Leading members of Harrow’s Jewish community have joined together to condemn anti-Muslim campaigners who are planning a protest in the borough this weekend. Rabbis Aaron Goldstein, Hillel Athias-Robles, Kathleen Middleton, Frank Dabba Smith, and Michael Hilton have signed a letter offering unequivocal support for the borough’s Muslim community.
They wrote: “As leaders of the Jewish community in Harrow, we are writing to express our support for our Muslim friends and neighbours, especially those at Harrow Central Mosque, who are under attack from those whose only purpose is to spread hatred and fear. We share the desire of the Muslim community of Harrow to respect our mutual traditions, to learn from each other’s cultures and ways of life, and to live together in peace.”
The Rabbis, from Northwood and Pinner Liberal Synagogue, Middlesex New Synagogue, Harrow and Wembley Progressive Synagogue, and Kol Chai Hatch End Jewish Community, used the letter to condemn Stop Islamisation of Europe, who are planning a protest outside the mosque in Station Road on Sunday, December 13.
The show of unity from the Jewish community is in defiance of a direct appeal by SIOE on its website for 1,000 Jews bearing the Israeli flag to turn up. However, the Rabbis hit out at SIOE’s “outrageous lies” which are “entirely without foundation” and accused the self-confessed islamaphobic organisation of spreading hatred and violence to divide the Harrow community.
See also Watford Observer, 8 December 2009