Last night, Jewish journalist and broadcaster Martin Lewis shared his experience of receiving antisemitic abuse on a train by a group of football fans.
After watching David Baddiel's documentary film, 'Jews Don't Count', the Money Saving Expert wrote on Twitter about being on a train in 2003 and hearing a group of football fans singing "gas chamber songs". When he challenged them, he said he was called a "f****** y**" and was physically assaulted.
Mr Lewis has previously spoken about being nicknamed "Jewy Lewy" at school, and receiving antisemitic abuse in his career due to being Jewish and a consumer money-saving expert, a combination that often elicited references to the antisemitic trope that Jewish people are good with money.
Writing on Twitter on Monday evening, Mr Lewis said: "Watching @Baddiel Jews Don't Count. Remembering sitting on a train in about 03 with a group the other side of the carriage, on their way to football doing gas chamber songs. I asked em to stop, most did & were embarrassed.
"One came up, asked me if I was 'a f****** y**', poking me in the forehead hard with each word. I was petrified but said yes. He then called me names & eventually walked away
"What upset me most was no one near, not even the man reading the medical textbook would make eye contact after, as if I'd been the one in the wrong."
poking me in the forehead hard with each word. I was petrified but said yes. He then called me names & eventually walked away
— Martin Lewis (@MartinSLewis) November 21, 2022
What upset me most was no one near, not even the man reading the medical textbook would make eye contact after, as if I'd been the one in the wrong.
Historian Simon Sebag Montefiore commented that it was "brave" of him to ask them to stop, to which Mr Lewis replied: "My father told me it was a mistake. Now I'm older - Im not sure who's right, me or him!"
He received an outpouring of support and sympathy from Twitter users, but there was also some pushback. One user questioned why another person should "put their neck on the line", and Mr Lewis replied: "Because he was opposite me, he could've given me a supportive glance after I'd been assaulted without anyone seeing but he didnt [sic]."
That same user then replied, "why should he", and Mr Lewis said: "Wishing you a lifetime of never needing anyone to stand up for you."
This is not the first time Mr Lewis has opened up about antisemitism. Earlier this year, he spoke to the BBC’s Nick Robinson for the Political Thinking podcast where he discussed his upbringing, his values, and the antisemitism that he has experienced both online and in person.
He said that there were two Jewish students in his year group at school, and that he was nicknamed “Jewy Lewy”, or something similar, that was shortened to simply “Jew”.
He told Robinson: “I didn’t see it as pejorative. I didn’t see it as antisemitic. I don’t think there was – I look back at it and think it was, but I don’t think it was deliberately or prescriptively. That was just how people did things in those days.”
Mr Lewis did recall one incident at school that particularly bothered him: “The only bit I remember I didn’t like was there was one boy who would occasionally throw sweets in the air, call Jewy, and look to see if I would run to grab the sweets, which of course I never did.
“This was the 1980s, it was just something I accepted” @MartinSLewis talks about his experience of being called “Jew” at his school growing up.
— The Jewish Chronicle (@JewishChron) June 23, 2022
pic.twitter.com/ZH9ihXZsvL
“But barring that, at school, I didn’t feel that. I mean, I think what it was, is certainly unacceptable with my 50-year-old eyes now, and if my child went through that, I would be going in to complain to the school and it would be outrageous.
“But this was the 1980s, and we were not the same on race and religion and diversity that we are now," he added.
Robinson then asked about the connection between being Jewish and being the Money Saving Expert, and Lewis replied: “You’re the first person, Nick, who has been brave enough to say that to me in the last 20 years.”
The veteran interviewer was surprised by that, and Lewis said: “Look, my Jewish friends all do because they know.”
Robinson noted: “That might be because I have Jewish blood,” to which Lewis replied: “Okay, but to actually be overt in a public forum and say, ‘you’re the Money Saving Expert and you’re Jewish’.
“As I always say, I’m the Money Saving Expert and I’m Jewish, I’m not the Money Saving Expert because I’m Jewish.”
READ MORE:
