At a time when a shocking increase of anti-Semitism is being seen I was recently invited to attend and speak at an event hosted in the House of Lords for Westminster Synagogue. The Westminster Synagogue is a congregation founded in 1957 under the original name of the ‘New London Synagogue’. The congregation is now based at the historic Kent House – named after Edward, Duke of Kent shortly after the original building was erected in the 1790s.
It was a pleasure to attend the event and congratulate them on their 60th anniversary.
I spoke at the event in which I brought up the worrying rise of anti-Semitism: there have been a total of 1,382 anti-Semitic incidents were recorded in 2017 by the Community Security Trust, which is a record high.
It is a worrying state of affairs when Jewish children living in this country in 2018 have to be protected by armed police.
It is also worrying that we in Parliament had to hold a debate on anti-Semitism. I was unfortunately unable to be in the chamber for the debate because of my ministerial duties but I quickly heard that it was one of the most powerful and moving debates in the House of Commons for some time.
You can watch this three hour debate by clicking on the following link: https://parliamentlive.tv/event/index/80fc2f9b-cda5-45da-8193-48f508169696?in=16:14:36&out=19:02:13