To those who had the courage to say no

For much of Jewish history, our enemies have relied upon a simple assumption. That if enough pressure is applied, eventually Jews will retreat.

Sometimes that pressure comes from governments, sometimes from mobs, sometimes from activists, sometimes from social or professional consequences. Often from the fear of standing alone.

The method changes, the objective rarely does. To make Jews smaller, quieter, less visible, less willing to stand openly behind who we are and what we believe.

This week offered several reminders that the strategy does not always work. Some people refuse to be intimidated, refuse to bend, refuse to stay silent.

So this week’s Shabbat Shalom is dedicated to those who stood their ground and had the courage to say no.

Shabbat Shalom to Jerry Seinfeld.

For nearly two years now, much of the entertainment industry has been engaged in a curious exercise. Not the pursuit of peace, not meaningful dialogue, not even legitimate criticism of Israeli government policy, something that exists in abundance within Israel itself. Rather, an increasingly aggressive effort to force Jews into a public act of disavowal.

The rules are remarkably simple. If you are Jewish, your views on almost every subject become irrelevant until you have first condemned Israel. The more visible you are, the louder the demand becomes.

Some comply, in fact some do so enthusiastically, discovering that there are rewards available for those willing to publicly separate themselves from their own community. Others arrive there more reluctantly, not because they necessarily believe what they are saying, but because endless pressure has a habit of wearing people down.

The abuse, social isolation, accusations, professional consequences. The constant demand to prove that you are one of the “good ones." Eventually many conclude that the easiest path is simply to give people what they want.

That is why Jerry Seinfeld matters.

Throughout the past two years he has been subjected to sustained criticism, abuse and pressure because of his support for Israel and because of his refusal to apologise for being a Zionist. Yet he has remained remarkably consistent.

He has not sought approval from people who would never give it. He has not abandoned long-held beliefs because they suddenly became unfashionable. He has not discovered a new political position every time social media demanded one. He has simply refused to be bullied and what makes that particularly significant is how rare it has become.

Consider Helen Mirren. Here is somebody who has spoken warmly and affectionately about Israel for decades. Someone who spent time on a kibbutz as a teenager. Someone who portrayed Golda Meir, the founding mother of modern Israel, in a role she described as one of the proudest of her career.

Yet after becoming the target of public hostility and abuse, even she appears to have shifted her position, leaning into language and accusations that would once have been unthinkable.

That is how these campaigns work. Not by changing minds overnight, but by making the cost of holding certain opinions feel increasingly unbearable.

Jerry Seinfeld’s significance lies not in the fact that he is famous, but in the fact that he has refused to pay that price. At a time when so many public figures are discovering reasons to distance themselves from the world’s only Jewish state, he has simply stood where he always stood.

Sometimes courage is not saying something new. Sometimes courage is refusing to abandon what you already know to be true.

Shabbat Shalom to Jerry Seinfeld and to those who understand that standing your ground is often the first step towards standing tall.

Shabbat Shalom to the Iranian supporters who filled SoFi Stadium.

This week, as Iran took to the field against New Zealand at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, thousands of Iranian supporters turned a football match into an act of defiance.

As the anthem of the Islamic Republic played, it was met by boos from large sections of the crowd. Across the stadium, the historic Lion and Sun flag appeared everywhere. A symbol of the Iran that existed before the revolution, before the Ayatollahs. Before a regime built upon repression, fear and religious extremism seized control of a nation with one of the richest and oldest civilisations on earth.

The presence of those flags was remarkable in itself. FIFA had sought to prevent them from entering the stadium, yet supporters found ways to bring them in regardless. Because these fans had not travelled to celebrate the Islamic Republic, they had come to celebrate Iran and that distinction truly matters.

The regime in Tehran has spent decades crushing dissent, imprisoning opponents, murdering protesters, sponsoring terrorism across the Middle East and threatening the destruction of Israel. Yet despite all of that, millions of Iranians continue to reject it. That rejection was visible in every corner of the stadium, in the flags that flew despite being banned, in the anthem that was booed, in the determination of ordinary Iranians to show the world that their country is more than the regime that currently controls it.

For Jews, there is perhaps something particularly familiar in this story. We understand what it means when others seek to define who you are. We understand what it means when history is rewritten, identity distorted and an ancient people told that their connection to their homeland, culture and heritage is somehow illegitimate.

The supporters at SoFi Stadium were rejecting exactly that. They were refusing to allow a regime to define their nation, to allow decades of repression to erase thousands of years of history, to surrender their identity to those who had hijacked it.

The Lion and Sun flags that filled the stadium were not simply symbols of opposition, but of continuity. A reminder that governments come and go, but civilisations endure. That tyranny is temporary, that history is longer than politics and that a people who remember who they are can never truly be conquered.

Shabbat Shalom to those Iranians who reminded the world that identity cannot be confiscated, history cannot be erased and that even after decades of oppression, a proud people can still stand up and say: this is who we are.

Shabbat Shalom to the Jewish community of Edgware.

There was a time when Britain understood something very simple, that places of worship should be left alone. Churches, mosques, synagogues should be left alone. That principle appears increasingly difficult for some people to grasp.

This week, more than a thousand protesters gathered outside a synagogue in Edgware because it was hosting a property event connected to Israel. Pause for a moment and consider how extraordinary that is. Not a government building, an embassy or a political headquarters. A synagogue, a place of worship, where Jewish families pray, celebrate, mourn and gather as a community.

The justification offered was that the event involved the marketing of homes in Israel. Yet many of those protesting were not objecting to a particular planning application or legal dispute, they were objecting to the very existence of a Jewish homeland.

Some waved flags associated with the Iranian regime. The same regime that openly calls for Israel’s destruction, funds terrorist organisations across the Middle East and has been linked to plots against Jewish communities around the world, including here in Britain.

Apparently that was considered acceptable, but what is harder to understand is why the demonstration itself was considered acceptable. We are frequently told that marches passing synagogues are inappropriate, that places of worship should be protected from becoming targets of political activism and that communities should be able to gather free from intimidation. All sensible principles, yet somehow they seem to apply inconsistently. When the issue involves Israel, standards that apply everywhere else become negotiable. If that sounds like a double standard, it is because it is.

There were, inevitably, those who argued that the event should never have taken place. That once it became clear protests were being organised, the sensible thing would have been to cancel it, to move it elsewhere, avoid confrontation and reduce the risk. After all, why bring danger to the doorstep of a synagogue? Why expose children to scenes of hostility? Why create tension where families gather to pray and celebrate?

At first glance, those arguments sound reasonable, in reality, they get the lesson exactly backwards.

For too long, Jews have been encouraged to believe that the solution to intimidation is accommodation. That if we make ourselves a little less visible, a little less public, a little less confident, those seeking to target us will eventually lose interest. History offers little evidence to support that theory.

The truth is that communities do not build confidence by retreating, they build confidence by standing their ground. The most important audience that day was not the protesters, it was our children. The young Jews who watched their community respond not with fear, but with dignity, not with retreat, but with resolve.

One day today’s children will inherit responsibility for our community. They will face their own challenges, their own pressures and their own attempts at intimidation. What they witnessed in Edgware was an example worth remembering.

Had the event been cancelled, had the community quietly stepped aside and accepted that Jewish spaces must alter their behaviour whenever hostility appears, I would have felt deeply ashamed. Instead, I felt proud, proud that people stood up, proud that they showed up and proud that our children got to see the difference.

Shabbat Shalom to the Jewish community of Edgware and to those who understand that courage is not something we simply teach, it is something we demonstrate.

Shabbat Shalom to the Court of Appeal.

There are occasions when the reaction to a decision tells you more about its correctness than the decision itself. This week, the Court of Appeal upheld the proscription of Palestine Action and predictably, outrage followed. Not merely from activists associated with the organisation, but from politicians and public figures who have spent the better part of two years insisting that almost any action taken in the name of Palestine should be viewed through a uniquely forgiving lens.

Among those criticising the decision was Zack Polanski. This is the same Zack Polanski who described it as “gut-wrenching" that Samuel Corner was sentenced to more than seven years in prison after being convicted of criminal damage and inflicting grievous bodily harm on a police officer. The officer in question suffered a broken spine after being struck with a seven-pound sledgehammer.

Most reasonable people would regard that as a serious crime. Polanski’s instinct was sympathy for the perpetrator, that tells us something. Not simply about him, but about a broader movement that has become increasingly unable to distinguish between protest and intimidation, activism and criminality, dissent and violence.

The argument for proscription was never about opposition to Israeli government policy. People remain entirely free to criticise Israel, they do so every day. The issue was whether an organisation that repeatedly engaged in criminal acts, celebrated unlawful disruption and sought to intimidate others should continue to enjoy the protections afforded to legitimate political activism.

The Court of Appeal has now answered that question and what has followed has been equally instructive. Some of the loudest voices objecting to the ruling have provided the strongest argument in favour of it.

When individuals cannot bring themselves to unequivocally condemn violence against police officers. When they reserve greater sympathy for those committing criminal acts than for those harmed by them. When they excuse conduct that would be condemned instantly in almost any other context. They reveal rather more about themselves than they do about the courts.

Sometimes the best argument for a decision is the company gathered against it.

Shabbat Shalom to those who understand that the rule of law matters, that violence is violence regardless of the cause it claims to serve and that drawing clear moral boundaries is not weakness but strength.

Palestine Action activists gathering outside the Court of Appeal London

Every week there are people who make a difference. Sometimes through leadership, sometimes through conviction, sometimes through the willingness to stand up when others would prefer them to sit down.

This week’s Shabbat Shalom is dedicated to those who reminded us that courage matters. The courage to hold your ground when others demand you retreat, to defend your identity when others seek to redefine it, to remain visible when others would prefer you disappear.

Jerry Seinfeld reminded us that principles are only meaningful if they survive pressure. The Iranian supporters at SoFi Stadium reminded us that identity cannot be erased by tyranny. The community in Edgware demonstrated that confidence is built by standing firm, not by stepping aside. The Court of Appeal reminded us that the rule of law means little if it cannot withstand intimidation.

Together, they tell the same story. That the future does not belong to those who shout the loudest, threaten the hardest or seek to make others afraid. It belongs to those who refuse to be moved, those who know who they are, stand their ground and ensure that the next generation learns to do the same.

It belongs to those who say NO!

Shabbat Shalom.