Reports of anti-Semitic hate incidents reached record levels in the UK last year and peaked in the week after the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, according to figures released by a Jewish security charity on Thursday.
Data compiled by the Community Security Trust (CST), an advocacy group founded three decades ago to help support the rights of British Jews, said that some 4,103 reports of “anti-Jewish hate” were registered in 2023.
The number is a dramatic rise from the 1,662 reports received in 2022, and close to double the previous highest tally of 2,255 recorded the year prior to that.
According to data published on the CST website on Thursday, about two-thirds of the reports of anti-Semitism were received in the week following the cross-border Hamas attack into Israel in October.
The data suggests that the surge in reports “was a celebration of the attack on Israel, rather than anger at Israel’s military response in Gaza,” the CST said. It also stated that “unprecedented levels of anti-Semitism” were observed across the UK following the onset of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.
UK Home Secretary James Cleverly said as part of Thursday’s report that “the rise in anti-Semitic hatred and abuse we have seen in the UK in recent months is utterly deplorable.”
He added that the Conservative government has “taken strong steps to confront this head on,” including ensuring that “expressions of support for the terrorist organization Hamas are met with the full force of the law.”
The study also detailed a sharp rise in instances of anti-Semitism involving British schoolchildren, saying that cases have more than tripled since 2022 – statistics that Higher Education Minister Robert Halfon described as “deeply concerning.”
“To see this form of hatred also take place in education is unacceptable,” Halfon stated, according to the BBC.
The findings appear to amplify British police data released late last year, which also recorded a rise in anti-Jewish offenses in the weeks after the Hamas attack. Several major regional forces, including Greater Manchester Police, West Yorkshire Police, and West Midlands Police, noted large increases in anti-Semitic abuse, the BBC reported.
The CST said last year that the policing figures were “shocking.”