You cannot make this comedy gold up. The only problem is that it is not actually really funny with far right activists from Britain First, aka Jayda Fransen and Paul Golding, parading in Golders Green looking for members of the local Jewish community to hand out their tawdry and malevolent leaflets to.
Forget the fact that a far right group attempts to make political capital out of antisemitic attacks and forget the fact that scratch the surface of these extremist groups and their antisemitism boils over. However, the sheer fact that they assume that their vile politics has any place within Jewish communities in the UK beggars belief and shows a political naivety that Neville Chamberlain would have been proud of.
Antisemitism, as we have said many times, is a sad reality and something that needs tackling. As the Chief Rabbi recently said, it is a light sleeper and has historically slept lightly in Europe. Yet, thankfully, things in our country are not as bad as in countries like Hungary and other states. This is acknowledged by respected antisemitic monitoring groups like the Community Security Trust.
What groups like Britain First fail to understand is that Jewish communities have long memories of when extremist far right groups targeted them when Muslim communities were not really the focus. They have not forgotten being chased down streets, being abused and spat at, or when their cars were keyed and when racist propaganda was left through their letterboxes. They have not forgotten when Jewish girls were bullied, when their institutions suffered arson and when these groups marched down streets and spread fear in the elderly. Simply put, they have not forgotten what the far right are about!
Let us also not be fooled by the fact that groups like Britain First, whilst trying to spin that they care about antisemitism, are the branches of the Jew, Black, LGBT and Muslim hating fascistic roots which provide the ideology that keeps such vile groups alive. This is the ideology of hate, of blaming others whilst believing that groups of people are the cause of ills in society. This is also the ideology that uses fear, a mob mentality, nationalism and pseudo science in their desire to use young minds as cannon fodder simply to feed their narcissistic egos. Whilst Paul Golding is no Hermann Goering, the ideological traits, it can be argued, are there for people to see.
Let us be clear. Britain First is no cuddly yet offensive party. It is a street movement that relies on fear, intimidation and malicious thuggery. Its intimidation of the elderly is well documented and its desire to spread fear well known. So next time they attempt to play the ‘we can help fight antisemitism routine,’ we hope that local communities can show them what they think of them by finding the nearest recycle bin in which to put their leaflets.
Finally, if anyone out there managed to receive one of their leaflets, we would be very interested in taking a look at it.
