A Jewish man was the victim of antisemitic abuse on public transport in London twice on Saturday night, his brother said on social media.
The first incident happened on the Underground, on the escalators leading down to the train platforms.
The video shared on Twitter showed a group of teenage boys laughing in his presence, chanting “we’ve got a Jew behind us,” and “we f***ing hate the Jews,” as the escalators descended.
Last night the atmosphere in London was one of united English joy, right? Except for my late friend’s visibly Jewish brother. He had to endure these vile men chanting ‘we fucking hate the Jews, we’ve got a Jew behind us’ in the tube station. I wish that was where it ended (1/2) pic.twitter.com/33RfuBeZSN
— Neil Ilan Lavie-Driver (@ilan_neil) July 4, 2021
An hour later he was harassed again. The man’s brother Shlomie Liberow said on Twitter that his “brother [who is visibly Jewish] was attacked on the 113 bus, heading in the direction of Oxford Circus... and the abuser threatened to ‘slit his throat for Palestine.’”
The video showed the man who had threatened him banging violently on the door of the bus, and shouting antisemitic slurs.
My brother [who is visibly Jewish] was attacked on the 113 bus, heading in direction of Oxford Circus, London at 11:33PM and threatened to "slit his throat for Palestine". Will anything be done about this rampant #Antisemitism @tfl @CST_UK @antisemitism pic.twitter.com/iCKV62rA8b
— Shlomie Liberow (@Shlibness) July 4, 2021
In response to the attacks, an official from Transport for London retweeted Liberow, saying they were “really sorry to hear that this has happened on a London bus,” and told his brother to contact the police to investigate the incident.
Metropolitan Police said they had launched two antisemitism investigations and would be meeting the victim to gather further information.
“How proud I am to be English tonight where someone visibly Jewish cannot use public transport without hearing ‘I [f***ing] hate the Jews,’” Liberow said, and called it “so depressing.”
British Jewish comedian David Baddiel responded to the incident on Twitter, noting the only people who had condemned the incident or tried to raise awareness about it so far had been Jews.
“The lack of non-Jewish allies,” said Baddiel, “as so often in these situations creates a kind of astonished despair.”