We have to wake up’ and tackle ‘the hatred that’s been allowed to build up’, says government’s anti-Semitism advisor

THE UK Government Advisor on Antisemitism has told GB News that more effective strategies are now needed to tackle “the hatred that’s been allowed to build up in this country”.

Lord Mann told GB News’ Political Editor Christopher Hope: “I was chair of the all-party group for about 15 years, and we brought in the system of putting security into Jewish buildings, which is why there’s some security in all of them. So anti-Semitism has been there for a long time. It’s been through that whole period.

“The question is, how are we best going to deal with it? And what I’ve been doing is giving advice to government on how best to do it. And the problem is increasing, and the problem is increasing across the world. It’s not a British problem, it’s a problem in every country across the world, and we need to get a lot better, a lot wiser on how we deal with it.”

Speaking live from Crumpsall in Manchester, he added: “This is the first time in many decades, very many decades, that someone’s been killed, two people simply for being Jewish, living their lives, the British citizens going about their everyday life like everybody else, going to a synagogue, walk into a synagogue on their holiest day in the Jewish calendar, and simply because they are Jewish being murdered.

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“Now, that’s not happened for about 50 years in this country, and the impact of it is well beyond the Jewish community. I mean, it’s a moment in time for this country, and what we need to be doing is looking at questioning and coming up with more effective strategies for the hatred that’s been allowed to build up in this country where people feel that they can do this kind of thing.

“You cited some absurd demonstrations going on on the same day that this happens. Well, this afternoon at a synagogue in the south of England, those Jewish people going about their normal business, going to their synagogue, were abused by a passing van.

“Well, what’s going on in the country when on the afternoon that people have been murdered simply because they’re Jewish, you’ve got other people abusing Jewish people, again, just going about their normal lives.

“This requires a lot of action from government. It’s well beyond government. It requires, well, people need to be challenging in their own families. They need to be challenging their friends, their neighbours, in their workplaces, when people hear hatred being spewed out, for example, hatred against Jewish people, people need to stand up and be counted to challenge it.

“And of course, politicians should be at the forefront of doing that and working together to do so. Security is important. Money will not be an objective. If there’s any weaknesses in security that money can address, they’ll be sorted. But this is much more than putting security in synagogues

“That is important, and I don’t underestimate the importance, and there’ll be a thorough review to see if there’s any weaknesses that can be addressed. But if someone’s going to kill somebody by running a car at them down a street they’re walking, it’s going to take more than much security money in synagogues to solve it.

“The long-term stuff, we’ve started. For the first time ever in this country, we have a program that started, it’s in schools and the universities on countering anti-Semitism. It’s rather absurd it’s taken us 70 to 80 years since the Holocaust to do that, but that has begun. But I don’t expect results from that for 10 years.

“That’s not going to be overnight. We need faster than that, and part of the extra change that’s needed, and you will fully understand this, Christopher, is we need to get a lot better on dealing with extremism, on defining extremism, on spotting the extremists, not just challenging them, but rooting them out.

“That’s a key part. Getting in while they’re being indoctrinated and re-educating them, but those who are not re-educated, taking them out of society so they don’t do damage to other people.

“This is this is a wake-up call, not just for government, not just for parliament and politicians, but for the whole country. It’s a moment in time.

“For the first time in about 50 years, Jewish people murdered in our country simply because they are Jewish. It’s not acceptable. It’s not on. We have to wake up.”