Anti-Israeli sentiments record new high in 2021 in UK

That’s driven by a spike in anti-Israeli hate reported during and after the airstrikes which were carried out by the Zionist regime against the Gaza Strip last year, CST reports.

The report coves the physical and online worlds – damage to property, assaults and threats; and ‘zoombombing’. As the report says: “The pandemic has not only given rise to new discourses through which perpetrators can communicate their prejudice, but also a new medium. In 2021, CST received 16 reports involving the hijacking of video conferencing events” – Zoom meetings interrupted with verbal abuse.

In May 2021, the month when the conflict in the region intensified, CST recorded a record 661 anti-Israeli incidents, and in June CST recorded the fifth-highest ever monthly total of 210. Together, May and June’s totals account for 39 per cent of the annual total. When there is a trigger event, it consistently affects the anti-Zionist hate directed at the diaspora Jewish community in the UK, CST says.

CST recorded 1,254 anti-Israeli incidents in Greater London, an increase of 33pc from the 941 incidents in 2020; and the highest number ever recorded in the capital. In Greater Manchester, another centre for Jews in Britain, CST recorded 284 anti-Israeli incidents in 2021, an increase of 86pc from the 153 incidents recorded in that city in 2020. Elsewhere in the UK, CST recorded 105 antisemitic incidents in West Yorkshire, 86 in Northumbria, 62 in Hertfordshire, 45 in Devon & Cornwall, 31 in Scotland and 31 in Thames Valley. CST recorded an anti-Israeli incident in all but one police force area..