Anti-Semitic hate on the rise, warns star Dame Kristin Scott Thomas
TOP actress Dame Kristin Scott Thomas has told of her fears that anti-Semitism is on the increase in Britain.
Dame Kristin, 54, whose latest film Suite Française is set against in 1940 during the Nazi oppression of occupied France, warned that anti-Jewish feelings were becoming more open.
In a candid interview with Radio Times, she pointed out that France played a role in the holocaust by deporting 76,000 Jews to death camps – and only apologised in 1995.
But she believes the UK has a hate problem as well. “Anti-Semitism has always existed in France but I do think it’s more open now, more accepted,” she said.
“I think people are pointing fingers at certain communities in a way that didn’t happen so much before – a lunatic talking about a march against the ‘Jewifi cation of Stamford Hill’, or others accusing mosques of not doing their jobs.
“We didn’t have that before – or maybe I’m just getting older and hearing it, whereas in my 20s I didn’t notice.”
The star of films like the English Patient and Gosford Park was made a Dame in the New Year Honours, and is married to Jewish fertility doctor Francois Olivennes.
Her lastest film is based on a novel written by Jewish author Irene Nemirovsky, who died at Auschwitz in 1942.
The manu script was discovered 50 years later in a suitcase and it was finally published in 2004, becoming an international bestseller.
Anti-Semitism has always existed in France but I do think it’s more open now, more accepted,
Mother-of-three Dame Kristin’s comments came after four Jewish people were killed by Islamic terrorists in a Paris supermarket, two days after the killing of 11 people at the Charlie Hebdo magazine in January.
Meanwhile two of the UK’s biggest police forces, the Met in London and Greater Manchester, have reported a “significant” rise in anti-Jewish attacks.
More than 70 anti-Semitic hate crimes were recorded in London between last April and Christmas. That is almost double the number of such incidents during the same period in 2013.
Research by the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism found that more than half of British Jews feel today’s persecution has worrying echoes the 1930s.
A Met spokesman said: “The Metropolitan Police Service is committed to tackling hate crime in all its forms and has long since recognised the impact of hate crime on communities.”
He vowed: “We will take positive action to investigate all hate crime, support victims and their families and bring perpetrators to justice.
“If anyone feels that they are the victim of hate crime, including anti-Semitic abuse, we would urge them to come forward and report any incident or crime as soon as possible.”
