When religious leaders from across faiths put aside their theological differences to sign a joint letter, it’s usually worth paying attention. And this week, they did exactly that, warning that antisemitism is no longer someone else’s problem to solve.
The letter, signed by senior figures from Christian, Muslim, Hindu and Jewish communities across the UK, comes after a string of incidents at synagogues and Jewish cultural sites that have left many communities shaken. The signatories are clear: silence, they argue, is no longer an option.
“This isn’t a Jewish problem,” one senior Church of England bishop wrote in the letter. “It’s a problem for every one of us who believes in a decent, open society.”
The timing is significant. Reported antisemitic incidents in the UK rose sharply over the past 18 months, with the Community Security Trust recording over 4,000 incidents in 2023 alone, the highest figure since records began. Physical attacks, graffiti on synagogue walls, verbal abuse in the street, the pattern has become grimly familiar to Jewish communities from Manchester to London.
What makes this letter stand out is who signed it. It’s one thing for Jewish organisations to raise the alarm. It’s quite another when imams, bishops, and Hindu priests are standing alongside them, saying they’ve seen enough.
The letter calls specifically on politicians, local councils, and school leaders to take more robust action, including mandatory Holocaust education, faster police responses to hate crimes, and greater community liaison funding. It doesn’t pull its punches on institutional slowness, either.
Some Jewish community leaders have welcomed the solidarity while noting, carefully, that words now need to be followed by action. “We’ve had warm statements before,” one rabbi told a national broadcaster this week. “What we need is people showing up.”
There’s something quietly powerful about faith communities, so often divided on doctrine and politics, finding common cause here. Whether local authorities and government ministers will respond with anything more than warm words of their own remains the real question.
Because if they don’t, the next letter might carry a very different tone.
