The reason that I am alive today is that, for my ancestors, there was a moment that they realised that their country was falling apart and becoming unsafe for Jews. For me, that moment came as I saw the footage from Glastonbury.
As Chief Executive of Campaign Against Antisemitism, I have had a front row seat as this country that sheltered my grandparents during the Second World War has become increasingly unrecognisable through hatred and extremism.
But Glastonbury was a pivotal moment for me, when some kind of ancestral sense was activated.
Tens of thousands of young humanitarians at the country’s premier music festival were chanting for “death”, in scenes reminiscent of mass rallies in Tehran or Sanaa, beamed into the homes of millions by the national broadcaster.
None of this should have come as a surprise. Bob Vylan has apparently engaged in this kind of behaviour before, and Glastonbury was already taking place under a cloud of controversy that it had courted by inviting soon-to-be-proscribed-as-terrorists Palestine Action to address the crowds and Kneecap to headline.
The Prime Minister had warned that the Kneecapper on trial for allegedly supporting terrorists “shouldn’t” be allowed to play, and the BBC – which had to pull a documentary after it emerged that a senior Hamas member’s family had been paid for assistance in its production – said it “probably” would not broadcast Kneecap’s performance.
But none of this prevented Bob Vylan’s rant about having to “work for Zionists”, chants for “death” and the obliteration of the entire Jewish state “from the River to the Sea” from appearing on screens in living rooms across the country, courtesy of the supposedly genteel and tolerant BBC.
Now of course, everyone is taken aback. Glastonbury’s managing dynasty, fronted by Emily Eavis, is “appalled” that the acts they chose so carefully behaved in this manner. The BBC says that the whole thing was “utterly unacceptable” and Ofcom is “very concerned”. Just another set of rapped knuckles and feigned surprise, but this is far bigger than that.
I have fought for over ten years alongside valiant, patriotic people, as Campaign Against Antisemitism has strained to wake up our countrymen to the radicals brainwashing their children and the toxic extremism taking over our institutions. We will continue to fight on, but for me, personally, this is the moment that the country that I grew up in ceased to exist. To my mind, the fight now is to restore something that we have lost, not to protect something still extant.
Once tolerant and decent Britain is a place where incitement to riot over Southport will rightly result in the full force of the law being brought to bear, while you can stand on a stage at Glastonbury and lead scenes reminiscent of a Nuremberg rally without facing much more than expressions of disapproval.
British justice, once famed around the world, is used to arrest counterprotesters like Mark Birbeck and Niyak Ghorbani standing up with signs saying “Hamas are terrorists” lest they provoke the ire of racists and bigots nearby. Campaign Against Antisemitism’s billboard vans showing the faces of children kidnapped and taken hostage by Hamas were shut down and ordered to leave London by police in case they caused offence to Hamas supporters in the capital. When I tried crossing the road at the weekly marches that spew hatred on our streets, I was stopped not by protesters but by the police for being “quite openly Jewish”, and then attacked in the media by commentators wondering what business a Jew had being in town anyway and what my motives were for having the audacity to walk anywhere in my home town that I please.
This country has lost its soul and lost the plot, and there is not a lot of time left to do something about it.
If you find that over the top, ask yourself this. Had Glastonbury – where people are apparently more concerned about cows being milked for human benefit than about calls for certain humans to be killed – platformed acts bemoaning having to work for black people or calling for the obliteration of a Muslim state what would have happened? How about if they presented artists who have supported the BNP or EDL?
Reputable musicians would have boycotted Glastonbury. The BBC would have cut its live feed, apologised and pledged never to broadcast the festival again. The Prime Minister would have reassured anyone affected and talked about the underlying causes. Police forces would have mobilised officers while Crown Prosecutors cleared their schedules.
But instead it was just another weekend in Britain. While the scenes at Glastonbury unfolded, taxpayer-supported broadcaster, Channel 4, announced plans to air a film that the national broadcaster, the BBC, shelved because it worried that it might be too biased towards Hamas. A regulated law firm announced that it would dedicate itself to removing the proscription on Hamas as a terrorist group. Just another weekend in Britain. Like all the weekends we’ve seen for over a year and half now.
But not for me. Not for most Jews. And not for many of my fellow citizens who are not Jewish, but who see that the country they knew is vanishing before their very eyes.
Moral clarity came from the US, where it has been made known that neither Kneecap nor Bob Vylan will be granted entry – “Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country,” said the State Department.
Of course they remain adored by their self-righteous, brainwashed young fans here in Britain – a country that is not just becoming unsafe for Jews, it is becoming a haven for hatred. This must be the moment that the country wakes up. That means each of us. Demand action. Use your voice. Please, before there is nothing left to save.
The reason that I am alive today is that, for my ancestors, there was a moment that they realised that their country was falling apart and becoming unsafe for Jews. For me, that moment came as I saw the footage from Glastonbury.
As Chief Executive of Campaign Against Antisemitism, I have had a front row seat as this country that sheltered my grandparents during the Second World War has become increasingly unrecognisable through hatred and extremism.
But Glastonbury was a pivotal moment for me, when some kind of ancestral sense was activated.
Tens of thousands of young humanitarians at the country’s premier music festival were chanting for “death”, in scenes reminiscent of mass rallies in Tehran or Sanaa, beamed into the homes of millions by the national broadcaster.
None of this should have come as a surprise. Bob Vylan has apparently engaged in this kind of behaviour before, and Glastonbury was already taking place under a cloud of controversy that it had courted by inviting soon-to-be-proscribed-as-terrorists Palestine Action to address the crowds and Kneecap to headline.
The Prime Minister had warned that the Kneecapper on trial for allegedly supporting terrorists “shouldn’t” be allowed to play, and the BBC – which had to pull a documentary after it emerged that a senior Hamas member’s family had been paid for assistance in its production – said it “probably” would not broadcast Kneecap’s performance.
But none of this prevented Bob Vylan’s rant about having to “work for Zionists”, chants for “death” and the obliteration of the entire Jewish state “from the River to the Sea” from appearing on screens in living rooms across the country, courtesy of the supposedly genteel and tolerant BBC.
Now of course, everyone is taken aback. Glastonbury’s managing dynasty, fronted by Emily Eavis, is “appalled” that the acts they chose so carefully behaved in this manner. The BBC says that the whole thing was “utterly unacceptable” and Ofcom is “very concerned”. Just another set of rapped knuckles and feigned surprise, but this is far bigger than that.
I have fought for over ten years alongside valiant, patriotic people, as Campaign Against Antisemitism has strained to wake up our countrymen to the radicals brainwashing their children and the toxic extremism taking over our institutions. We will continue to fight on, but for me, personally, this is the moment that the country that I grew up in ceased to exist. To my mind, the fight now is to restore something that we have lost, not to protect something still extant.
Once tolerant and decent Britain is a place where incitement to riot over Southport will rightly result in the full force of the law being brought to bear, while you can stand on a stage at Glastonbury and lead scenes reminiscent of a Nuremberg rally without facing much more than expressions of disapproval.
British justice, once famed around the world, is used to arrest counterprotesters like Mark Birbeck and Niyak Ghorbani standing up with signs saying “Hamas are terrorists” lest they provoke the ire of racists and bigots nearby. Campaign Against Antisemitism’s billboard vans showing the faces of children kidnapped and taken hostage by Hamas were shut down and ordered to leave London by police in case they caused offence to Hamas supporters in the capital. When I tried crossing the road at the weekly marches that spew hatred on our streets, I was stopped not by protesters but by the police for being “quite openly Jewish”, and then attacked in the media by commentators wondering what business a Jew had being in town anyway and what my motives were for having the audacity to walk anywhere in my home town that I please.
This country has lost its soul and lost the plot, and there is not a lot of time left to do something about it.
If you find that over the top, ask yourself this. Had Glastonbury – where people are apparently more concerned about cows being milked for human benefit than about calls for certain humans to be killed – platformed acts bemoaning having to work for black people or calling for the obliteration of a Muslim state what would have happened? How about if they presented artists who have supported the BNP or EDL?
Reputable musicians would have boycotted Glastonbury. The BBC would have cut its live feed, apologised and pledged never to broadcast the festival again. The Prime Minister would have reassured anyone affected and talked about the underlying causes. Police forces would have mobilised officers while Crown Prosecutors cleared their schedules.
But instead it was just another weekend in Britain. While the scenes at Glastonbury unfolded, taxpayer-supported broadcaster, Channel 4, announced plans to air a film that the national broadcaster, the BBC, shelved because it worried that it might be too biased towards Hamas. A regulated law firm announced that it would dedicate itself to removing the proscription on Hamas as a terrorist group. Just another weekend in Britain. Like all the weekends we’ve seen for over a year and half now.
But not for me. Not for most Jews. And not for many of my fellow citizens who are not Jewish, but who see that the country they knew is vanishing before their very eyes.
Moral clarity came from the US, where it has been made known that neither Kneecap nor Bob Vylan will be granted entry – “Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country,” said the State Department.
Of course they remain adored by their self-righteous, brainwashed young fans here in Britain – a country that is not just becoming unsafe for Jews, it is becoming a haven for hatred. This must be the moment that the country wakes up. That means each of us. Demand action. Use your voice. Please, before there is nothing left to save.