LONDON: The UK government announced an extra £25 million ($33 million) to fund security for Jewish communities on Thursday, a day after two London Jews were knifed in the latest attacks targeting the community.
“People have a sense of deep insecurity… and that is why the government is bringing forward investment, an additional £25 million to invest in the security of our Jewish community,” interior minister Shabana Mahmood told Sky News.
“That will pay for more protective security for our Jewish synagogues, schools, places of worship, community centres,” she added.
Wednesday’s assaults in north London come in the wake of a string of arson attacks on synagogues and other Jewish sites in the area and a deadly attack in which two people died at a synagogue in Manchester last year.
A little-known group believed to be linked to Iran, and which has claimed responsibility for the London arson attacks, said one of its “lone wolves” was behind the stabbings, the SITE Intelligence Group reported.
Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya (HAYI) — meaning The Islamic Movement of the People of the Right Hand — made the uncorroborated claim in a video posted online, according to SITE.
Mahmood also said the government would legislate to deal with “a gap in the law when it comes to organisations that may be linked to hostile states” and their proxies.
The government would be “fast tracking that legislation in the coming weeks”, she said.
A 45-year-old man, a British national who was born in Somalia who came to the UK as a child, remains in custody following Wednesday’s stabbings in the street in broad daylight.
The victims — two men aged 76 and 34 — were in a stable condition in hospital.
Monitoring groups have reported a surge in antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents in Britain, particularly since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
