On Sunday last week I was a guest speaker at the opening of the newly refurbished Hillel House in Leeds, which provides kosher accommodation and a “home from home” for Jewish students at Leeds University. Hillel Houses can be found across many campuses in this country.

Leeds has the largest number of Jewish students at any university in the country. Its flagship Hillel House not only provides this home from home, but also provides a much needed haven for the many Jewish students who find themselves attacked on University campuses across the country by anti-Israel supporters, and worse, by anti-semites. Anti-semitic attacks on Jewish students nationally have gathered pace in recent years, often provoked by paid agitators funded in other countries and I have spoken publicly over the last few years, about the real need to protect Jewish students who find themselves suffering racist attacks which they have done nothing to provoke. It is a truly horrifying situation recognised in a Parliamentary report on the problem which acknowledges how serious and widespread it is.

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