On Yom Kippur, 2 October 2025, the United Kingdom was shocked by a murderous attack on worshippers at a synagogue in Manchester. Shocked, but not surprised – such was the reaction within the Jewish community. Anti-Jewish hate speech has gone hand in hand with the demonisation of Israel and of those associated with it. It … Continue reading The ‘Genocide’ narrative and ritual vilification: South Africa’s discursive distortion, and Manchester’s complicity in anti-Jewish violence
Author: ymatras
A storm broke the tea cup: Perspectives on the Gaza conflict
Gaza conflict, July 2025: Israeli protestors in Tel Aviv carrying images of Palestinian child victims and Palestinian protestors in Gaza carrying images of Israeli child victims (images from @HenMazzig) I recently attended a social gathering of international academics who get together occasionally to watch films. This time, the suggested piece was Gaza Sound Man. Promoted … Continue reading A storm broke the tea cup: Perspectives on the Gaza conflict
Antisemitism and the fight against racism. My thoughts on the Runnymede Trust report ‘Facing antisemitism: the struggle for safety and solidarity’
Left: Me in a playful mood exploring so-called 'pride in heritage'; Right: Great-grandfather Rabbi Meir Matras who escaped pogroms in the Jewish Pale of Settlement in present-day Ukraine. In January 2025 the Runnymede Trust published a short report entitled ‘Facing antisemitism: the struggle for safety and solidarity’, authored by members of the Birkbeck Institute for … Continue reading Antisemitism and the fight against racism. My thoughts on the Runnymede Trust report ‘Facing antisemitism: the struggle for safety and solidarity’
The story of Hugh, or: Why I’ve joined the London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism
At the age of nineteen I left Israel to take up university studies in Germany. It was the early 1980s. Israel had launched a military offensive in southern Lebanon and the only way to avoid serving in the army was to leave. My grandmother, who was raised in the German-speaking principality of Danzig and had … Continue reading The story of Hugh, or: Why I’ve joined the London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism
Manchester connections, universal roots
My great-grandmother Pepi Bleich-Schwager arrived in Manchester, England in 1899 with her mother Chaje after leaving the town of Skalat in Austrian Galicia (now Ukraine). They travelled via Hamburg with a group of Jewish emigrants and found work as seamstresses in Manchester’s flourishing textile industry. Pepi met my great-grandfather, Moses (Morris) Margulies, of Brody in … Continue reading Manchester connections, universal roots
Yaron Matras 