Abstract: The report shares, for the first time, data on observing Succot in the UK, based on the responses of over 4,800 adult British Jews to the JPR 2025 Jews in Uncertain Times Survey. The report compares Succot observance with other Jewish New Year holidays and festivals, and explores who is more likely to celebrate Succot.
Some of the key findings in this report:
50% of Jews in the UK said they celebrate Succot in some way (e.g. attending synagogue, spending some time in a 'Succah', etc.)."
Compared with its neighbouring High Holidays, Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, and with other Jewish festivals and practices, Succot is somewhat less commonly observed.
The larger the household size, the more likely it is that Succot is observed. Households with school-aged children at home are much more likely to celebrate Succot, especially if they are in Jewish schools.
74% of British Jews observe Rosh Hashanah rituals at home. 63% of British Jews fast on Yom Kippur most or all years.
Abstract: This project seeks to gain an understanding of what spirituality means from a Jewish perspective and how it can be incorporated into the educational provision of Jewish schools in the UK. The literature review explores the relationship between spirituality and religion in general. Two approaches to spirituality are identified, one which promotes the experiential and the other which encourages critical realism. It is suggested that relational consciousness could be used as an educational model to harmonise the two approaches. Sources within Jewish literature are then explored, uncovering similar approaches and concluding with the description of a Jewish model for spiritual learning. The merit of a qualitative study is justified as best suited to investigate the perceptions and attitudes of Jewish studies teachers towards Jewish spiritual education. Using semi-structured interviews, a purposive sample of nine Jewish studies primary school teachers are asked what spirituality means to them, how they attempt to incorporate it into their religious studies lessons and what the impact of teaching spiritually on their students is. The responses are analysed using the inductive approach of IPA to reveal four overarching themes. Three themes frame spiritual education as the development of relationships within pupils, between themselves and others, and themselves and God. The fourth category focuses on the pedagogy deployed by the teachers and the challenges they face in delivering spiritual education. The research highlights two approaches to spiritual education, with one group of teachers preferring an extrinsic approach, imbuing their lessons with meaning and purpose. The other group view spirituality as an intrinsic quality that when nurtured, brings to the fore creativity and individuality. The centrality of a philosophy of God’s immanence as a foundation for spiritual education is emphasised and a model which promotes dialogue, relationships and community is presented as one that could be implemented to deliver Jewish spiritual education.
Abstract: At the time of writing, one consequence of Israel’s response to the massacre that took place in Israel by Hamas on 7 October 2023 is an unprecedented surge in global antisemitism. This massacre was the largest mass murder of Jewish civilians since the Holocaust; its scale, brutality and sadism have led to comparisons with the Holocaust, and to more and deeper sensitivities and controversies in Holocaust Education. In an attempt to address this, the proposed chapter will discuss the relationship between Holocaust Education and Antisemitism Education, and its relevance to Religious Education (RE) in schools.
Holocaust Education comprises learning about and from the Holocaust (Cowan and Maitles, Understanding and teaching Holocaust education. Sage, 2017). The former focuses on the historical narrative; the latter focuses on moral issues related to active citizenship. Research findings in England (Foster, Pettigrew and Pearce et al., What do students know and understand about the Holocaust? Evidence from English secondary schools. Centre for Holocaust Education, UCL Institute of Education, 2016, p. 1) were that 68% of students (n = 7952 students) were “unaware of what ‘antisemitism’ meant”. Similarly, during a group interview, following their return from a visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau organised by the Archdiocese of Glasgow, Scotland, each of the four students indicated that they did not understand the term “antisemitism” (Cowan & Maitles, 2017, p. 139). Further, Short’s discussion of the failings of learning from the Holocaust included the lack of reference to “the key role played by Christian antisemitism in preparing the groundwork for the Holocaust” (Short, Learning from genocide? A study in the failure of Holocaust education. Intercultural Education, 16(4), 367-380, 2005; Failing to learn from the Holocaust. In As the Witnesses Fall Silent: 21st Century Holocaust Education in Curriculum, Policy and Practice (pp. 455–468), 2015). Cowan and Maitles (2017, p. 56) further assert that historical antisemitism contributes to understanding present-day antisemitism.
Abstract: In this report:
As the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly approaches, and with key statesmen and leaders, including British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, announcing that their countries may recognise a Palestinian state at the summit, this report finds levels of agreement with the contention that “a two-state solution is the only way Israel will achieve peace with its neighbours in the Middle East” have fallen to below 50% among British Jews for the first time since records began.
The report is based on over 4,800 responses from members of the JPR Research Panel to the 2025 Jews in Uncertain Times Survey, conducted in June/July 2025.
Some of the key findings in this report:
49% of respondents agree with the two-state solution contention, compared with 54% a year ago, and 78% in 2010.
Despite the reported drop, support for the two-state solution remains the majority opinion among British Jews, as 41% disagree with it and 10% are not sure.
Younger Jews are found to be less likely to believe in the two-state solution than their elders, with over 40% of 16-29-year-olds showing a degree of support for a shared bi-national state.
Attitudes to support for the two-state solution correlate with Jews’ Jewish denominational positions, political allegiances and attitudes to Zionism.
Anti-Zionist Jews, who constitute a small minority of British Jews as a whole, are particularly likely to favour bi-nationalism over the two-state solution. The much larger, mainstream and orthodox communities overwhelmingly reject this position, but show considerable scepticism for the two-state solution, most likely on security grounds.
British Jews overwhelmingly reject the idea that ‘Israel should take over full control of Gaza.’
Abstract: This report from B’nai B’rith International, democ and the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS) documents the surge of antisemitism on university campuses across Europe in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel. Since then, Jewish students and faculty have faced harassment, intimidation and violence, creating a climate of fear and exclusion across campuses.
Universities that should safeguard open debate and diversity have instead seen antisemitic rhetoric, Holocaust distortion, glorification of Hamas and calls for “intifada.” Professors, radical student groups, and outside organizations have often fueled this atmosphere, while administrators too often failed to act.
Covering Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom, the report identifies repeated patterns: threats and assaults against Jewish students, antisemitic vandalism, incitement to violence, and weak or inconsistent institutional responses.
Topics: Jewish Identity, Jewish Involvment, Jewish Community, Main Topic: Identity and Community, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Youth Movements, Educational Tours, Family and Household, Age and Generational Issues, Denominations
Abstract: CST recorded 1,521 antisemitic incidents across the UK in the first half of 2025, the second-highest total ever reported to CST in the first six months of any year. This is a decrease of 25% from the 2,019 antisemitic incidents recorded by CST in the January- to-June period of 2024, which was the highest figure ever reported to CST for the first half of any year. CST recorded 965 incidents in the first six months of 2023, 823 from January to June 2022, and 1,371 in the first half of 2021.
The 1,521 anti-Jewish hate incidents recorded in the first six months of 2025 is a fall from the half-year record reported in 2024, but it is a significant total, fuelled by ongoing reactions to the conflict in the Middle East. It is 11% higher than the third- highest six-monthly figure of 1,371 incidents recorded in 2021, which itself was a result of antisemitic reactions to an escalation of conflict in the Middle East across May and June that year. Antisemitic incidents have been reported to CST at an increased rate since the Hamas terror attack in Israel on 7 October 2023. After an immediate and notable spike in anti-Jewish hate immediately following that date, observed before Israel had coordinated any large- scale on-the-ground military response in Gaza, incident levels eventually settled at a substantially higher average than prior to the attack.
In the six months leading up to 7 October 2023, CST recorded a monthly average of 161 antisemitic incidents per month. In the first six months of 2025, this monthly average stood at 254 incidents, a 58% increase from that earlier period. CST had only ever recorded monthly incident totals exceeding 200 on five occasions prior to October 2023, each correlating with past periods when Israel was at war.Since the 7 October attack, the only month in which CST logged an incident figure below 200 was December 2024. The current war in the Middle East has lasted the entirety of the period covered in this report and has continued to impact the volume and discourse of antisemitism reported to CST in the first six months of this year, as it has every month since October 2023.
Abstract: This thesis looks into representations of Palestinian and Israeli-Jewish non-elite civilians in the liberal press
in Britain, namely the Guardian and the Independent newspapers. The period examined in the research
follows the al-Aqsa Intifadah (since September 2000) and the Arab-Israeli conflict during the 2000s (2000-
2010). The research findings look specifically into the coverage of the peace months of July and December
2000. The primary proposition of the thesis follows the burgeoning literature regarding the parallel,
centuries-old histories of the Arab, Jew and the Idea-of-Europe in tandem, in one breath as it may (e.g.,
Anidjar, 2003, 2007; Kalmar and Penslar, 2005; Boyarin, 2009). This theorisation finds the Arab and Jew
as two formational Others to the Idea-of-Europe, with the Jew imagined as the religious and internal enemy
to Europe and the Arab as the political and external enemy (Anidjar, 2003). This research enquires how
liberal-left forms of racialisations (not only extreme right racialisations) towards the Arab and Jew are
contingent upon these centuries-old images and imaginaires, even during moments of peacemaking (not
only times of heightened violence). The main hypothesis of the research is that in the mediated, Manichean
packaging of the Arab-Israeli conflict in both newspapers the Palestinian and Israeli-Jew are reduced to
two sediment polarized identities where no Palestinian exists outside the articulation of being oppositional
to the Israeli-Jew through difference marked by violence, and vice versa. Critical Solidarity is proposed as
a mode of Peace Journalism (e.g., Galtung, 2000; Lynch and McGoldrick, 2005; Kempf, 2007) which hopes
to address concerns at the intersection of news reporting about the conflict and race.
Abstract: Reports have indicated an increase in anti-Jewish hostility and antisemitic incidents following the Hamas terrorist attack in Israel on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent war in Gaza. In two studies (NStudy1 = 354 and NStudy2 = 490), we experimentally investigated the impact of priming with material referring to the war in Gaza on hostility toward Jews, and on antisemitism as well as other various ethnic groups (to determine whether this exposure specifically affected attitudes toward Jews or had a broader impact on ethnic attitudes in general). We also examined the indirect relationship between political orientation and anti-Jewish hostility and antisemitism, through sociopolitical factors such as global identification, out-group identity fusion, social dominance orientation, and misanthropy. Our results showed an experimental effect of increased negative attitudes toward Jews, as well as toward Britons and Scandinavians, but did not reveal an increase in antisemitism. This effect was not replicated in Study 2, possibly due to reduced media attention. The indirect effects suggested that political orientation (left vs. right-wing) was positively associated with anti-Jewish hostility and antisemitism through social dominance orientation. In contrast, conservative political orientation was negatively associated with antisemitism through out-group identity fusion with the Palestinian people. Our findings imply two distinct political pathways to antisemitism: one linked with classical political right-wing orientation and the other to a complex identity-based conflation of attitudes toward Israel with prejudice toward the Jewish ethnic group.
Abstract: Vast research has been carried out on the way Jewish women feel about their infertility and their use of assisted reproductive technologies (ART). This has been particularly researched in Israel, a distinctly pro-natalist country. Building on this scholarship, this thesis explores the infertility experiences of Orthodox Jewish Women living in London. Based on twenty-six interviews, conducted between 2017 and 2018, with Orthodox Jewish women living in North West London, this thesis presents some of the challenges these women faced when experiencing infertility, and the ways in which they found strength and support to navigate their journeys through ART. This thesis is comprised of two parts. Part I provides the background context for the thesis in three chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the reader to Judaism and British Jewry along with the development of its denominations and the meaning behind ‘community’. Chapter 2 broadly discusses Jewish meanings attributed to fertility and infertility alongside studies on the way individuals experience infertility, reproduction and pregnancy with a particular focus on Jewish scholarship. Chapter 3 outlines the methodology used, explaining how this thesis was developed from thought into fruition. Part II of the thesis concentrates on original data, with four data chapters each concentrating on a key theme emerging from the data – My destiny (Chapter 4), My Rabbi (Chapter 5), My Relationships (Chapter 6), My Identity (Chapter 7), a discussion chapter (Chapter 8), and a final chapter for conclusions, reflections and future work (Chapter 9). The key findings of this thesis illustrate that while all women believed their infertility was God given, their acceptance of these perceived ‘tests of faith’ was not smooth. The relationships that appeared to suffer the most were those the women held with their mothers. Inversely, the relationships that flourished most, as a result of infertility, were those which the women held with their Rabbis. This research gives useful insight into an under researched population. Its findings could offer guidance to medical professionals, counsellors, policy makers, and religious leaders. Additionally, this work could be encouraging for other Orthodox Jewish women when facing infertility.
Abstract: Depuis les années 1970, s’observe une « orthodoxisation » de la judaïcité mondiale, notamment en France, au Royaume-Uni, aux États-Unis ou en Israël. Ce mouvement est d’abord porté par des jeunes. Or, jusqu’ici, les études n’ont pas suffisamment abordé la conjonction de la globalisation, de la jeunesse et de la religion dans cette évolution. Cet article étudie la globalisation d’un courant juif orthodoxe, le mouvement loubavitch. Comment insère-t-il les jeunes dans une stratégie de globalisation ? Quels en sont les effets sur leur pratique religieuse ? Cette ONG confessionnelle est un important vecteur d’une « orthodoxisation » chez les jeunes. Elle investit de manière prioritaire dans la jeunesse, notamment par un système éducatif spécifique : il vise à favoriser l’intégration à la communauté loubavitch, par le biais d’une formation orthodoxe standardisée. Mais au sein du mouvement, les jeunes sont aussi des agents : ils sont promoteurs d’une orthodoxie juive globalisée.
Abstract: From Introduction:
As the world marks the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, the J7 – Large Communities’ Task Force Against Antisemitism is releasing its first J7 Annual Report on Antisemitism. This report offers a comprehensive and sobering overview of the current state of antisemitism across seven countries with the largest Jewish communities outside Israel: Argentina, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The J7 Task Force was established in July 2023 to foster cooperation among these communities in response to growing concern about the resurgence of antisemitism worldwide. This crisis has only intensified following Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which was followed by a marked rise in antisemitic incidents across the world, including in the J7 countries. In the months following the attack, reports of antisemitic activity increased by hundreds, and in some cases, thousands, of percentage points, compared to the same period the previous year, with incidents targeting Jewish schools, synagogues, businesses, and individuals.3 The data presented here is troubling. Across all seven countries, there has been a clear rise in antisemitic incidents, particularly violent ones. From 2021 to 2023, antisemitic incidents increased by 11 percent in Australia, 23 percent in Argentina, 72 percent in Germany, 90 percent in the United Kingdom, 83 percent in Canada, 185 percent in France, and 227 percent in the United States. In two of the four J7 countries that published incident numbers for 2024, namely Australia and the United States, the number of antisemitic incidents continued to rise, showing the lasting impact of the tsunami of antisemitism unleashed by Oct. 7.
Abstract: This paper presents two digital public history resources—online maps—that are concerned with the everyday lives and reminiscences of Jewish people in two cities in the United Kingdom: London and Manchester. Using techniques derived from Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and the spatial humanities more broadly, these resources take the form of interactive maps which compile recordings of oral history interviews with background research, documentary photographs, and historical maps. Drawing on the work of Raphael Samuel and Pierre Nora, and the insights derived from space syntax urban research and what we have termed ‘memory mapping,’ we discuss the tensions between memory, which in Nora’s sense refers to the past as it is recalled informally and colloquially, and history, the academic study of the past. Digital mapping technologies, we argue, shape new opportunities for exploring the relationship between these two modes of historical thinking. Through a consideration of specific examples taken from the two maps, we discuss how bringing these materials into dialogue with cartographic maps opens new avenues for spatially and historically situated research into memory.
Abstract: Background Ethnic and religious minorities in the UK had a higher risk of severe illness and mortality from COVID-19 in 2020–2021, yet were less likely to receive vaccinations. Two Faith Health Networks (FHNs) were established in London in 2022–2024 as a partnership approach to mitigate health inequalities among Muslim and Jewish Londoners through a health system–community collaboration. By evaluating the FHNs, this study aimed to examine: the organisational processes required for FHNs to serve as a model of interface between health systems and minority communities; the role these networks play in addressing public health inequalities; and implications for their future development and sustainability.
Methods A qualitative evaluation of the two FHNs was conducted using semi-structured interviews (n=19) with members of the ‘London Jewish Health Partnership’ and the ‘London Muslim Health Network’. Participant clusters included public health professionals, healthcare workers, community representatives and local government workers.
Results The FHNs shared similar structures of leadership, but differed in core membership, which influenced their access to expertise and the activities developed. They were found to perform a key conduit role by integrating expertise from within the health system and faith communities to address the needs and expectations of underserved communities, with the ultimate goal of addressing health inequalities through the design of tailored campaigns and services. Emerging themes for developing an FHN model included enhancing their sustainability by determining funding allocation, strategic integration into health systems and identifying the appropriate geographical scope to sustain their impact. Further implications included recognition of intersectionality, addressing diverse needs within faith communities and trust-building approaches.
Conclusion This evaluation offers insights into developing partnership models between faith-based organisations and health sectors to foster relationships with underserved communities. These findings provide valuable considerations for teams navigating the priority of health equity and community engagement as part of our learning from the pandemic to support the development of FHNs across different faith communities, not just for vaccine uptake, but to support the broader health and well-being of communities more widely.
Abstract: Why do non-Jewish football fans chant "Yid Army" or wave "Super Jews" banners—especially in support of clubs that are not Jewish? The Making of "Jew Clubs" explores how four major European football clubs—FC Bayern Munich, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur—came to be seen as "Jew Clubs," even though they have never officially identified as Jewish.
In this transnational study, Pavel Brunssen traces how both Jewish and non-Jewish actors perform Jewishness, antisemitism, and philosemitism within European football cultures over the 20th and 21st centuries. Drawing on a wide array of primary sources—from fan chants and matchday rituals to media portrayals and club histories—the book reveals how football stadiums have become unexpected stages for negotiating memory, identity, and historical trauma.
Offering a new approach to Holocaust memory, sports history, and Jewish studies, The Making of "Jew Clubs" shows how football cultures reflect and reshape Europe's conflicted relationship with its Jewish past.
Abstract: At the beginning of the twenty-first century, antisemitism still constitutes a significant problem in many parts of the world, including in Britain. Although many historical, social and political aspects of anti-Jewish prejudice have been studied extensively, something that has received only scant attention is whether and how key institutions and actors have attempted to counteract it. This thesis contributes towards filling this gap in the scholarly literature by examining governmental and non-governmental responses to contemporary antisemitism in Britain, which it conceptualises as a multi-dimensional and contested social problem. Analysing government documents, parliamentary records and other publications, the thesis compares how state and civil society actors have discursively framed antisemitism, and what practical measures – if any – they have adopted to counter it. This analysis shows that the state has traditionally tended to neglect anti-Jewish prejudice, or to address it only indirectly in the context of much larger categories of issues, such as racism or inequality. While this universalistic approach is not entirely dismissed, the thesis problematizes the underlying assumption that contemporary antisemitism should simply be subsumed under the larger umbrella of racism. The limitations of such an approach become especially apparent in the context of Holocaust remembrance and Holocaust education, to which the thesis devotes a separate chapter. On the other hand, while the thesis does not propose a simple dichotomy of universalistic state responses and particularistic civil society responses, it argues that the work of groups such as the All-Party Parliamentary Group against Antisemitism and the Community Security Trust highlights the potential of civil society to make significant contributions to the fight against contemporary antisemitism by engaging with it as a particular issue. However, an examination of British Israel advocacy organisations in the final chapter demonstrates that this inherent potential is not always realised in practice. Overall, the thesis argues that a multi-level framework for addressing anti-Jewish prejudice that includes different governmental as well as non-governmental actors is most likely to be effective in countering antisemitism in all its complexity.
Abstract: Historian Gavin Schaffer wrestles Jewish history away from the question of what others have thought about Jews, focusing instead on the experiences of Jewish people themselves.
Exploring the complexities of inclusion and exclusion, he shines a light on groups that have been marginalised within Jewish history and culture, such as queer Jews, Jews married to non-Jews, Israel-critical Jews and even Messianic Jews, while offering a fresh look at Jewish activism, Jewish religiosity and Zionism.
Weaving these stories together, Schaffer argues that there are good reasons to consider Jewish Britons as a unitary whole, even as debates rage about who is entitled to call themselves a Jew. Challenging the idea that British Jewish life is in terminal decline, An unorthodox history demonstrates that Jewish Britain is thriving and that Jewishness is deeply embedded in the country's history and culture.
Abstract: Ashkenazic Hebrew is a unique language variety with a centuries-long history of written use among Central and Eastern European Jews. It has distinct phonological and grammatical features attested in texts composed by Ashkenazic Jews (e.g. adherents of the Hasidic and Maskilic movements) in Europe prior to the twentieth century. While Ashkenazic Hebrew is commonly believed to have been replaced by Israeli Hebrew in the twentieth century, this traditional written variety of the language actually continues to thrive in contemporary Diaspora Haredi (strictly Orthodox) communities, chiefly the Hasidic centres of New York, London, Montreal and Antwerp. This fascinating and understudied form of Hebrew is used widely and productively in the composition of a rich variety of original documents for a Hasidic audience (about e.g. Covid transmission, United States educational stipulations, Zoom schooling, lockdown rules, etc.). In this article we demonstrate that contemporary Ashkenazic Hebrew has many shared orthographic, phonological, grammatical and lexical features with its Eastern European antecedent. These include: orthography of loanwords based on Yiddish conventions (e.g. חולי הקאראנא xóylay ha-koróna ‘those ill with coronavirus’); morphology of plural loan nouns (בקאלידזשעס be-kóleǧes‘in colleges’, הפראגראמע״ן haprográmen ‘the programmes’); retention of the definite article with inseparable prepositions (בהשכונה be-ha-šxíne‘in the neighbourhood’);
Abstract: This chapter outlines the character, causes and extent of antisemitism within English football. This has included several high-profile incidents within English men’s football involving professional players, coaches, officials, and especially supporters. The chapter begins with a short historical background to the presence of Jews and antisemitism in England before moving onto the current situation and then considering how antisemitism is manifest within English football. The chapter expounds why Tottenham historically developed a quasi-Jewish identity that serves as a catalyst for antisemitic abuse from rival supporters. In doing so, the chapter examines the different subcultural meanings and intentions behind the controversial uses of the word ‘Yid’ within the context of English football supporter culture, which has been re-appropriated by Tottenham fans. Finally, the chapter critically reviews the responses to antisemitism in English football by governing bodies within the sport, Jewish community organisations, campaign groups, the criminal justice system, and professional football clubs.
Abstract: In recent decades, comedy studies have displayed a concern with understanding the power dynamics and cultural norms shaping the ‘marginal’ and ‘mainstream’ in comedy. Rarely, however, have intersecting norms concerning religion, gender and race been taken as a point of departure in this field. Through a qualitative analysis of Creeger’s 2022 set Pray It Forward! and of a semi-structured interview conducted with the comedian in August 2022, this chapter explores precisely these issues. Stand-up comedian Rachel Creeger, whose work is the central focus of this chapter, experiences particular intersecting forms of marginalization as an Orthodox Jewish woman on the normatively secular British comedy circuit. She experiences both covert misogyny and anti-Semitism, and more subtle forms of exclusion. At the same time, the frame of marginality is not always experienced by Creeger as a straightforwardly ‘negative’ thing. Instead, Creeger’s comedy complicates the frame of ‘marginality’ through an emphasis on the advantages of having a ‘unique voice’ and on the relatability of her material. Specifically, a repertoire of popular culture references in Creeger’s material blurs the imagined binary between the categories of ‘religion’ and ‘the secular’ and implicitly disrupts norms concerning religion and gender entangled with this binary frame.
