Knife Attack Targets Jews Outside London Synagogue as Antisemitism Rises

A man ran through the streets of Golders Green, one of London's most visibly Jewish neighborhoods, with a knife that morning, seeking Jews to stab. He attacked a 70-year-old man and another in his 30s outside a synagogue. The attacker has been arrested and faces charges.

The response followed a familiar pattern. Officials called it deeply concerning. The next day, the U.K. government raised the national threat level from substantial, meaning an attack is likely, to severe, meaning an attack is highly likely in the next six months. It last reached that level in November 2021.

In the weeks before the stabbings, a Jewish charity's ambulances were firebombed in the same neighborhood. A memorial to victims of the Oct. 7 attacks was burned. Antisemitic violence has risen across the country.

Two weeks earlier, Shurat HaDin filed a complaint at the International Criminal Court against Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez for enabling terror through material support to Iran. The group argues that responsibility extends beyond attackers to those who enable them.

Shurat HaDin applies the same principle to Britain. The U.K. has allowed calls to globalize the intifada on its streets and tolerated incitement, the group says. Jewish life has become increasingly expendable.

A growing number of British Jewish families are planning to move to Israel. The numbers remain small compared to the community size, and most Jews plan to stay and fight for the country. But families who never considered leaving two years ago now weigh it seriously.

After Oct. 7, officials said not to overreact. Marches were just marches, and words were just words. Now marches have led to arson, rhetoric to violence, and that morning to a knife attack outside a Golders Green synagogue.

Prime Minister Starmer, after years of treating antisemitism as a public-relations issue, now calls it a security emergency. He raised the threat level and promised measures to combat it. He said the era of indifference must end.

Shurat HaDin views recognition as overdue but insufficient without enforcement. The group has spent two decades holding governments, banks, and enablers accountable in U.S., European, and Hague courts. It has frozen terror financiers' assets and won judgments against state sponsors.

The complaint against Sánchez holds that governments creating conditions for attacks on Jews bear legal responsibility. Shurat HaDin says the U.K. has enabled a climate of street chants for globalizing the intifada, firebombed ambulances, and torched Oct. 7 memorials, with responses limited to candles and press releases until recently.

The group is mapping the chain from march permits to incitement, ignored warnings, and attacks. It plans to pursue legal action against British officials if enforcement fails.

Shurat HaDin tells British Jews their fears were justified. They have a government starting to act, legal allies ready to file cases, and Israel as an option.