Why Jews, like all vulnerable minorities, need more than sympathy amid rising attacks and hate
People need to have the courage to champion the considerable achievements of Jewish people and other minority groups who face prejudice
Each time there is an attack upon the Jewish community in the United Kingdom, I am inundated with an avalanche of sympathetic messages from friends and even strangers. Whilst I greatly appreciate this outpouring of love and concern for me and my family, I am also distraught that we are not doing more on a regular basis to publicly support and celebrate the achievements of the Jewish people and other vulnerable minority groups.
We commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day on January 27 every year. However, each time I ask myself and others: “What are we doing the rest of the year to ensure the tragedy of the Second World War never happens again?” Obviously we are not doing enough as the evil virus of antisemitism is rapidly rising in British society as evidenced by thousands of attacks in the past year alone.
Perhaps now is the time to plan and launch a national campaign celebrating the achievements and essentiality of Jewish people and all other vulnerable minority groups in society. For example, did you know that 20 per cent of all Nobel Prizes for science have been awarded to Jews, a very small group of people representing only 0.4 of all society? Many others may be unaware that the achievements of the Jewish people in culture – in film, theatre, the visual arts and other fields – have greatly enriched our society in so many ways.
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Einstein, Spielberg and Winehouse
All you need to do to better understand the breadth and depth of these achievements is to remember the names of Albert Einstein, Stephen Spielberg, MGM (founded by Jewish refugees), Rodgers and Hammerstein, George Gershwin, Billy Joel, Irving Berlin, Amy Winehouse, and, in Britain, our own TV, theatre and film luminaries like Esther Rantzen, Maureen Lipman, and Rachel Weisz.
Closer to home, most people don’t realise that the Edinburgh Festivals were founded by two Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany in 1947. Sir Rudolph Bing invited his fellow Jewish refugee Bruno Walter, the conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic, to perform at the Usher Hall for the first-ever Edinburgh International Festival and together they erected a platform for the flowering of the human spirit that was firmly constructed and has annually bloomed for 77 years.
Their pioneering efforts are enshrined upon a large plaque within the Usher Hall’s dress circle. When the idea for a plaque was conceived, I asked a civic leader who I should submit a petition to, how many committees I needed to speak before, and what other hoops I would need to jump through in order to gain permission.
This civic leader, a person of courage and valour, invited me to speak directly with the concert hall’s manager, who recommended placing the plaque in a very prominent location. And that is where it is displayed today as a reminder to hundreds of thousands of audience members of the numerous large and small achievements of the Jewish people in Edinburgh and worldwide.
‘We are all in this together!’
However, whilst symbolic gestures such as plaques and annual programmes are welcome, during these tremulous times, much more is needed each and every day if we are to move from sympathy to empathy and finally to extolling the virtues of the Jewish people and other groups who are threatened today.
Almost every week I join other faith leaders and representatives in local primary schools to present the award-winning Edinburgh Interfaith Association faith roadshow. During this one-hour programme, more than 100 P5-to-P7 pupils learn about seven different faiths and also meet constables from Police Scotland to learn about how to report hate crime. This programme regularly encourages our young people to embrace others with respect and understanding.
When I recently asked one pupil what he had learned, he replied: “You are all so different and yet we are all in this together!”
Indeed we are. Therefore, now is the time to add to the sympathy felt for the Jews following another bloody attack a strong backbone of courage in our nation by praising, celebrating, and respecting our achievements, to continually remind our fellow citizens of how much poorer this world would be without Jewish people in our daily civic life.
Afraid to leave her room
Following the October 7, 2023, surprise attack in which 1,200 Israelis were murdered by Hamas terrorists, the associate chaplain at the University of Edinburgh invited me to a “listening” session. She said she had invited Jewish students and others to share their feelings in a safe space. Nearly three years later, my heart is still broken from hearing their agony, pain, and fear.
One recently arrived Israeli student confided: “I am afraid to leave my room!” I gave her my card and offered to escort her to the shops, library or even classes. I also reminded her that this had happened before, such as during the Yom Kippur War, and it might get worse before it got better. Then I told her it would eventually get better. She looked at me sceptically.
Many of my fellow Jewish people have recently asked me: “Do we need to move to a safer place?” I refuse to even entertain this thought for “even a New York minute”, as they say. Instead, I shall stop wringing my hands and start rolling up my sleeves while asking my fellow citizens to join me, hand in hand, to work even harder to praise and celebrate in public the achievements of Jewish people and other minorities in Scotland, the UK, and indeed all over the world.
This could be the beginning of a precious ‘championship season’ for all vulnerable minorities. Perhaps with a few more champions, we will need less sympathy in the future.
Professor Joe Goldblatt is Ambassador for Interfaith for the Edinburgh Interfaith Association. For more information about his views visit www.joegoldblatt.scot