“People might genuinely ask us if we’re antisemitic or racist,” says Seymour as he briefs a crowd preparing to go door-to-door asking people to boycott Israeli goods.
“I know that can be a shocking question to get if you’re motivated by anti-racism. But treat it as an honest question,” he tells the group gathered in the centre of Brighton.
Seymour – he doesn’t want to give his second name – is one of the organisers of a grassroots initiative to create what they’re calling an apartheid-free zone in Brighton and Hove.
They’ve come together to express solidarity with the Palestinian people, but the accusation of many in Brighton’s Jewish community is that the actions of the group could encourage antisemitism.
The volunteers break off into smaller groups and head off around the streets of Brighton city centre.
Working their way down a list of addresses, we watch as a volunteer knocks on a door, explaining he’s trying to get people to sign up to their campaign.
“So I can’t eat hummus?” asks the man who opens the door. “Well, you can eat hummus but just not Israeli hummus,” says the volunteer.
‘Targeted campaign against Israel-supporting Jews’
Vicky Bhogal from the organisation Jewish and Proud is following the volunteers around, having seen the promotion of the campaign online.
“It makes me feel sick to my stomach,” she says. “Because I feel that it’s a targeted campaign to turn the people of Brighton against Jews who support Israel.
“They know they can get away with this. They know they can go door to door, eliciting support.”
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She continues: “Any campaign against Israel is a campaign against British Jews. You can’t separate it. The way I see it is that the modern face of antisemitism is anti-Zionism.”
Organiser Seymour – who is also door-knocking – says he isn’t antisemitic but is anti-Zionist. “The Zionist ideology is an apartheid ideology in our view,” he says.
I ask him if he can understand why people who dispute that view would be uncomfortable if they opened the door to one of his volunteers.
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“It might be uncomfortable,” he says. “But it’s only a one-on-one conversation. We’re very polite [at] the door. Whatever someone’s background is, we treat them like anyone else.
“It’s no different from the actions of a political party like the Conservative Party or the Labour Party who also go door to door and ask people how they feel.”
‘UK dealing with sense of antisemitism and mistrust’
It’s a complex issue, but many in the Jewish community say they are feeling insecure and vulnerable at a time of deep concern over antisemitism across the UK.
Fiona Sharpe is the community liaison for the Sussex Jewish Representative Council.
She says: “I think there is an underlying feeling that this country and this city [Brighton] is dealing with an underlying sense of antisemitism and mistrust unlike anything I have ever experienced.
“I think increasingly we see Jewish communities and individual Jews almost forced to take what I call purity pledges – to say ‘yes I’m Jewish, but I don’t support the state of Israel, the situation in Gaza or whatever’.
“I’m a British Jew. I don’t need to justify my existence and my place in my city to anybody.”
‘No part of society not scarred by antisemitism’
Fiona says she feels antisemitism is cutting through “all segments” and “all classes” of British society.
She says: “There is no part of British society that is not marred and scarred by antisemitism.”
Brighton musician Josh Breslaw told me: “I think the targeting of one nation and one group of people that are very closely connected to that nation is very wrong, very worrying, very sinister.”
Josh is the Brighton-based drummer in the band Oi Va Voi. A venue in Bristol admitted it was a mistake to cancel a gig by his band following complaints from pro-Palestinian activists.
Promoters in Brighton then cancelled Oi Va Voi after Josh refused to sign a declaration that their performance wouldn’t be political.
He says: “I’ve never heard of anyone doing anything like that before. I would call it anti-Jewish racism straight up.”
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Josh says his band isn’t a “vehicle” for political beliefs. “In the music industry, there does seem to be this kind of loyalty test – this Spanish Inquisition. If you say the right thing – if you post the right statement online – then you can play,” he adds.
“If you refuse to say what they want you to say – regardless of your beliefs – then you’re on the outside. The right kind of Jews will be allowed to perform.”
