to expressions of hatred toward Jews as a community. Incidents included the daubing of swastikas, threats to Jewish individuals with no political involvement, and harassment of Jewish students at universities. The conflation of Jewish identity with Israeli state policy, which holds Jews in Britain responsible for the actions of a foreign government in which they have no role, is a defining characteristic of this form of antisemitism.
Historical context
Antisemitism in Britain has a long history. The 1290 expulsion of Jews from England, under Edward I, was one of the earliest in medieval Europe. Jews were readmitted under Oliver Cromwell in 1656 and gradually achieved full legal equality through the nineteenth century, with Jewish emancipation formally completed by the Jews Relief Act of 1858. The twentieth century brought waves of Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe, the development of organised fascist antisemitism in the 1930s under Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists, and the post-war establishment of a substantial Anglo-Jewish community that contributed substantially to British cultural, professional, and public life.
Contemporary British antisemitism draws on multiple traditions: the traditional far-right racism of the fascist movements, the Islamist antisemitism imported through some communities with roots in the Middle East and South Asia, and a left-wing variant associated with anti-Zionist politics that has at times tolerated or adopted antisemitic tropes in the name of Palestinian solidarity. All three traditions were present in the 2023-24 surge.
The institutional response
The UK government adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism in 2016, which defines antisemitism with specific reference to double standards applied to Israel and the holding of Jews collectively responsible for Israeli actions. The definition has been controversial, with critics arguing that it conflates criticism of Israeli policy with antisemitism. Its defenders argue that without a clear working definition, institutions are unable to identify and act on antisemitic incidents reliably.
The Community Security Trust, working with the police, universities, and government, has pressed for stronger institutional responses to antisemitism across public institutions. The record of universities in particular has been contested, with several high-profile cases of Jewish students reporting that antisemitic harassment was not addressed effectively by their institutions.
See also
- Modern Antisemitism and Historical Patterns
- Social Media and Holocaust Denial
- Holocaust Education in UK Schools
- The Living Memory Problem
Sources
- Community Security Trust, Antisemitic Incidents Report 2023, CST, 2024
- Community Security Trust, Antisemitic Incidents Report 2024, CST, 2025
- All-Party Parliamentary Group Against Antisemitism, Report of the All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism, HMSO, 2006
- Dave Rich, The Left’s Jewish Problem: Jeremy Corbyn, Israel and Anti-Semitism, Biteback, 2016
- International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, Working Definition of Antisemitism, IHRA, 2016