UK prime minister calls for tougher action on further Gaza protests after anti-Semitic attacks

Britain’s prime minister warned on Saturday that tougher action needs to be taken against people chanting certain phrases at Palestinian protests, as concerns grow for the safety of British Jews. after the stabbing of two Jewish men in London.

Keir Starmer said he would always defend the right to protest, but said there may be occasions when other marchers protest. war in Gaza it should be banned. He suggested that the repeated pro-Palestinian marches had a “cumulative effect” linked to the escalation antisemitic incidents in the UK

“If you see, when you hear some of those songs – ‘spread the intifada’ would be one I would pick – there has to be a strong crackdown on that,” Starmer told the BBC. The Arabic word intifada is usually translated as “rebellion.”

A 45-year-old man was charged with attempted murder on Friday after two Jewish men were stabbed and injured on Wednesday in Golders Green, a London area that is the heart of Britain’s Jewish community. Police called the attack an act of terrorism.

It was the latest in a series of incidents involving recent arson attacks in synagogues and other Jewish places in the British capital.

“It’s very scary,” said an Orthodox Jewish resident, who also asked not to be named. he told CBS News on Friday. “I can’t believe what’s happening. We have to live in fear – always looking behind us, wondering if someone might attack us with a knife … and even if we’re walking, where are we going? There are people trying to attack us everywhere.”

The UK’s top police chief warned on Friday that British Jews face the biggest threat they have ever faced, and blamed social media for making religious discrimination more widespread than ever. Mark Rowley, head of the Metropolitan Police, said that British Jews are now the target of all extremist hate groups.

“The shocking truth is that Jews are on everyone’s list, all of those hate groups, whether you’re extreme right, whether you’re extreme left, whether you’re an Islamist terrorist, whether you’re a right-wing terrorist, and hostile states and now serious threats related to Iran,” he told The Times. “There’s a terrible Venn diagram between them.”

Britain’s official terror threat level has been raised from high to serious after Wednesday’s attack. Severe is the second highest on a five-point scale and means intelligence agencies are looking at the most likely attack in the next six months.

The government said the change was not only due to the Golders Green attack but also due to the increased threat “from Islamist and the serious right-wing terrorist threat from individuals and minority groups based in the UK”.

The number of anti-Semitic incidents reported across the UK has risen since the attacks by Hamas-led militants in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and the subsequent war in Gaza, according to the charity Community Security Trust. The group recorded 3,700 incidents in 2025, up from 1,662 in 2022.

“No one here is shocked or surprised that this happened,” Dan Forman, a 22-year-old author and activist from Golders Greer who said his great-grandfather survived a Nazi concentration camp during World War II, told CBS News after the stabbing. “We all know after the previous attacks that this is not a question of if there will be another attack, but when.”