Anger and despair among Jewish Britons after spate of attacks

LONDON — Britain in 2026 is a place where Jack Hur doesn’t feel safe wearing his Star of David pendant. It’s where some Jewish mothers tell their teenage sons to remove their kippot before boarding the tube. It’s where dinner-table talk of leaving the country no longer seems outlandish.Standing behind the counter of Sulam’s Kosher Food Store, Hur, 32, produces his Star of David necklace from underneath his sweatshirt. From his back pocket he reveals a kippah. “I only wear this sometimes,” he says, unfolding the small, black skullcap. “It depends where I am.”Ultimately for Jews, he said, “Britain just isn’t safe.”Golders Green, a hub for Britain’s tiny Jewish community, feels like a neighborhood under siege. Antisemitism had been surging in the United Kingdom since the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack on Israel and Israel’s subsequent offensive in the Gaza Strip. There were 3,700 reported antisemitic incidents last year, more than double the number in 2022, according to the Community Security Trust, a charity that coordinates security measures at Jewish institutions and tracks this data.But a spate of attacks against synagogues and other Jewish sites in recent weeks has brought that to another level.Jack Hur in Golders Green.Alexander Smith