I have good news and bad news about yesterday’s demonstration outside the JW3 community centre in north London.

The bad news is – well, you hardly need me to tell you. A mob of so-called ‘anti-Zionists’ assembled outside a Jewish community centre and started screaming abuse at Jews. You can, if you are so minded, try to spin this one away with the usual drivel about anti-Zionism being nothing to do with antisemitism, but standing outside a Jewish community centre and screaming abuse at Jews is about as classic an example of antisemitic abuse as one can imagine.

But there is good news, too. Phew.

You see some of the Jews inside JW3, who were there for a conference sponsored by left-wing Israeli paper Haaretz, including some who called for sanctions against Israel, weren’t the run of the mill filthy Jews – you know, the type of Jew whose blood lust leads us to drink the blood of babies. No, not at all. They were elevated Jews. They were good Jews and should have been left alone.

So we are told by our betters, who get to decide which of us is a good Jew who should be allowed to roam free, and which of us doesn’t deserve that privilege. And there is no more upstanding arbiter of who is and who isn’t a good Jew than Nick Lowles, the CEO of Hope not Hate - an organisation whose very purpose is to decide who is worthy and who is not. Mr Lowles may be self-appointed to his role, but heh, who are we to question him? Some of us aren’t good Jews, after all.

After the protest, Mr Lowles graciously gave his ruling on social media – and it was good news for those inside JW3: “The scenes outside JW3 today have been deeply disturbing and unacceptable. There is a line where the right to protest crosses into intimidation and threatening behaviour. This line was crossed today.

“More significantly though, the event was being sponsored by Haaretz, a left-leaning Israeli newspaper, and much of the discussion was about finding an alternative to the Netanyahu/far right coalition. This position is attracting growing support amongst the British Jewish community.

This was lost and/or wilfully ignored by the people protesting outside.”

Those foolish protestors! If only they had had the benefit of Mr Lowles’ ruling before they started screaming at random passing Jews, they would have known that the random passing Jew might in fact have been a good Jew. Perhaps they could have had a quick test ready for the random passing Jews to take, to see if they should be attacked or given free passage into JW3.

It's easy to pillory Mr Lowles – because it’s what he deserves. But his distinction between good Jews, who as it happens (and how fortunate!) agree with him about Israel, and the rest of us is one of the most widespread but pernicious faux-intellectual responses to the acceleration in open antisemitism since October 7.

You see it and hear it almost everywhere – across social media, on TV and radio, in newspapers. Subscribe to a certain viewpoint and you’ll be given house room as an acceptable Jew. But if you don’t: ugh, get out of here and keep your mouth shut, you foul specimen.

The thing is, though, it’s all fake. They’ll give you a pass if you’re a good Jew, for the moment. But look at the history of Judaism and the history of Jew hate and the same pattern repeats every single time, without exception. At some point the distinction disappears because, well, in the end Good Jew = Bad Jew = still a bloody JEW.

Which means, I am sorry to report, that there was no good news to go along with the bad news from yesterday’s demo. The mob weren’t making the distinction between good and bad Jews because…why would they? They are, as always, all purpose Jew haters.