Identifiably Jewish Derbyshire man “shaken” following antisemitic incidents

An identifiably Jewish man from Chesterfield, Derbyshire has spoken out after a series of alleged antisemitic incidents in the area.

The man, who chose to remain anonymous, said that he “saw the Star of David graffiti at first and I felt a little bit shaken, but it didn’t really get to me.” 

However, he added that due to “the repetitive nature of these incidents, the fact that it’s been happening consistently got to me. When it keeps happening, it grinds you down.”

In addition to the Star of David graffiti, swastika graffiti was reportedly seen as well.

The Jewish man stated that as an identifiably Jewish person living in the area, he began to think: “Who’s doing this? Do they really have a problem with me? What’s beneath all this? It’s really worrying and I’m concerned.”

In another example of what the man felt was targeted harassment, a passerby allegedly yelled out ‘Hitler’ towards him.

He believed that the perpetrator was a young child or a teenager. “When I turned around to see who it was, they ran away. It was a very cowardly thing to do,” he said.

A spokesperson for Derbyshire Police said: “Officers are carrying out enquiries following a number of reports of antisemitic graffiti in the Middlecroft area which have taken place during October and November. We take hate crime extremely seriously and are committed to identifying those responsible. If anyone has any information that could help us with our enquiries, please get in touch on the details below, quoting reference 22*671209.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism’s analysis of Home Office statistics shows that an average of over five hate crimes are directed at Jews every single day in England and Wales, with Jews more than five times likelier to be targets of hate crimes than any other faith group.