Voice of the Jewish News: The best response

THE HISTRIONICS in Westminster appear even more ridiculous when we look across the Channel at Brussels, where bombers killed 34 people and injured hundreds, and Istanbul, where bombers killed four people and injured dozens.

There were Jewish and Israeli victims in both cities, including two Israeli-Americans and one Israeli who died in Turkey.

More than 10 Israelis injured in the two attacks, but there is no hard evidence that Jews were targeted in either.

Every time these things happen, we trip into the same response: we denounce the terrorists, reaffirm our values, pledge to unite and call for more cross-continental co-operation. But with the increasing frequency of attacks, that response risks being seen as automatic, a ‘copy and paste’ coping mechanism.

Two years ago, we were reluctant to identify the enemy that is radical Islam. Today, not only have we named it, we’ve declared our intention to wage war against it.

But what is ‘it’? Have we really understood ‘it’? Is ‘it’ a set of grievances? A world view? An ideology? A process of radicalisation?

One thing is for sure: Jews in Brussels this week gave the best response to terror by standing firm against it.

The best response is not to let them win. It is to continue living, while taking obvious and sensible precautions.

We hope, if it ever happens here, that British Jews react similarly.