Leeds University is becoming a hostile environment for Jewish students
Anti-Semitism is now so rife that an NHS trust is investigating accusations that a Jewish boy was mistreated by nurses wearing “Free Palestine” badges on a hospital ward. According to his family, the nine year-old, wearing his kippah skullcap, was “kicked out of his bay” and made to sit on the floor.
That this reportedly happened in Manchester, home to the UK’s biggest Jewish community outside London, is deeply worrying. Yet wherever you find Jewish people, you’ll find anti-Semitism.
Over in Leeds, where Britain’s third largest Jewish community resides, Rabbi Zecharia Deutsch, the Orthodox Jewish chaplain for a number of universities in Yorkshire, was forced into hiding in February after receiving threats to his safety and that of his family.
When I studied law at Leeds University in the late 1990s, it boasted a proud community of Jewish – and Israeli – students, some of whom were on my course. But now my alma mater appears to have been captured by pro-Palestinian protesters who “occupied” the historic Parkinson Building and generally have made Jewish students feel deeply uncomfortable on campus.
Last week, the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism reported the posting of a grossly offensive sticker which read: “Zionism? Nein danke”, while a stall that was being operated by Jewish students was attacked. It also said that, last month, one of the university’s professors had led a “from the river to the sea” chant, and in a separate incident a Jewish student centre, Hillel House, was defaced with graffiti that read: “IDF off campus” and “Free Palestine”.
According to Guy Dabby-Joory, of the Union of Jewish Students: “Jewish students have been targeted by violent threats, physical assault and verbal abuse by their peers, while grieving the consequences of Hamas’ attack.” Emma Levy, president of the Jewish Society, told me: “Jewish students are exhausted of constantly having to defend their right to exist proudly on campus. We deserve the right, like any other group, to display our identity without risk of abuse.”
Dame Andrea Jenkyns, the Conservative MP for nearby Morley and Outwood, has rightly demanded an urgent meeting with the vice-chancellor. This isn’t the Leeds University that I used to know and love.
