VOICE OF THE JN: The many questions that follow the rally for hostages

It was meant to be a day of solidarity for British Jews. Instead it will be remembered for how fractured and fearful our community has become since 7 October 2023.

Sunday’s images are now seared into the memory. A 5,000-strong crowd outside Downing Street – an impressive turn out for a short-notice event in August – standing as one in calling for the release of hostages that have languished in Hamas terror tunnels for almost two years. And two mainstream rabbis being shouted down and removed from the stage. In front of cameras. In front of hostage families. In front of a community that prides itself pulling together when it counts.

Two images. Worlds apart.

The rabbis, Charley Baginsky and Josh Levy, joined all the speakers in making clear the fate of the hostages must be our top concern. But criticising Israeli policy and politicians and speaking up for Palestinian self-determination at a rally that was dedicated to the hostages was always likely to profoundly insult sections of the crowd. They surely knew that.

That said, the pair made it abundantly clear that they would only agree to address the event if they could include criticism of Israel’s leadership in line with much of the Israeli public and hostage families. They’d offered to withdraw if this wasn’t acceptable. And it wouldn’t be accurate to pretend the rally was devoid of politics from others.

Rabbi Josh Levy and Rabbi Charley Baginsky speaking at communal rally before being forced to stop

The question for Baginsky and Levy is whether the message they delivered was worth the backlash.

Strip away all the heat and here’s the reality. Privately, most Jews, whatever their faction, acknowledge the humanitarian disaster in Gaza, even if they hold differing views about whether Israel could and should have done more. They know the images of destruction corrode Israel’s standing in the world. They know delivering aid isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s in Israel’s strategic interest. They also believe in two states as a result of negotiations.

The difference between them is not whether they see the suffering, it’s whether they will say so in public at a time when British Jews feel under siege like never before.

Hamas bears sole responsibility for 7 October and the horrors that followed, as the two rabbis made clear in their speech. But Israel must still hold fast to humanitarian principles, even in the thick of war it has no choice but to win completely.

Can leaders lead without being honest or in public or is leadership in times likes these about saying certain things to specific audiences?

That was the core of the rabbis’ point. Many agree with it behind closed doors.

Few will voice it with a microphone.

The answer is not to scream like yobs until those they disagree with can’t be heard or to take away the microphone. Silencing conscientious voices in our community doesn’t end disagreement – it buries it, making genuine dialogue and common ground impossible when we need it most.

After last weekend’s ugly scenes, we’ve never needed it more.

Which brings us back to the start. Can leaders lead without being honest or in public or is leadership in times likes these about saying certain things to specific audiences?

Is a result of this war that we can’t even stomach views with which we disagree? Have we really become a community for whom the very idea of Palestinian statehood is too much to handle, or that is unable to recognise the humanity of people ‘on the other side’?

From the conversations we have, we genuinely think not. We had better hope not, or our ability to speak both to the next generation of Jews and to the world beyond our bubble will be severely limited.

Then Hamas really will have won.