Our Jewish community must do more to support Muslims attacked by Islamophobes

Yet occasionally, there are actually positive stories related to the issue of antisemitism, and a few months ago, I was fortunate to be able to cover one of these.

In May, people buying any one of a number of national daily papers will have turned the page and seen the following, emblazoned across the top of a full-page ad

“We Muslims have one word for Jews: Shalom.”

The ad went on to say that:

“As British Muslims, we believe the time has come to speak out. For far too long, antisemitism has gone unchecked. Sadly, it has become entrenched across society… as Muslims, we believe that our future peace, security and prosperity in this great country cannot be ensured while Jewish communities feel under threat.”

It was profoundly moving to know that we were not alone. That other people, from another religion, had noticed what we were going through, and had decided to stand with us in the most public way possible.

As Jews, we need to do the same.

Because the truth is that antisemitism is not the only bigotry which has gone unchecked in this country. Islamophobia is rampant across Britain. Earlier this week, we saw an example of how this can work.

Boris Johnson, who has returned to writing a regular column at the Telegraph after quitting as foreign secretary, decided to use his latest effort to wax lyrical on the subject of the “Burka”. In this country, that's generally a mistaken reference to what is in fact called the “Niqab”, the full facial covering that some strictly orthodox Muslim women wear.

Mr Johnson, who despite his public persona is not a stupid man, made it clear that he was against a “Burka ban”, like the one just introduced in Denmark. But at the same time he couldn't resist getting in a pop or two at women wearing the garment in question, describing them as looking like “letterboxes” and “bank robbers”.

Quite frankly, I thought we'd evolved slightly since the days when comedians like Bernard Manning, infamous for his racist routines, were popular. 

As the journalist Hugo Rifkind described it, “It's a very well-pitched dog whistle. Plenty of liberals are uncomfortable defending religious dress. So he exploits that while adding a little jovial racist barb for the actual dogs he's after.”

I don't know about you, but I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable if a prominent non-Jewish politician, in a national newspaper column, took a pop at the dress code of Chassidim, even as part of an article defending their right to wear fur coats and shtreimels.

In the responses to Mr Johnson’s column, we’ve seen people using some very familiar language. Hatred against Muslims, another MP, Andrew Bridgen, suggested on TV, isn’t “racism” because “Islam isn’t a race.” David Baddiel, the Jewish comedian who receives inordinate amounts of antisemitic abuse online, tweeted a link to that interview, along with the line “Racist c***s, as we know, say this about Jews too.”

We also see people saying that “Islamophobia is not about hatred against Muslims, it’s just a term used by Muslims trying to shut down debate.”

This sounds more than a little like what we often hear from antisemites, who, straight after saying something disgustingly antisemitic, often quote a saying attributed to Hajo Meyer, the deeply troubled extreme anti-Zionist Holocaust survivor; “Formerly an antisemite was somebody who hated Jews because they were Jews and had a Jewish soul. But nowadays an antisemite is somebody who is hated by Jews.” Such a sentiment is disgusting when used by antisemites. It’s just as disgusting when used by Islamophobes.

The Board of Deputies has tweeted its “solidarity with the Muslim community over rising anti-Muslim incidents.” Jonathan Goldstein, chair of the Jewish Leadership Council, rightly called the TV interview “appalling and rightly pointed out that “we as Jews would be being hypocritical if we weren’t standing in solidarity with the UK Muslim community.”

This is right, but more is needed. In May, as the Jewish community was hurting, a group of Muslims reached out in one of the most public ways imaginable to demonstrate their support. I would hope, at the very least, that our communal organisations were planning to reciprocate with a similarly public measure.