Is this still a ‘perception problem’, Zack?
When politicians downplay attacks on British Jews, they risk obscuring a growing and dangerous reality.
A week ago, the Green Party leader Zack Polanski suggested that Jews in Britain only had the perception of unsafety. British Jews may feel unsafe, but Zack seems to think it might just all be in their heads.
Yesterday in North London, two Jewish men were stabbed.
No doubt Zack Polanski will soon be on hand to reassure them that while they might feel as though they have been stabbed, and while stabbing is generally to be frowned upon, there is a discussion to be had about whether they only had the perception of being stabbed. I’m sure that will reassure the Jewish community of Golders Green no end.
One attack like this, on any other minority group in the UK would meet nothing like this level of breezy equivocation. For once, can we stop pretending that this is anything other than pure antisemitism? Or are we to believe that it would be acceptable for the leader of a major political party to gaslight any other minority community about its own experiences?
It isn’t as though Polanski was unlucky either. It would certainly be a cruel twist of fate if this was an isolated incident that took place only days after his crass observation. But this is not isolated, it is the latest in a string of violent attacks on British Jews. There have been multiple attempted firebombings at numerous synagogues over only a matter of weeks. Hatzola, a volunteer-led ambulance service operating in the Golders Green area, was set on fire last month. And only last week, a Jewish man was attacked in Slough and accused of ‘killing babies’.
And yet there remains a persistent instinct in parts of political discourse to soften, contextualise or deflect. The left is already trying to mitigate the severity of yesterday’s attack by muttering darkly about Israel, Iran and Gaza. As if a British Jew waiting for the bus has anything on earth to do with the state of Israel’s domestic or foreign policy. No matter what your position on Israel and Gaza, it is a squalid and dishonourable excuse to trot out that somehow Jews in Britain deserve this treatment because of what’s happening in the Middle East.
What makes this more troubling is not just the violence itself, but the response to it. Too often, it is muted, conditional, or hedged with caveats. Statements are recycled and issued, concern is expressed, and then the moment passes.
If this had happened to anybody else, people would already have taken to the streets. Shops would have been looted, cars set aflame, flags waved and sombre speeches given to baying crowds. And I am not suggesting that this should be the response - but the contrast is impossible to ignore.
The government will point to its recent announcement of funding replacement ambulances after the arson attack. Forgive me, but this fundamentally reactive measure does nothing to address the underlying hostility that has made such attacks possible in the first place. Once again, the Jewish community is offered recycled statements, sympathy, and then no doubt silence. An expectation to absorb what has happened and carry on.
It is absurd that it takes people being stabbed in broad daylight before we listen, and even then, the left barely takes notice. What is it going to take?
Eve Lugg is a Voice for Freedom with Fighting for a Free Future. Eve Lugg served as Special Adviser (SpAd) in the Cabinet Office and brings with her experience in policy and comms, as well as knowledge of how Whitehall really operates.
Header image: “Finchley Road close to Golders Green tube station in the Golders Green neighbourhood of the London Borough of Barnet” (20 November 2025) by Sjenghai, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
