I didn’t plan on writing another book on antisemitism. Then 7 October happened

This is the book that I wasn’t supposed to write.

When I finished my previous book, Everyday Hate, in February 2023, I promised myself that I was done with writing about antisemites. Enough of focusing on the people who spread hateful lies about Jews, I thought: they aren’t worthy of more attention. Instead, I decided to find a more positive story to tell about Jews who fought back, that might provide an example of pride and defiance. There are plenty of inspiring options, incredible stories of Jewish resistance that deserve a wider audience. I even started researching a story that I still hope to write one day.

Eight months later, on 7 October, Hamas attacked Israel and, as we all witnessed the atrocities and felt the trauma of that day, I began to write this book instead. Not that I realised that was what I was doing at the time. I was just writing an article about some of the nauseating responses to the 7 October attack, denouncing the immediate and celebratory demonstrations across the Western world at the slaughter of Jews in Israel. This was less an act of writing, more a cathartic effort to process the horror of that day. I was in shock at what had happened, felt deep foreboding at what was to come, and was angered by the sight of people actually celebrating the mass murder, rape and hostage taking of Israeli civilians.

Three years later, I’ve had unwelcome reasons to write many more such articles, and together, they now form my latest book. Titled From Be’eri to Bondi: Global Antisemitism after October 7, it is not a chronology of events so much as a chance to pause and reflect: hopefully, looking at the past three years from a fresh angle may generate fresh insights and new understandings about what we have been through. Mostly written in real time as events unfolded, From Be’eri to Bondi describes the global surge in antisemitism, demands more action against it, highlights the failure of so many to respond at all, and warns about what this means, not just for Jews, but for Western societies and liberal democracies as a whole. Most of all, it conveys something of what it has felt like to be a Jew in this new age of antisemitism.

The public, media and political discussion of antisemitism and Israel has felt unrelenting at times, as if we are all walking round with a target on our backs and a blinding spotlight shining over our heads. The effect this has had on our own identities as Jews, on our relationships with Israel, and on our cohesion as a community, is complex and fluid. It is hard enough for Jews to work this out for ourselves, without Jewish identity being placed front and centre of national debate, inviting incessant and insensitive hectoring about what we should think, say and feel from social media figures whose huge followings are matched in size only by their vast ignorance of all things Jewish.

The rise in anti-Jewish terrorism, with Jews murdered on multiple continents, is the most striking and deadly manifestation of antisemitism today. It may not have been inevitable that the atrocities at Kibbutz Be’eri and elsewhere in southern Israel on 7 October would lead to the massacre of Jews on Bondi Beach two years later, but the failure to tackle the global rise in anti-Jewish hatred and extremism made it entirely predictable. This terrorism is the product of an atmosphere in which violent rhetoric has become normalised and hate towards anything deemed ‘Zionist’ is welcomed in some parts of society. This is how terrorism always works: political violence and racist attacks do not emerge from a vacuum but rely on a body of ideas and a flow of incitement. In this context, the spread of Islamist extremism and the unacceptably high degree of antisemitic attitudes within Muslim communities are fuelling the flow of anti-Jewish violence.

Beyond this immediate physical threat, the enduring, angry anti-Israel protests are part of a wider political polarisation, with voters pulled to the extremes and street politics of right and left increasingly playing out in direct opposition to each other. In intellectual circles, the legacy and meaning of Holocaust commemoration is under attack, as is the fundamental connection that Jews have to the land of Israel, with history itself being rewritten in pursuit of both these dishonourable goals. Running beneath all of it is a fervent hatred of Israel that transcends regular political campaigning and has become a movement of faith and belonging, in which any connection at all to Israel and Zionism is treated as a form of impurity and reason for disgust.

From Be’eri to Bondi doesn’t promise a silver bullet that can solve all of these problems, but it does offer some practical suggestions for government, civil society, and for the Jewish community. More than that, I hope it offers a path forward for all of us. The scale of the challenge we face should not be underestimated, but nor should the strength, resilience and capacity of the Jewish people to get through it. After all, we have been through worse times and survived.

Dr Dave Rich’s new book, ‘From Be’eri to Bondi: Global Antisemitism after October 7’, is published by Routledge on 1^st October https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beeri-Bondi-Antisemitism-October-Contemporary/dp/1041346700/