British Foreign Secretary David Cameron last visited Israel in November 2023, and though the conflict is no longer the top news agenda item in the Western media, the context could not be more kinetic and volatile. The agenda for discussions with Israel will be marked not by what Lord Cameron sets out to achieve but by what the UK (and US) seek to avoid; in broad terms that is escalation into an all-out regional conflict (dragging in the US and UK) including direct confrontation with Iran, and a potential humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

I have just returned from Israel. It was never going to be an easy trip, but I felt well prepared. In fact it turned out to be both more depressing and more uplifting than I had anticipated.

As we look back in sorrow on 2023, a year overshadowed by Hamas’s 7th October attacks on Israel and the ensuring conflict, we should take a moment to reflect that for those in the Jewish community it was also the start to a terrible Rosh Hashanah (with the attacks coming barely a month afterwards, on the eve of Simchat Torah which celebrates the beginning of a new cycle in the Jewish calendar).

Today marks the start of Hanukkah – a time when Jewish families gather together to celebrate the miracle at the heart of the “Festival of Light.”

The images of the pale, weak and overwhelmed hostages as they are freed from captivity should serve as a reminder that without pressure from Israel, in the form of a ground invasion into Gaza, their fate would have been as additional entries on Hamas’s tally of terror and barbarism.

This week’s news cycle has seen unrelenting focus on the Al-Shifa hospital, with ever increasing media skepticism turning into hostility towards, and condemnation of Israel, as it searches for hostages and pushes forward with its mission to ensure Hamas’ terrorist infrastructure and its ability to operate as a terrorist organisation are destroyed.

As the Israeli ground invasion progresses, a coalition is gradually emerging between those that were reluctant to condemn the 7th October (7/10) terrorist attacks on Israel and even those who, it appears, were prepared to only give lip-service to Israel’s right to defend itself. This nascent and loose coalition is rallying around the call for an immediate unilateral ceasefire.

Growing up embedded into a strong Jewish community, just outside of London, I previously believed that antisemitism had largely been discredited due to increased awareness and enlightenment like other forms of abhorrent discrimination such as racism, homophobia and sexism.