By Andrew Jehring,Editor,Natalie Lisbona
Copyright dailymail
The President of Israel personally warned King Charles that Britain has become ‘overrun with anti-Jewish hatred’ just days before the Manchester terror attack.
Isaac Herzog made an unprecedented appeal to His Majesty to speak with Sir Keir Starmer to get spiralling anti-Semitism under control.
He also urged the King to speak with leaders in Canada and Australia following a huge spike in attacks against the Jewish community.
Writing on Monday in a letter seen by the Mail, Mr Herzog said: ‘The nations which just eighty years ago stood united against fascism and Nazism have now become overrun with anti-Jewish hatred.
‘We know of course all too well that the rise in antisemitism correlates directly with the events on the ground in the Middle East yet the free world cannot and must not allow the conflict to become a political tool against the Jewish people.
‘I would be most grateful if Your Majesty would raise these significant concerns with leaders across the Commonwealth and elsewhere and use your important voice to speak out and encourage public efforts to promote greater awareness and education about antisemitism and the history that informs it.
‘Education, remembrance and measured leadership are vital tools in ensuring that hatred has no place in our societies.’
Mr Herzog pointed to a 316 per cent increase in reported anti-Semitic incidents in Australia and a 58 per cent increase in the UK since the Hamas terror attack on October 7, 2023.
Meanwhile in Canada, Jewish people are 25 times more likely to experience hate crime than a fellow citizen making them the most frequently targeted religious minority.
He said there have been ‘repeated shootings’ in Ottawa where a Jewish woman was stabbed and swastikas have been painted on synagogues across the country with the oldest synagogue in Western Canada defaced.
In Australia the Jewish community has suffered ‘a series of violent arson and firebombing attacks against synagogues, schools, and businesses’, he wrote.
Mr Herzog appealed to King Charles as ‘a dearly cherished and true friend of the Jewish people, and as a vital voice of moral clarity in these very dark times.’
His Majesty sees himself as a ‘multi-faith leader’ and wrote to the Israeli President to congratulate him on Israel’s 77th independence day in April this year.
King Charles said he and the Queen were aware of the ‘immense pain and suffering’ of the hostages and that their ‘special thoughts and prayers’ are with those families.
He added that it was his ‘profound hope that they are able to return home to their loved ones and that there is peace in the region’.
Writing this week, Mr Herzog said that sadly the ‘three proud democracies’ of the UK, Australia and Canada are now ‘three countries where Jews no longer feel safe’.
He referred to the late Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks as ‘a man we both dearly loved and respected’ before quoting his comments that anti-Semitism is ‘the world’s most reliable early warning sign of a major threat to freedom’.
Mr Herzog said: ‘These statistics and testimonies point to one very grave reality: the world, and the Commonwealth in particular, is suffering from an epidemic of antisemitism posing a real and present danger to the wellbeing of not only the Jews, but all in society.
The Palace was contacted for comment.