Community leaders from 11 European countries have united to condemn a prominent rabbi who said that governments should provide Jews with guns.

Rabbi Menachem Margolin, director general of the European Jewish Association (EJA), wrote to European ministries last week encouraging a change in legislation “to allow designated people in the Jewish communities and institutions to own weapons for the essential protection of their communities”.

He also demanded that training be provided “to protect Jews from potential terror attacks.”

Board of Deputies President Vivian Wineman was among the signatories of the open letter, which stated that the rabbi was unfit to speak on the subject.

It said: “Mr Margolin lacks any expertise or authority to speak on these critical issues on behalf of the Jews of Europe, and therefore lacks all the basic components for Jewish community responsibility.”

The joint statement, signed by representatives from nations including Belgium, Austria, Sweden and the Czech Republic, went on to discredit the rabbi’s organisation and emphasise that only their groups represent European communities.

“Mr Margolin’s association of irrelevant and unrepresentative self-created groups does not in any way convey upon him a role as a spokesman or representative of our communities. He has never been chosen nor elected to any such role.

“Our organisations are uniquely recognised as the official interlocutors for our Jewish communities in all our countries.”