The grandest committee room in Westminster Palace fell silent as ordinary British Jews — a student, a waitress, a parent, a nurse — stood to describe a reality that statisticians have been tracking for years but that few in government have moved urgently enough to confront. The event, convened this week inside the Houses of Parliament by Christians United for Israel UK (CUFI) and the GPS Network, was no ordinary parliamentary hearing. It was an emergency summit — and it felt like one.

The “Victims of Antisemitism” event gave a platform, inside the very seat of British democracy, to individuals who have faced death threats, workplace intimidation, vandalism, and physical assault — not in a distant era, but in the Britain of today. Across England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, constituent MPs convened crisis talks with attendees earlier in the day, as organisers tabled a package of ten policy proposals designed to push government action far beyond what advocates say has been an inadequate response to a spiralling crisis.

The Voices That Filled Westminster

The summit’s most powerful moments belonged not to dignitaries or politicians, but to the victims themselves. Priority was given, by design, to ordinary Jewish people from across the country — the faces behind the statistics. Their accounts were, by any measure, shocking.

Rachel Riley: “Regular Brits Would Demand Action”

Television presenter and prominent antisemitism campaigner Rachel Riley addressed the packed room, calling on the broader British public to recognise the scale of what is happening. “Behind soaring antisemitism statistics are real children, families, nurses, teachers — ordinary Jewish people experiencing levels of hate we’ve never known before in the UK,” she said. “Regular Brits stand for fairness and equality. Were they to know the true extent of this crisis, they would demand something be done.”

Riley was joined at the podium by Lord Daniel Finkelstein, the Conservative peer and columnist who has been among the most consistent parliamentary voices on the issue. The presence of both reflects the cross-party, cross-sector urgency that organisers worked to build into the event’s design.

Christians Standing Shoulder to Shoulder

CUFI’s Alastair Kirk delivered a declaration of solidarity that drew visible emotion from those gathered. Speaking on behalf of tens of thousands of British Christians, he made clear that Christian silence on Jewish suffering was no longer an option. “We will not be bystanders. We will not be simply observers of this hatred. We will stand with you shoulder-to-shoulder, until antisemitism is expelled from our midst,” he said.

Kirk framed Christian engagement as both a moral imperative and a practical necessity, noting that Christians significantly outnumber Jews in the UK. “One of our goals at CUFI is to mobilise as many Christians as possible to provide the practical support that is needed,” he said — pointing to the GPS Network’s policy proposals as a concrete vehicle for that action.

“We Jews — We Need Your Help”

GPS Network’s Jeremy Wootliff, speaking to CUFI supporters outside Parliament, did not mince words about the existential dimension of the moment. “The oldest hatred has resurfaced and Jews are now eight times more likely to be attacked per capita than any other racial or ethnic group,” he said. Invoking the well-known warning about the sequential targeting of minorities, he told the crowd: “First they came for the Saturday people, and then they came for the Sunday people.”

His appeal to Christian allies was direct and unashamed: “We Jews, we need your help. We are only 270,000 people. We’re not enough; we cannot win this on our own. We have an equal right to go about our daily lives in peace and without distress.”

Ten Policy Proposals Tabled at Parliament

Together, CUFI and the GPS Network presented MPs with a package of ten proposals designed to complement and go beyond the actions of established organisations — addressing what advocates described as chronic under-enforcement of existing laws and a systemic failure of institutions to protect Jewish victims. Among the headline proposals:

A Movement Taking Shape

What made the Westminster summit notable was not only the gravity of the testimonies or the calibre of the speakers — it was the deliberately grassroots character of an event that placed victims at its centre and built policy proposals from their experiences outward. In the largest committee room in Westminster Palace, ordinary British Jews found themselves finally given a platform inside the institution most empowered to help them.

The organisers are clear-eyed about what comes next: turning the moral weight of the room into political movement. CUFI’s mobilisation of the wider Christian community — through welcome circles, churches, and advocacy networks — represents a potential force multiplier for a Jewish community that, as Wootliff said plainly, cannot win this fight alone. “Antisemitism has become pervasive across the whole of society,” he warned. The question the summit left hanging in the air of Westminster was a simple one: will Parliament answer?