We are leaving England.

Not for the reasons you think, but we are leaving; we are not running away and, sadly, at this time we are not making aliyah. But we are leaving. 

We have been planning this move for months now and on Thursday, just a week after the deadly attack on a synagogue in Manchester, we are boarding a plane. Daniel was born here; our eldest son was the fourth generation to be born in this country from Daniel’s family, and my family moved to London in 1992. It was the first community that, in the many moves my family had made around the world, felt like home for me. It’s where I saw my parents really blossom and where my younger sister has grown up and made her family home. It’s where we have partially raised our own family over the last eleven years. And now we are closing the door on this chapter and saying farewell. 

There is a concept in Judaism called seeing the “Nolad” — seeing what is just over the horizon, reading what is in the wind and making a change before it is too late. That is not what is happening here. Don’t get me wrong: this is not going to be a love letter to the UK — this current government has lost the trust of many of its citizens. But it’s also not a castigation of this country. There is hope and I would like to share some ideas with you. 

The first is: let’s not kid ourselves. England has had a long and difficult history when it comes to antisemitism; it was the country of the first blood libel against its Jews and the first complete expulsion of Jews. It is also the country that allowed Jews to return and to practise freely. Furthermore, it was also the country that helped us build the current State of Israel in its most nascent days, though it quickly changed its stance — but not before we were able to make the most of the short-lived green light. 

It’s a country where Daniel and I have met the Prince of Wales in our synagogue and the King at a reception hosted by a Jewish patron, and at the same time it is a country with some of the most virulent antisemitism of our time. In the days of the massacre of Jews in Clifford’s Tower in York (1190) there was only one significant minority in the country: Jews. Today, in London, there are over 40 stated minorities and over 300 languages spoken. And yet the number of minorities have not shielded us, the Jews, from unwanted attention. 

Is England worse than any other country on the globe at the moment? I don’t know; the news amplifies the bad — and it is bad here — but is it better where we are going? 

Last Thursday morning, as Daniel led the Yom Kippur morning service from the bima (the stand in the centre of the synagogue), I watched as our security guard handed him a piece of paper. In the middle of his prayers he read the paper; his voice missed a note, and in the middle of his prayers I could hear a cry in his voice. Three thoughts went through my mind: the first — and the best — that all the hostages had been released; the second, that, God forbid, they had all been killed; and the third, that the war in Gaza had escalated. And then I saw him hand the piece of paper to the president of the CST who was sitting nearby; who absorbed its contents and expressed a look of sadness at the inevitability of such an event. No shock. Just quiet anger and an “I told you so” look on his face. 

At 9:31am on Yom Kippur a man whose name literally means “holy war”, from Syria, rammed his car into the gates of Heaton Park Synagogue in Manchester, then got out of his car, knife in hand, and with what appeared to be a belt of explosives around his waist, intent on killing Jews — and he succeeded. Two Jews are dead, and three further are injured. A community is broken, and Jews not just in Manchester, not just in England but the world over are also left broken. If you are reading this, you are a friend. To you I don’t have to say that targeting Jews isn’t anti-Zionist or anti-Israel — it is antisemitism. Target a synagogue, a Jewish school or a kosher supermarket: you don’t have a problem with Israel, you have a problem with Jews. But for every person who does not see that, supporting terrorism and calling the pro-Palestine rallies that happen in cities across this country “freedom of expression” and not what they are — which is hate riots — is being either naïve or delusional. 

Is there hope? I need to believe so. As Martin Luther King said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” There are enough people in this country and in the world who are not blinded by prejudice and hate; who see that the people who on Saturday night held an impromptu rally calling to “globalise the intifada” just metres from my front door in Central London are in the wrong. And for England — not Jews in England, but for a regular British citizen to have the “quiet life” so many of them strive for — they will need to be ‘not so quiet’ at this moment. 

On the day after the Yom Kippur attack, I combed YouTube looking for videos to hear what people were saying. There was the horrible MP who said that Jews brought this on themselves and blamed Israel. Another MP demanded that the Israeli ambassador to the UK be kicked out of the country, and the protesters out in the street who have been claiming genocide from day one were back at it, even though a deal sits on the table to end the conflict immediately. And of all the ridiculousness, there is support around the globe for those who seem terribly upset that Greta Thunberg’s yacht was detained and not allowed to float into Gaza. 

None of these upset me as much as one Jewish YouTuber — a young person whom I have thought of as brilliant and who, being so young, has an incredible grasp on current events and has been a trusted news source for me on what is happening on the ground in Israel. On their podcast following the Manchester attack, they emphatically claimed that all Jews in the UK only had two choices: either stand up and fight back or make aliyah; anything else will lead to our immediate deaths. How irresponsible! Fear-mongering isn’t the answer either. 

So what should we do? After all, Daniel and I are leaving. Are we any better than the fear-mongering YouTuber? When I say we are leaving, we are on our way to Australia. And if I were to believe the people in shul on Yom Kippur, just after we all found out about the events in Manchester, they were telling me that it is worse in Australia — is that true, or is that projection? Or is it that now, including Israel, nothing is safe at this moment.  We Jewish people are being tested and we need to keep faith and trust in good, in ourselves and our brethren and bolster our governments, convince them to do better. I still haven’t told you what to do — I don’t know. 

But this I do know: that we as individuals have more power than we can possibly imagine. Did your non-Jewish friends write or message you after the attacks? If so, write back. Tell them what this means to you, and how this affects you. We have been using the line “what starts with Jews doesn’t end with Jews.” But how many people believe us? I’m not sure that is a good strategy, as making other people afraid isn’t going to work. What I think will work, at least here in the UK, is the quiet-life argument. To many people in this country, nothing is more appealing than the “quiet life” and for every British garden and allotment, for every cup of tea and cheeky chocolate biscuit, it is a British person seeking a moment of quiet. It’s telling them that if every Jew was no longer in this country, if Israel didn’t exist, those extremists parading down the streets of London, of Glasgow, of Liverpool, of Leeds would still be rioting. But they would no longer be able to hide their intentions behind Jews and behind Israel; instead they would use the words they really mean, which are “down with the West, down with Judeo-Christian values.” This fight isn’t coming — it is here, both from the far left and from the far right. 

I, unlike the podcaster, don’t think we should leave; I do think, though, that we should fight. 

Just as we once fought for civil rights for all and other worthy causes, we now need to put that incredible Jewish power into fighting for the West. Because what they say is anti-Israel, but, what they attack is a synagogue, and what they really mean is the West — and in America they have started attacking churches. What starts with Jews doesn’t end with Jews, but rather than wag a finger, pack our bags and run, we need to put a line in the sand, stand firm and demand that people see the truth. 

We should stand in solidarity, in the knowledge that Jews may initially be the canary in the coalmine, but we have also ultimately been the lighthouse. 

As we leave England behind, a decision that had little to do with the current climate here and much to do with an opportunity to play a significant part in another community, we will do as we have done here: meet with our leaders, give them support, share our knowledge forthrightly and listen, and together work for a brighter, better future that is free of hate and free of evil. And our colleagues here will do the same. And for those who are frightened and those who are choosing to make aliyah, that is a good choice as well, as Israel is our ultimate home. 

But while the world is as interconnected as it is, and while Jews are dispersed around it, and while nearly half of all Jews live outside of Israel, we must support them as well. And as much as world Jewry needs Israel, Israel needs world Jewry. That may not always be the case, but it is so at this moment and has been for centuries. We must look after all our own people both inside and outside Israel, and we must look after our non-Jewish friends both inside and outside Israel. It’s only through strength and love, intelligence and courage that we will weather this storm.