LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism

Combating antisemitic hatred that continues to surge through our proud northern city and beyond🎗️ Follows/RT not endorsements.👆Donations welcome

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We are proud British Jews with a strong sense of national identity and belonging to the UK, including its democratic values, culture, traditions, history, and laws. We cherish the freedom this country offers, as well as our heritage, which shapes who we are.

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One Thousand Days.
On the 7th of October 2023, the worst massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust took place in southern Israel. Men, women, children and the elderly were murdered, tortured, burned alive and taken hostage. Hamas did not attempt to hide what they did. They filmed it. They broadcast it. They celebrated it.
One thousand days later, we find ourselves having to say that again. Because extraordinary as it sounds, there are those who still deny it.
Not in the shadows. Not in whispers. Openly, on our streets, on our campuses, on our social media feeds and occasionally from our public platforms. The footage exists. The testimony exists. The evidence is overwhelming, documented and undeniable. And yet denial persists — dressed up as scepticism, as context, as resistance, as politics. It is none of those things. It is a choice. A deliberate, conscious choice to look away from the murder of Jews and call it complicated.
That choice has consequences. In the one thousand days since October 7th, Jewish communities around the world have experienced a surge in antisemitism without modern precedent. In Leeds, in Manchester, in London, in Paris, in New York, in Melbourne — Jews have felt it. Innocents have been murdered and maimed for one reason only — for being Jewish. In the streets, in their workplaces, in their places of worship, on the beach. Those who have stood publicly with the Jewish community have felt it too — the messages, the hostility, the accusation that solidarity with Jews is somehow a political provocation.
It is not. It is a moral baseline.
We also remember, on this milestone, the hostages taken into Gaza on that day. Their ordeal, and that of their families, is woven into every one of these one thousand days.
LLAA was founded to ensure that Leeds would not be a city that looked away. In almost three years of sustained, visible, cross-communal work, we have built something that stands as proof that communities of good will — of every faith and none — will not be silent in the face of hatred directed at any people.
One thousand days.
We are still here.
We are still standing.
And we will continue to do so — peacefully, publicly and persistently.
Am Yisrael Chai.

@antisemitism
@StopTheHate_UK
@IsraelinUK
@forisraelnow
@RawaneOsmane
@mishtal

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@StopHate_Leeds @GME_1970 @Kokothecat2 @vampywitchy Paid for by their bosses no doubt …..

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@jessisajew you need to come to us next time your here!

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Amazing to have @RawaneOsmane @MarkJSewards together with other amazing speakers standing Shoulder to Shoulder with the Leeds Jewish Community today!
The message is clear - NO TO ANTISEMITISM!

Thank you from us all!!!

@StopTheHate_UK
@antisemitism
@Elad_Si
@i24NEWS_EN
@i24NEWS

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@Kokothecat2 @GME_1970 Thanks for the feedback! Amazing 🤩

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@GME_1970 Thank you for your support!!!

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@HeidiBachram Cancelled !

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https://t.co/QVLer6rbfH

A packed out room came to listen to https://t.co/lMwOzj8xDU and @mishtal last week, at an event hosted by LLAA.

Here’s the link for those that were unable to attend.

@antisemitism
@StopTheHate_UK
@Jewishworldnews

[LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism @LeedsLeadsAA]

Thankyou to everyone who took the time to join us last night for what was an incredibly powerful event chaired by Marshall Frieze. Brendan O’Neill and David Collier - thankyou for sharing your insights and your wisdom. We heard difficult truths. Thank goodness Brendan and David have such powerful voices.

@mishtal
@antisemitism

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@HeidiBachram @Fiddzee Absolutely disgusting, yet not surprising

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The hottest topic of conversation last Tuesday may well have been the weather! With temperatures soaring, we kept things a little shorter than usual but despite the heat it was another positive afternoon of outreach in Leeds city centre.

Many people were happy to take leaflets, offer words of encouragement and show their support, even if they didn’t stop for long conversations. The overwhelming feeling was one of kindness and goodwill.

Among the highlights was a lovely conversation with a lady who simply could not understand why antisemitism and Holocaust denial still exist today. She spoke warmly about the Jewish family who had supported her during her childhood and the lifelong friendships that followed. It was a powerful reminder of how personal connections help break down prejudice and build understanding.

We also met several people who spoke fondly of their Jewish friends, neighbours and colleagues, sharing stories of friendship, respect and community. These conversations may have been brief, but they were heartfelt and encouraging.

One particularly touching interaction came from an Iranian lady who stopped to offer her blessings and prayers for everyone involved. Moments like these remind us how support comes from many different backgrounds and communities.

Overall, it was a quieter session than some weeks but perhaps that’s a good sign. No negativity to report, plenty of smiles, lots of leaflets distributed, and a strong sense that our presence continues to be appreciated.

As always, we are incredibly grateful to our volunteers who continue to turn up week after week, whatever the weather. We couldn’t do this without you.

[LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism @LeedsLeadsAA]

Community Action – Leeds City Centre

A slightly quieter afternoon for conversations this week but what stood out was how many people, even those who didn’t necessarily take a leaflet, stopped to say they supported what we are doing and were deeply concerned by recent events.

One elderly couple repeatedly asked why antisemitism keeps increasing despite constant statements from leaders saying it is “unacceptable.” Their feeling was simple: speeches alone do not stop hatred, there also needs to be a real change in attitudes across society.

We also spoke to a lovely Catholic gentleman called Peter who warmly expressed his support, happily took leaflets, and encouraged us to keep up our visible presence and witness in the city.

Although there were fewer long conversations than usual, the overall atmosphere was thoughtful, sympathetic and encouraging. It really does feel as though more people are beginning to recognise the seriousness of what Jewish communities are facing.

Most importantly, we are so grateful for our ever expanding group of volunteers. Week after week people continue to give their time, energy, kindness and courage to stand with us in the city centre and we truly couldn’t do it without every single one of you 💙

Proud to continue standing together with Leeds Leads Against Antisemitism!

#LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism #LeedsCommunity #StandingTogether #EducationNotHate

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@KemiBadenoch Thank you for your support @KemiBadenoch ! We’d love to welcome you to Leeds to stand with us on our weekly vigils.

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Stop The Hate Now!!

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We’re so proud to have our logo amongst so many well respected and recognised organisations, for tomorrow’s event in London.
This stands as a thank you to everyone who has supported us over the last two and a half years or so, be it on our vigils, our marches, our 07/10 Memorials or even with anonymous financial support.

LLAA has achieved what is has because of every single one of you!

THANK YOU!!

From all of the committee.

@LordJohnMann
@BBCLookNorth
@itvcalendar
@GBNEWS
@TalkTV

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@StopHate_Leeds @EBluemountain1 @vampywitchy We will be there !!!!!

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Community Action – Leeds City Centre

We had another meaningful afternoon in Leeds city centre, with a real mix of conversations and strong engagement throughout.

We are so lucky to welcome new volunteers too welcome Anne-Marie Kissoon

We handed out a large number of leaflets and spoke with people from many different backgrounds. The majority of interactions were positive, with many passers-by offering encouragement saying “we’re with you”, giving thumbs up, or stopping to thank us for being there. It’s always uplifting to see that quiet support.

There were also some deeper and more challenging conversations. In several cases, people arrived with strong views shaped by what they had seen online or in the media. Through calm and respectful discussion, we were able to explore these perspectives, clarify misunderstandings, and bring the focus back to antisemitism here in the UK. Even where views didn’t fully align, many conversations ended on a more thoughtful note, with mutual respect and a willingness to reflect.

We also met people who were genuinely shocked to learn more about the level of antisemitism faced by Jewish communities today. Conversations with students and younger people were especially encouraging, with some showing real openness to learning and understanding more.

There were also some lovely moments of connection from people sharing their personal links to Israel and Jewish communities, to others expressing heartfelt gratitude for the work being done. One supporter even brought along birthday cake to share, adding a special touch to the day.

Overall, a busy and engaging session, a reminder that even when conversations are not always easy, they are important. Being present, listening, and engaging respectfully continues to make a difference.

Sadly as we were packing up, there was a very unpleasant incident by a member of the Women in Black group who came and screamed at us us that we kill babies and are murdering people . After a further altercation the police acted swiftly and decisively. We are very grateful to the West Yorkshire police for their help arresting this woman. West Yorkshire Police. The incident was almost identical to the one in Slough that occurred earlier this week.

Proud to stand together once again with Leeds Leads Against Antisemitism.

✨ Debbie was really touched by all the birthday treats and the birthday song, it meant so much. Thank you everyone for making her feel so special x

Thank you to everyone who joined us! See you next week!

#CommunityAction #LeedsCityCentre #LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism #StandingTogether #EducationNotHate

[LeedsLeadsAgainstAntisemitism @LeedsLeadsAA]

Here's a blog written by our Co-Chair, Marshall Frieze

The intifada has been globalised.
We tried to tell you

I have been trying on and off, to write this piece for a year. Every time I sit down to do it, another thing happens that makes the draft obsolete. The Heaton Park Synagogue, on Yom Kippur. Hatzola's ambulances burning in Golders Green. Finchley Reform. Kenton. A Holocaust survivor in Milton Keynes opening an antisemitic card on her ninety-fifth birthday. The Community Security Trust logged 3,700 antisemitic incidents in Britain in 2025 — the second-worst year ever recorded, and the first year in which no single calendar month fell below 200. The average is now 308 a month. Before October 7th, 2023, it was 154.
So let me stop updating the draft and just say the thing.
If you are not Jewish and you have read this far, I am glad. I have written it mostly for you.

The intifada was globalized
I know what "intifada" means, because one of them very nearly took my family with it. On 27 March 2002 — Seder night — we were booked to stay at the Park Hotel in Netanya. At the last minute we changed our plans. A Hamas suicide bomber walked into the dining room of that hotel and murdered thirty people at the Passover table; a hundred and forty more were wounded. If we had not moved, I do not think I would be writing this.
So when someone tells me "globalise the intifada" is a call for resistance in the abstract, they are talking to the wrong person.
"Globalise the intifada" is not a metaphor anymore, if it ever was. It's a description of what has happened.
Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim, a couple on the brink of an engagement, were shot dead outside a Jewish museum in Washington DC. The gunman, as he was arrested, shouted Free Palestine. In Boulder, Colorado, a man with a flamethrower and Molotov cocktails attacked a weekly walk held for the Hamas-held hostages, trying — literally — to set Jews on fire. In Manchester, on the holiest day of our year, two men were killed at the door of their synagogue — the perpetrator phoned 999 to pledge allegiance to Islamic State. In London, right now, an Iran-linked group calling itself Ashab al-Yamin is working its way through north London's Jewish buildings with bottles of accelerant. And who can forget the scenes from the terror attack at Bondi Beach?
These are not local stories. They are one story. A slogan that was chanted, week after week, in the capitals of the West, has produced exactly the programme it advertised. Jews are being targeted, firebombed, shot and murdered — not in Tel Aviv, but in Washington, in Boulder, in Crumpsall, in Bondi and in Harrow.
You don't get to say, after all of that, that "globalise the intifada" was about resistance in the abstract. The bodies are the translation.

What the marches actually were
From the first weekend after October 7th, there were marches in London every Saturday — our Shabbat — through streets the community has always used. I understand the right to protest. The question was never whether people could march. It was what it meant that the marches were repeatedly, visibly, audibly anti-Jewish, and that the state treated that as a policing inconvenience rather than a civic emergency.
Police conditions were imposed and then ignored. Organisers were prosecuted for violating them and the marches continued. "Globalise the intifada" and "from the river to the sea" became, in effect, lawful public chants — contested in tribunals, argued over on Newsnight, but not, functionally, stopped. The Met has told Jews, in so many words, that walking home from synagogue on a Saturday near central London is a matter for your own route planning. A year and a half into this, they finally started arresting people for the intifada chant — after Bondi Beach, after Washington, after Manchester. Why aren't other Police Forces doing the same?
We were told the marches were peaceful. And many marchers were. But "mostly peaceful" is how you describe a fire when you don't live in the house. Every Saturday, the message to British Jews was: the streets are not for you this week. And every Saturday, a small, rising group on those marches learned that there was no real cost to openly calling for what is, in plain English, our elimination. Some of them were going to act on it eventually. Some of them did.

Zack Polanski, and the sentence I can't get past
I want to be careful here, because Zack Polanski is a Jew, and I am not in the business of reading other Jews out of the room. He grew up in Manchester. Apparently, he changed his name back to his grandfather's after his family anglicised it to escape antisemitism. On the day of the Heaton Park attack, he posted that he had attended a North Manchester Synagogue and that the Green Party stood with the Jewish community. Fine. Noted.
But then, three weeks ago, after Hatzola's ambulances had been torched and after the first of the Finchley firebombings, he told an Israeli journalist this: "There's a conversation to be had about whether it's a perception of unsafety or whether it's actual unsafety, but neither are acceptable."
Read that again. Two Jews had been murdered at a synagogue door six months earlier. Jewish ambulances were still smouldering in the street. And the leader of a British political party — a Jewish leader of a British political party — thought there was "a conversation to be had" about whether what we felt was real, and added, as though it were a concession, that either way it was unacceptable. As though the concession were the point, and not the sentence before it.
I read it three times. Not because I didn't understand it. Because I didn't want to have understood it correctly.
The Community Security Trust said publicly they could not understand why any politician would question that reality. The Jewish Leadership Council pointed out, mildly, that "Two Jews were murdered attending synagogue in Manchester. It is not a matter of perception." They were being kind. What Polanski did, in that one sentence, was offer every person who did not want to look at British antisemitism a pre-loaded alibi: well, even a Jewish MP says it's a "perception."
This is the role. It isn't that Polanski is personally an antisemite — I don't think he is, and it isn't the point. The role is to use Jewishness to make the minimisation of Jewish fear respectable. To stand on a stage and say "genocide" about Israel weekly, while your own members' WhatsApp groups circulate the claim that the ambulance arson was a "false flag" and that a plane crash was the work of Mossad. To refuse to call Zionism racist and then to preside over a conference where that motion keeps being tabled. To ask us, after everything, whether we have got our fear right.

What I want
I want "globalise the intifada" treated as what the Prime Minister, finally, said it is — a call to attack Jews — and policed accordingly, every single time, from the first chant. I want the public inquiry the community has asked for into two-tier policing. I want the Green Party, and everyone who has borrowed its moral vocabulary, to stop pretending that a sentence about "perception" is anything other than a door held open for people with petrol bottles. I want politicians who say "never again" on Holocaust Memorial Day to understand that "never again" is a present-tense obligation, not a commemorative one.
And I want my neighbours to notice. Not the marchers, not the ministers — the quiet majority of decent British people, whose silence for the last two years has been the single most demoralising thing about being a Jew in this country. You have been very quiet. You've told pollsters you're appalled. You've liked the right posts. You have not, mostly, shown up.
We are the oldest minority in this country. We built a lot of it. We are still here.
If you do one good thing today, reach out to your Jewish friends and let them know you're there for them.
That is what I am asking.

@antisemitism
@CAMERAorgUK
@JewishNewsWorld