Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis
Rabbi Ephraim MirvisYoni Kempinski

British Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis accused the Metropolitan Police of failing to protect Jewish residents of London in the face of the anti-Israel protests that followed the October 7 massacre, the Jewish Chronicle reported.

In an interview with The Times, Rabbi Mirvis criticized the police for approving a protest that will be held on Saturday, January 18, near two synagogues. He said that despite months of conversations with police, they refused to provide assurances that the protest will not be allowed to target synagogues as Jews attend Shabbat services.

“The Metropolitan Police are responsible for upholding the right to peaceful protest and for ensuring that Jewish Londoners feel safe. There can be no justification for not making a clear commitment that the routes of Pro-Palestinian marches will not come anywhere close to local synagogues," Rabbi Mirvis said.

"It is hard to see the absence of such a commitment as anything other than a failure of the Met’s duty to members of Jewish communities who no longer feel safe walking to and from their synagogues on the Sabbath," he added.

Rabbi Daniel Epstein, the rabbi of Western Marble Arch, one of the synagogues the protest will be held near, told Jewish News, “We don’t want to have to reach a situation like this. We don’t have an issue with freedom of speech, under which the vast majority of those protesting operate — but we have had many conversations with the Met where we believed they were taking our concerns into account, but nothing seems to have changed.”

Community Security Trust (CST) chief executive Mark Gardner echoed their concerns and said, “We have repeatedly stated that these protests should be kept away from synagogues, especially on the Sabbath. Their chutzpah is unmatched, exploiting freedoms that they deny to others. Above all, they hate anyone suspected of backing Israel and we know full well what destruction they mean by slogans such as ‘River to the Sea’ and ‘Global Intifada’.”

This is not the first time the Met has been accused of failing to take antisemitism seriously. Last month, the Metropolitan Police declared that an Imam's prayer to "destroy Jewish homes" does not constitute a hate crime.

The anti-Jewish prayer was uttered at an east London Mosque two weeks after the Hamas terrorist organization committed the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust on October 7, 2023.

The Imam stated, “Oh Allah, curse the Jews and the children of Israel. Oh Allah, curse the infidels and the polytheists. Oh Allah, break their words, shake their feet, disperse and tear apart their unity and ruin their houses and destroy their homes.”

A police spokesperson told the Jewish Chronicle that while “many people found the content upsetting… the entire sermon, including the wording, context and narrative have been reviewed and officers concluded that it does not meet the threshold of a crime."

The paper wrote that the police's assertion that the sermon did not reach the hate crime threshold "baffled security experts."

The CST said that the finding was indicative of “two-tier policing” that fails to treat Jews the way other communities are treated.

Britain has seen a surge in antisemitic incidents in the year that has passed since Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

Data released last month by the government found that religious hate crime in England and Wales surged by a record 25 percent over the past year, driven by an increase in antisemitic incidents since the onset of the Gaza war.

The highest annual tally of religious hate crimes in over a decade was attributed to a rise in offenses "against Jewish people and to a lesser extent Muslims" following the Hamas attack on October 7 last year, the interior ministry reported.

Hate crimes against Jewish people more than doubled, reaching 3,282 cases, while offenses against Muslims also climbed to 3,866.

The data was released days after protesters carrying banners in support of Hezbollah marched through central London.

Incidents of antisemitism in Britain in recent months include one which occurred in May, when a woman carrying a large knife was arrested in Stamford Hill, north London.

The woman allegedly told a Jewish man that he is a "provocation" before adding, "You people, you Jewish...all the trouble you’re creating in the world."

A month earlier, a Jewish man was attacked by four men in Stamford Hill. According to the Stamford Hill Shomrim, a Jewish civilian watch organization, the four individuals approached the Jewish man, threatened him, and demanded he get into the trunk of their car.

Several days before that, two men were arrested at a pro-Palestinian Arab march in London. One of the men was taken into custody for carrying a swastika emblazoned placard and another for allegedly making racist remarks towards counter-protesters, the Metropolitan Police said.