Manchester to Manhattan: Why Jewish Safety Is Now a Question for Every Western City
23rd September 2026
On Tuesday, British police confirmed the fears of Manchester’s Jewish community. Two men were arrested in the city center the night before Yom Kippur, on suspicion of plotting an imminent attack. The arrests and searches in Salford and Liverpool came just before the anniversary of the Heaton Park attack, when two worshippers were killed outside a synagogue.
The Heaton Park attack was the first deadly antisemitic terror incident in Britain since 1984, carried out by an Islamic State supporter. The anniversary was marked by armed police outside synagogues across Manchester, underlining the ongoing threat.
For Orthodox Jews visibly walking to synagogue, the message from the heavy police presence was clear: You are a target. The national terror threat level remains severe, and Jewish communities increasingly feel under siege on their holiest days.
Palestine has made Jew-hatred cool again amongst the British Crust.
Antisemitism is one of the oldest hatreds, with deep historical and religious roots. In 627, in Medina, the violent conflict between Muhammad and the Jewish tribes, which ended in mass executions of the Jews, set a pattern of hostility repeated for centuries in many societies, including modern Britain.
Hamas is in the same position; in its 1988 charter, it references a well-known hadith attributed to Muhammad, which says that, in the last days, even the stones and trees will cry out, “O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me—come and kill him.”
The document prepared at the time when Hamas was founded declares that the struggle against the Jews is both great and serious, and that the only solution to the Palestinian question lies in jihad. The Oct. 7 massacre was no exception; it was the embodiment of that ideology.
