When Jeremy Corbyn, who has called Hamas his “friends,” led the Labour Party between 2015 and 2020, mainstream British Jews struggled to explain how fair criticism of Israel can easily segue into a brand of medieval-style antisemitism in which devil Jews can do no right and must be expelled, eradicated, expunged. It is obvious now that, though Corbyn was exposed and has no material power, the idea still does. It is rampaging across the continent as it has done periodically for centuries. It is a truism that antisemitism is always different, and it is always the same: in Europe, we wait to see how different it will be in the early twenty-first century—and how similar.

As news of the October 7 massacre spread, there was a race to blame the victim. The charge was led by a tiny number of young British far-left Jews, who offer succor and concealment to non-Jewish antisemites and love to do so. I suspect that this is rooted in family dynamics, but it is impossible to say, as they do not seem to know themselves why they do it. One called the massacre “a day of celebration” (she later apologized). Another said, “Shabbat shalom and may every colonizer fall everywhere.” (He did not apologize.) According to the spin, the massacres went from being appalling to unfortunate to excusable in short order. Defamation of Jews thrived online and seeped into real life.

[It’s well worth reading, as Gold has some significant insights into what’s driving this. I would love to tell her than it’s better in America, but … I’m not sure it is. And that should shame us all. — Ed]