I love Britain. This country has played a disproportionate role in the betterment of humanity – from the freedoms we all enjoy, the laws that protect us, the language that millions of us communicate with and the culture that enriches us. I will always be eternally grateful to Britain for providing shelter to four generations of my family when they otherwise would have been murdered in the Russian pogroms or Hitler’s war of extermination. Without the benefits of British citizenship, we could never have enjoyed the comfortable, happy and secure lives that we have led for the past one hundred years. I imagine most of the Anglo-Jewish Community feels the same way about Britain. I am very lucky to have encountered little anti-Semitism in my life, an experience backed up by the Anti-Defamation League’s report earlier this year which stated that the levels of anti-Jewish prejudice in the United Kingdom were at anall time low.
However my belief in British exceptionalism has been shaken these past few weeks. Ever since the time of the British Mandate, there has been a rather nasty and unpleasant attitude towards Israelis amongst segments of British public opinion. At times this has exploded into outright hostility from the usual suspects – the Left Wing press as well as certain politicians, ambassadors and businessmen with interests in the Arab world. When Israel has undertaken some of her largest defensive operations such as Lebanon in 2006 or Cast Lead in 2009, there have been outpourings of anti-Israel sentimentwithin the media and on busy shopping streets. To counter this prevailing attitude there have always been a plethora of British Prime Ministers on both sides of the political divide who have heroically stood with the free world and with Israel – Harold Wilson, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown to name the most notable.
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