British Jews

British Jews (often referred to collectively as British Jewry or Anglo-Jewry) are British citizens who are Jewish. The number of people who identified as Jews in the United Kingdom rose by just under 4% between 2001 and 2021.

History

The first recorded Jewish community in

Following de-colonisation, the late twentieth century saw Yemeni Jews Iraqi Jews and Baghdadi Jews settle in the United Kingdom.^[6][7][8] A multicultural community, in 2006, British Jews celebrated the 350th anniversary of the resettlement in England.^[9]

Demographics

Population size

According to the

From 2005 to 2008, the Jewish population increased from 275,000 to 280,000, attributed largely to the high birth rates of Haredi (or ultra-Orthodox) Jews.^[22] Research by the University of Manchester in 2007 showed that 75% of British Jewish births were to the Haredi community.^[23] Ultra-Orthodox women have an average of 6.9 children, and secular Jewish women 1.65.^[24] In 2015, the Institute for Jewish Policy Research reported that in England the orthodox community was growing by nearly 5% per year, while the non-haredi community was decreasing by 0.3% per year.^[25] It has been also documented that in terms of births, between 2007 and 2015, the estimated number of Strictly Orthodox births per annum increased by 35%, rising from 1,431 to 1,932. Meanwhile, the estimated number of ‘Mainstream’ (non-Strictly Orthodox) births per annum increased to a lesser extent over the same period, going from 1,844 to 1,889 (+2.4%).^[26]

Historical population

Going into the 19th century, the Jewish population was small, likely no more than 20,000 individuals. However, the population quadrupled in just a few decades after 1881 as a large number of Jews fled oppression in the Russian Empire. The population increased by as much as 50% between 1933 and 1945, with the United Kingdom admitting around 70,000 Jews between 1933 and 1938, and a further 80,000 between 1938 and 1945. The late 1940s and early 1950s proved to be the high point, numerically speaking, for British Jewry. A decline followed, as many of the new arrivals moved to Israel, moved back to Europe, or emigrated elsewhere, and many other individuals assimilated. The decline continued into the 1990s, but has since reversed. The estimates given before the 2001 Census are likely not directly comparable to the Census, as the Census is based purely on self-identification, whereas the estimates are based on community membership, and it is probably the decline from 450,000 to 266,740 is more like a decline from 450,000 to somewhere between 300,000 and 350,000 going by the metrics of the estimators. Contemporary Jewish demographers like Sergio DellaPergola give figures around 300,000 for the British Jewish population in the early 2010s, since when it has grown.

Migration

The great majority (83.2%) of Jews in England and Wales were born in the UK.

In 2018, 534 Britons emigrated to Israel, representing the third consecutive annual decline. The figure was one third down on 2015 and was the lowest for five years. Meanwhile, immigration of Jews from Israel is consistently higher than emigration of Jews to Israel, at a ratio of about 3:2, meaning the British Jewish community has a net gain of Jewish immigrants, to the point Israelis now represent around 6% of the British Jewish community.^[30][31]

Ethnicity

Geographic distribution

The majority of the Jews in the UK live in southeastern England, particularly in and around

In total, including communities some distance from London, just under 46,000 Jews live in the six counties bordering Greater London, of which two-thirds live in areas immediately adjacent to London. There are, in total, more than 26,400 Jews in

The next most significant population is in Greater Manchester, a community of more than 28,000, mostly in Bury (10,730), Salford (10,370), Manchester (2,630), and Trafford (2,410).

The most Jewish county in the UK is Hertfordshire, which is 2.23% Jewish; this is followed by the City of London, at 2.06%, and then Greater London at 1.63%. Greater Manchester is 1.00% Jewish, Essex is 0.70% and East Sussex is 0.65%. No other county is as much as 0.50% Jewish. The least Jewish county or principal area in England and Wales is Merthyr Tydfil, which is less than 0.01% Jewish despite once having had a significant community. Hertsmere and Barnet councils are the most Jewish local authorities in England, with Jews composing one in six and seven residents respectively. Finchley and Golders Green is the political constituency with the largest Jewish population in the UK.^[39]

The Scottish population is concentrated in Greater Glasgow, which counts around 3,300 Jews. Over 40% of the Scottish Jewish population, or around 2,400 people, resides in or around the Glasgow suburb of Newton Mearns. Fewer than 900 Jews live in Edinburgh; the remaining 30% of Scottish Jewry is scattered throughout the country. The largest Welsh community is in Cardiff, with almost 700 Jews, comprising about a third of the Welsh Jewish population and 0.19% of the population of Cardiff itself. The only synagogue in Northern Ireland is in Belfast, where the community has fewer than 100 active members,^[40] although 439 people recorded their religion as Jewish in the Northern Irish census of 2021; despite remarkable growth since the previous census in 2011, this still leaves the Northern Irish community as the smallest of the four Home Nations both in overall numbers and percentage terms. There are small communities throughout the Channel Islands, and there is an active synagogue in St Brelade, Jersey, although the Jewish population of the island is only 49.^[41][42] There is only a small number of Jews on the Isle of Man, with no synagogue.^[43]

Age profile

The British Jewish population has an older profile than the general population. In England and Wales, the median age of male Jews is 41.2, while the figure for all males is 36.1; Jewish females have a median age of 44.3, while the figure for all females is 38.1.^[18] About 24% of the community are over the age of 65 (compared to 16% of the general population of England and Wales). In the 2001 census, Jews were the only group in which the number of persons in the 75-plus cohorts outnumbered those in the 65–74 cohort.^{[citation needed]}

Education

About 60% of school-age Jewish children attend Jewish schools.^[44] Jewish day schools and yeshivas are found throughout the country. Jewish cultural studies and Hebrew language instruction are commonly offered at synagogues in the form of supplementary Hebrew schools or Sunday schools.

The majority of Jewish schools in Britain are funded by the government. Jewish educational centres are plentiful, large-scale projects. One of the country's most famous Jewish schools is the state-funded

The Union of Jewish Students is an umbrella organisation that represents Jewish students at university. In 2011 there were over 50 Jewish Societies.^[47]

British Jews generally have high levels of educational achievement. Compared to the general population, they are 40% less likely to have no qualifications, and 80% more likely to have "higher-level" qualifications.^[48] With the exception of under-25s, younger Jews tend to be better educated than older ones.^[49] However, dozens of the all-day educational establishments in the Haredi community of Stamford Hill, which are accused of neglecting secular skills such as English and maths, claim not to be schools under the meaning of the Department for Education.^[50]

The annual Limmud festival is a high-profile educational event of the British Jewish community, attracting a wide range of international presenters.^[51]

Employment and income

The 2001 UK Census showed that 30.5% of economically active Jews were self-employed, compared to a figure of 14.2% for the general population. Jews aged 16–24 were less likely to be economically active than their counterparts in the general population; 89.2% of these were students.^[52] In a 2010 study, average income per working adult was £15.44 an hour. Median income and wealth were significantly higher than other religious groups.^[53] In a 2015 study, poverty has risen the fastest per generation than other religious groups.^[54]

Marriage

In 2016, the Institute for Jewish Policy Research reported that the intermarriage rate for the Jewish community in the UK was 26%. This was less than half of the US rate of 58% and showed little change from the rate in the early 1980s of 23%, though more than twice the 11% level of the end of the 1960s. Around one third of the children of mixed marriages are brought up in the Jewish faith.^[55][56]

Religion

There are around 454

• Orthodox ("consisting of the United Synagogue, the Federation of Synagogues and independent Orthodox synagogues") – 42.8%
• Strictly Orthodox ("synagogues aligned with the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations and others of a similar ethos") – 23.5%
• Reform (Movement for Reform Judaism and Westminster Synagogue
  and Chaim V'Tikvah and Hastings and District Jewish Society) – 19.3%
• Liberal (Liberal Judaism and Belsize Square Synagogue) – 8.2%
• Masorti (Assembly of Masorti Synagogues) – 3.3%
• Sephardi
  – 2.9%

Those in the United Kingdom who consider themselves Jews identify as follows:

• 34% Secular
• 18% Ultra Orthodox
• 14% Modern Orthodox
• 14% Reform
• 10% Traditional, but not very religious
• 6% Liberal
• 2% Conservative
• 2% Sephardi ^{[57]: 11–12}

The Stanmore and Canons Park Synagogue in the London Borough of Harrow said in 2015 that it had the largest membership of any single Orthodox synagogue in Europe.^[58]

Culture

Media

There are a number of

Cookbooks grew in popularity in Britain during the mid 1800s and shaped the overall cuisine that British Jews experienced by teaching and inspiring housewives how to cook. The shaping of Jewish food overtime told the story of their frequent migration throughout Europe. There was a lot of influence from Eastern European and Ashkenazi food. This resulted in the common staples of Anglo-Jewish women to keep bread, bagels, and potatoes consistently in their homes. Since, they had a history filled with Diaspora, dishes varied heavily and included fish, meat, spaghetti, pudding, or soup.^[60]

Politics

Before the 2015 general election, 69% of British Jews surveyed were planning to vote for the Conservative Party, while 22% would vote for the Labour Party.^[61] A May 2016 poll of British Jews showed 77% would vote Conservative, 13.4% Labour, and 7.3% Liberal Democrat.^[62] An October 2019 poll of British Jews showed 64% would vote Conservative, 24% Liberal Democrat, and only 6% Labour.^[63]

Jews are typically seen as predominantly middle-class, though historically many Jews lived in working-class communities of London. According to polling in 2015, politicians' attitudes towards Israel influence the vote of three out of four British Jews.^[64][65]

As per a 2023 survey, four out of five British Jews identify as Zionists.^[66]

In London, most of the top constituencies with the largest Jewish populations voted Conservative in the 2010 general election - these are namely, Finchley and Golders Green, Hendon, Harrow East, Chipping Barnet, Ilford North, and Hertsmere in Hertfordshire. The exceptions were Hackney North and Stoke Newington and Hampstead and Kilburn, which both voted Labour in the election. Outside the region, large Jewish constituencies voted for Labour, namely Bury South and Blackley and Broughton.^[39]

Some MPs, such as Robert Jenrick and Keir Starmer, while not Jewish themselves, are married to Jews and have Jewish children.^[71][72]

Antisemitism

The earliest Jewish settlement was recorded in 1070, soon after the

Jews were readmitted into the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland by Oliver Cromwell in 1655, though it is believed that crypto-Jews lived in England during the expulsion.^[4] Jews were regularly subjected to discrimination and humiliation which waxed and waned over the centuries, gradually declining.^[5]

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the number of Jews in Britain greatly increased due to the exodus from Russia, which resulted in a large community forming in the East End of London.^[6] Popular sentiment against immigration was used by the British Union of Fascists to incite hatred against Jews, leading to the Battle of Cable Street in 1936, when the fascists were forced to abandon their march through an area with a large Jewish population when the police clearing the way were unable to remove barricades defended by trade unionists, left wing groups and residents.^[7]

In the aftermath of the

Records of antisemitic incidents have been compiled since 1984, although changing reporting practices and levels of reporting make comparison over time difficult. The Community Security Trust (CST) was formed in 1994 to "[protect] British Jews from antisemitism and related threats".^[73] It works in conjunction with the police and other authorities to protect Jewish schools, Synagogues, and other community institutions.

Polling data from the Campaign Against Antisemitism reveals that almost half of British Jews have contemplated leaving the UK since the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel due to rising antisemitism.^[66]

Communal institutions

British Jewish communal organisations include:

See also

• List of British Jews
• List of Jewish communities in the United Kingdom
• History of the Jews in England
• History of the Jews in Scotland
• History of the Jews in Ireland
• History of the Jews in the Isle of Man
• Emancipation of the Jews in the United Kingdom

Notes and references

Notes

References