Leo Pearlman is a London based producer and a loud and proud Zionist. His most recent film about the Oct 7 Nova Music Festival massacre, ‘We Will Dance Again’ has won the 2025 Emmy of the 46th Annual News & Documentary Awards for most ‘Outstanding Current Affairs Documentary’.
The first two weeks of March have delivered a grim reminder of something many people would rather ignore. When hatred of Jews is normalised in public life, it does not stay theoretical. Eventually, it turns into violence.
Look at what has happened in just the past ten days.
In Belgium, an explosion outside a historic synagogue in Liège caused significant damage. In Canada, three synagogues were targeted in separate shootings within the space of a week. In Michigan, a man rammed his truck into a synagogue and its preschool before being shot dead by police. In Rotterdam, authorities are investigating an arson attack on a synagogue. In Amsterdam, an explosion damaged a Jewish school in what the city’s mayor described as a deliberate attack against the Jewish community. In Norway, individuals were arrested attempting to carry out attacks against synagogues in Oslo and Trondheim.
And those are only the attacks that were actually realised. They do not include the arrests in Germany this week of Hamas-inspired terrorists plotting against Jewish targets. They do not include the arrests in London of individuals linked to the Iranian regime accused of planning attacks against the Jewish community. They do not include the plots that intelligence services quietly disrupt before the public ever hears about them.
Nor do they include the ones that will inevitably succeed.
What we are seeing is not coincidence. It is the real-world consequence of a lie that has been repeated so often that many people have begun to accept it as truth.
The lie that hatred of Israel is somehow separate from hatred of Jews. It never has been and it never will be. The slogans always come first, the marches follow, the intimidation escalates and eventually the bombs, bullets and fire arrive at synagogues.
If you want to understand the direction of travel, you only needed to watch the scenes on the streets of London this weekend during the Al-Quds Day demonstration.
What gathered in the capital of Britain was not a peace movement. It was an alliance of convenience between two ideological camps that agree on almost nothing about how the world should work, except for one thing. Their hatred of Israel.
Islamists standing alongside segments of the radical left.
One side advocating theocratic rule, the suppression of women and the destruction of liberal democracy.
The other side claiming to represent progressive values.
The contradiction is obvious to everyone except the people chanting.
Together they rallied in support of a regime in Tehran that murders its own citizens, suppresses dissent and executes protesters. Together they chanted for the destruction of the only Jewish state on earth.
Of course the chants of “From the river to the sea" rang out, a slogan whose meaning is not subtle. Of course there were calls to “globalise the intifada". Of course the musician Bob Vylan stood proudly among them, leading chants of “Death, death to the IDF" in a climax of excitement and bloodlust.
Think about that for a moment. A crowd in London chanting for death. Not whispering it or hiding it, but chanting it openly.
To be clear, the authorities did recognise the danger this year. For the first time, the Al-Quds march itself was banned. But because of a loophole in public order law, organisers were still able to gather as a so-called “static demonstration".
So the march did not move, but the message did and the hatred did.
And the most revealing chant of all was the call to “globalise the intifada". Because when people chant those words, they are not speaking in metaphor. The intifadas were not abstract political movements. They were waves of violence that included shootings, stabbings, suicide bombings and attacks on civilians. Over 1000 Jews were killed and 8000 wounded in the Second Intifada in Israel that began in 2000.
So when multiple attacks against synagogues occur around the world within a single week, perhaps we should stop pretending the connection is unclear.
This is what “globalising the intifada" looks like. It looks like explosions outside Jewish schools, arson attacks on synagogues, trucks being driven into Jewish preschools.
Yet we are still told that none of this has anything to do with antisemitism. We are told these demonstrations are about human rights, told these slogans are about justice, that these crowds are simply expressing political opinions.
History has heard these excuses before, it heard them in the 1930s. It heard them whenever mobs marched through European cities chanting hatred of Jews. Back then too, respectable people insisted that the rhetoric should not be taken literally. Back then too, people said the violence was isolated. Back then too, people looked away.
Until it was too late.
This year marks the 90th anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street. In 1936, Jews and their allies, including large numbers from the political left, stood shoulder to shoulder in East London to block the advance of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists.
They recognised the danger early, understood that when people march through the streets chanting hatred of Jews, you do not debate them politely. You stop them.
Fast forward ninety years and the moral picture looks very different.
In 2026, the descendants of those who once stood beside Jews to confront fascism now find themselves marching beside those who chant for the destruction of the Jewish state. Standing shoulder to shoulder with movements that openly celebrate terror. Joining crowds that shout for the “globalisation" of violence against Jews.
History has not repeated itself, but it has turned with a cruel and bitter irony. Because the question facing Britain today is the same one it faced in 1936.
When hatred of Jews marches through your streets, what do you do?
Do you confront it or do you explain it away?
History teaches a brutal truth.
Hatred like this does not disappear if you ignore it.
It grows.
It gathers confidence.
And eventually it stops marching and starts killing.