Last month, before her wedding, a close friend of mine decided to purchase an assortment of second-hand crockery from local charity shops. These items were meant to be used by guests during the reception.

As an artist, she transformed these worn dishes by adorning them with intricate paintings and cheeky slogans. At the end of the celebration, guests were invited to take a piece home as a keepsake.

My daughter chose a side plate embellished with floral designs and a cheeky slang phrase for a part of the male anatomy. Meanwhile, I opted for a bowl that featured the phrase ‘More Joos.’

The Antisemitism Policy Trust notes that this particular misspelling is often used online by individuals trying to bypass filters or algorithms that detect the term ‘Jew.’

However, my friend is anything but an anti-Semite. With pride in her Jewish heritage, she cleverly reclaims this slur, showcasing her humorous and defiant spirit.

I was particularly drawn to that bowl because, in recent years, my friend’s Jewish identity has been a topic of reflection for me.

As the oldest hatred has roared back, I’ve seen how she – and other Jewish friends – have grown increasingly anxious. A bleak new tradition has emerged where I reach out to these chums each time a new anti-Semitic atrocity occurs.

A quick message to say ‘I’m thinking of you’ seems woefully inadequate in response to something like the murderous Hamas invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023 but it’s all I have to offer.

The scene near Bondi Beach in Sydney after gunmen opened fire at Jews celebrating Hanukkah

Mourners visit a floral memorial in honour of the victims of the mass shooting on Sunday

And it’s true. I think of these friends – and the fear they feel – increasingly often, these days.

On Sunday, as news broke of the Islamist terror attack on a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi Beach in Sydney, I sent a new raft of these messages.

‘Another awful day,’ replied a pal in London. ‘I wish I could say it’s the last one but it’s not.’

I wish I could have told him he was wrong.

But he was not.

We should be in no doubt that anti-Semitism is not only on the rise but that it is frequently excused or minimised by people in positions of power and authority. Their shame should dog them.

Shortly after news of Sunday’s attack in Sydney, which left 15 people dead, First Minister John Swinney posted words of condolence on social media.

‘I am horrified,’ he wrote, ‘by the events at Bondi beach and send my sympathy and solidarity, and that of the people of Scotland, to those affected. This is an appalling incident.’

John Swinney initially failed to mention Jewish victims when posting a message of condolence on social media – before later describing the shooting as an ‘appalling act against the Jewish community’

There was no mention in Mr Swinney’s post of the fact that this was another brutal attack on Jews.

An hour after several people pointed this out, the First Minister issued a second statement in which he stated – correctly – that this had been an ‘appalling act against the Jewish community at a precious moment in the Jewish calendar’.

Mr Swinney got there in the end but his failure to identify the problem in the first instance was hardly surprising. It is now clear that a great many mainstream political figures on the self-styled ‘progressive’ left feel uncomfortable identifying anti-Semitism wherever it occurs.

This, I’m afraid, is because mainstream parties of the left – the SNP, Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens – have many members who not only harbour hatred of Jews but see themselves as righteous for doing so.

Of course, they don’t usually come out and say how they feel. Instead, they talk of opposition to Israel or of being anti-Zionist.

Particularly grotesque is the tendency for ‘good’ people to demand Jews account for the actions of the Israeli government.

At its most extreme, this manifests itself in angry protesters gathering outside synagogues where they accuse attendees of supporting ‘genocide’. But it also presents in more subtle ways.

The Jewish journalist Noa Hoffman – raised in Sydney, university educated in Edinburgh – was invited on to BBC Radio Scotland’s Mornings phone-in show on Monday to discuss the Bondi Beach murders.

Jewish journalist Noa Hoffman discussed the atrocity on BBC Radio Scotland in the wake of the shootings 

Members of Ms Hoffman’s family live near the site of the attack and the distress in her voice was apparent but she spoke with great clarity about the ‘weird, unholy alliance between ultra progressives and Islamists’.

She spoke of protesters calling for the globalisation of the intifada and about the risk to Jewish lives of that rhetoric.

Presenter John Beattie put it to his guest that ‘most people’ who participate in protests over the Middle East are criticising the actions of the Israeli government in Gaza.

Ms Hoffman made the entirely accurate point that a large number of those protesters are going further than simply condemning Israeli policy decisions.

‘The percentage of people on protests who are veering into rhetoric that totally crosses the line is not small,’ she said. ‘People are significantly overstepping.’

I was horrified when Mr Beattie responded to this point by asking, in the most dismissively condescending tone, ‘You don’t think Israel’s overstepping?’ To Ms Hoffman’s great credit, she composed herself quickly enough to state that she did not understand how that was relevant to people being murdered in Sydney.

‘I don’t,’ she added, ‘understand why you would ask me that.’

I’m afraid I do understand. The BBC’s reporting on conflict in the Middle East and on protests in the West has been shockingly partial.

Hamas propaganda has been reported as fact by several of the corporation’s correspondents and the broadcasting watchdog Ofcom was even compelled to intervene when it emerged the BBC had run a documentary about Gaza without informing viewers that the narrator was the 13-year-old son of a member of the terrorist organisation’s command.

Over the last few days, we’ve heard endless statements of solidarity from political leaders on the Left who have remained silent in the face of increasingly hateful protests by Islamists and their useful idiot allies from the Left.

Those offering words of sympathy should have spoken out sooner.

They should have condemned marches during which protesters called for the destruction of Israel.

They should have left police in no doubt that calls to ‘globalise the intifada’ are not statements of solidarity but of hatred against Jews and that those making them should face consequences for their criminal behaviour.

Instead, what I hope is their cowardice (for it would be unbearable to think they are all motivated by hatred of Jews) has allowed anti- Semitism to flourish.

What happened in Sydney on Sunday was shocking, indeed, but it will happen again. It will happen on the other side of the world and it will happen here, at home, in the UK.

And the legacy of the ‘progressives’ who only speak up when they have no other option will be more dead Jews.