The head of the Metropolitan Police has issued a stark warning over the threat facing British Jews in the wake of the Golders Green stabbing. Sir Mark Rowley said Jews were facing a “ghastly Venn diagram” of hate from all sides, and warned antisemitism was a growing threat to their safety because of social media.
The Met Commissioner’s comments, in an interview with the Times, comes just two days after a stabbing at Golders Green, in which two Jewish men were injured. It is the latest in a number of incidents where the Jewish community has been targeted.
Sir Mark said: “Every racist or extremist or terrorist group has a list of people they hate because they all create an ‘other’ who they want to blame everything on and visit everything on. The ghastly fact is that Jews are on everybody’s list, all of those hateful groups, whether you’re extreme right, whether you’re extreme left, whether you’re Islamist terrorist, whether you’re right-wing terrorist, and some hostile states as well now with some sort of Iranian-related threats. There’s a ghastly Venn diagram that they’re at the middle of.”
The “social media-led” news ecosystem which has developed online means more people are getting their views from “non-traditional sources”, Sir Mark said, adding that antisemitism was “becoming more and more mainstreamed”. The Met Commissioner also said he has requested urgent funding to recruit 300 officers to protect the Jewish community, with plans for a dedicated group of police to patrol north west London.
Sir Mark also defended the two officers who detained the suspect in the Golders Green attack. In footage shared on social media, the officers appeared to kick the 45-year-old suspect in the head after they had used a Taser to force him to the ground. The Met chief and Sir Keir Starmer were both highly critical of Green Party leader Zack Polanski after he shared a social media post which accused the officers of acting “violently”.
Earlier, the director of public prosecutions warned of a “deeply troubling rise” in antisemitic incidents across the country, as he vowed to use the “full force of the law” against perpetrators. The UK terrorism threat level was raised to “severe” by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre, meaning a terror attack is “highly likely”, following the Golders Green attack.
