Image source, Pool

The PM says the increase in antisemitic attacks mean Jewish people are "scared to show who they are", scared to go to the synagogue or go to university as a Jew, or send their children to school or tell colleagues they are Jewish.

"Nobody should live like that in Britain, but Jews do," he says.

"Yesterday this anxiety, that is always there, went to another place, to terror, frankly. That is the right word."

Starmer says Britain's Jewish community suffered "yet another vile, terrorist attack" yesterday as two men were stabbed "because they were Jews".

The PM, who earlier visited Golders Green, said there he shared his "determination to act, because the truth is, this attack is not a one-off, there have been a series of attacks".

Prime Minister Keir Starmer is delivering an address from Downing Street on the Golders Green attack.

We will bring you his remarks here or you can watch live at the top of this page.

Image source, Pool

Lucy Manning and Daniel Wittenberg
BBC News

Shloime Rand, the 34-year-old victim of the Golders Green stabbing attack, has spoken to the BBC from hospital.

"A very big miracle happened to me, you know, I feel like God's given me back my life," he says.

"I am really happy that it was only these injuries, it wasn't worse. I would have been even happier if nothing would have happened, but you know, in this situation I'm very happy that I survived and I can talk.

"I've had a stab to my chest, and yes, my lungs have to recover. The oxygen was now reduced, and I hope I'll be better soon."

Rand hopes he will be discharged "within the next few days".

Recounting Wednesday's attack, he says he was walking down the street when the attacker came towards him and "just stabbed me in the chest".

He adds: "I managed to jump back, so thanks God."

Asked whether enough had been done to deal with antisemitism, Rand says: "Definitely not. Maybe from now on, you know, government will pull their socks up and begin dealing with the problem properly."

He goes on: "It's terrible, and it can no longer be ignored by the government.

"You know, when it's come to a point that people's lives are in danger... I have all friends and people telling me they're scared to walk in the street, and they look all around them, they don't know what's going on.

"People are now afraid and it's been taken to a new level."

He adds: "Statements coming out from Downing Street that they will not tolerate any antisemitism is not enough.

"The tone they talk about what's going on has to be changed… and it has to be changed in a very different way to get the streets to be safe again."

Harry Low
Reporting from Golders Green

Golders Green resident David Baddiel tells the BBC "that there's not much future for Jewish people here in the UK" following recent attacks.

"I thought about this a year ago. I've been planning it for a year and I keep thinking, 'am I doing the right thing?' Every time I come up with the same conclusion: yes, get out," he says.

"There are other people doing it. I've got family members doing it and I think that other people will eventually do that too.

"This is like the 1930s. This is how it started when Jews lived in Poland. The signs were there, the writing was on the wall, the people felt comfortable, but the writing's on the wall, we need to go."

When asked, he agrees leaving the UK would make him feel sad.

"This culture is what I know," he says. "I'm British, I'm not Israeli. This is where my family are, this is where my community, my friends are.

"It's not what I want to do, it's what I have to do."

Image source, Reuters

BBC News understands that Hatzola, a Jewish charity ambulance service, treated the suspected Golders Green attacker.

Its staff were among the first on the scene and tended to the suspect, who was Tasered by police, before he was taken to hospital.

Yesterday, the London Ambulance Service (LAS) confirmed three patients were treated at the scene and taken to hospital - two by LAS and one by Hatzola.

It's not known which service took the suspect to hospital.

In March, four of the charity's ambulances were set ablaze in a suspected antisemitic arson attack, which also took place in Golders Green.

While Hatzola is run by the Jewish community and operates in places with large Jewish populations, it treats patients regardless of faith.

Daniel Sandford
UK correspondent

The BBC understands that the suspect being held after the Golders Green knife attack yesterday is 45-year-old Essa Suleiman from south-east London.

He was born in Somalia, but came to the UK as a child in the early 1990s. He came legally, and is now a British citizen.

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley previously said he had a "history of serious violence and mental health issues."

He was referred into the government counter-terrorism Prevent programme in 2020.

The referral was closed in the same year. An address in south-east London is being searched.

After his arrest, Suleiman was treated briefly in hospital and now remains in police custody.

He is being held under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, so can in theory he can be held for up to 96 hours if the police are granted permission by a magistrate, though that may not be necessary in this case.

The Met Police has written to residents in Stamford Hill, another part of north London with a large Jewish community, following yesterday's attack in Golders Green.

The force says there has been a "visible increase" in uniformed police patrols in the area in recent weeks, supported by plain-clothes officers.

The Met works "closely with national security partners" to assess and respond to intelligence reports, the letter says. "Our Counter Terrorism Command provides ongoing and advice... to synagogues and other community venues in Stamford Hill".

Specially trained officers conduct risk assessments and policing plans for events in the area, including major Jewish festivals, it adds.

Daniel Wittenberg
Reporting from north-west London

Prayers and religious study are continuing at the synagogue where the two victims were worshipping shortly before Wednesday’s attack.

Hager’s Shul, in Golders Green, also houses a seat of higher Jewish learning known as a kollel, where people have been studying today.

According to one member, the atmosphere this morning was defiant.

“This is who we are. This is where we come. We will carry on coming whatever happens and we will carry on learning. That’s the best protection for all of us," they said.

Image source, PA Media

A new police investigative unit should be introduced in the capital to handle hate crime investigations, the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan says.

In a statement, Khan says he and Met Police Commissioner Mark Rowley have outlined plans for a new policing approach to counter extremism in the capital, including creating a new community policing hub near the centre of the Jewish community in Barnet.

He says the approach would "grow" neighbourhood policing teams in areas with large Jewish populations.

Khan also urges Londoners to "remain on their guard against those who are trying to exploit this attack".

Dominic Casciani
Home and legal correspondent

The government has announced it will “fast track” new powers to go after individuals or groups acting on behalf of state-sponsored organisations.

This is relevant to yesterday’s attacks because of the possibility that a militant Shia group, acting for the Iranian regime, has been targeting British Jews.

The UK’s state threats and terror laws watchdog, Jonathan Hall KC, recommended in May 2025 that the government should pass a law allowing Parliament to ban organisations that are working on behalf of a foreign state and involved in criminality and plotting in the UK.

One target could be Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards.

The tool would be equivalent to the power used to ban groups involved in terrorism, such as the far-right National Action or self-styled Islamic State.

Once a group is banned, the police can pursue suspects for supporting, organising, directing its activities or fund-raising for them, even if they have not committed a specific criminal offence like an attack.

So the plan now being fast-tracked had been a year in the making - which, in fairness to government officials and lawyers, may not be surprising because of the challenge of converting this simple idea into water-tight legal wording.

What does fast-track mean? Well, Parliament returns to work on 13 May with the King’s Speech and the draft plan will be included in it.

But how long it takes to go from draft to law is then down to ministers and the Parliamentary timetable they choose to set.

We're now seeing pictures of Prime Minister Keir Starmer who has been in Golders Green this afternoon.

He was joined by Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley and MP for Finchley and Golders Green Sarah Sackman.

They held a round table discussion with leaders from the Jewish volunteer medical service Hatzola, and from security group Shomrim.

Mahmood told one of the volunteers: "Keeping the community safe, running to towards risk is sadly necessary."

Image source, PA Media

Image source, PA Media

Image source, PA Media

Image source, Reuters

As our correspondent Lucy Manning reported earlier, Keir Starmer was jeered as his car arrived in Golders Green.

You can watch the moment here:

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent, reporting from Golders Green

Sophia Ziff was one of those protesting in Golders Green during the prime minister’s visit and is angry.

"This is my area. I am British," she tells me.

"What the actual heck is going on that I don't know if I'm safe here anymore. I don't know if I should be reconsidering where in the world I should go, because I don't feel safe as a British Jew. I don't feel safe. I do not feel supported.”

She said as a traditionally left-leaning person she felt let down by Starmer: "I just feel like all the platitudes are like ‘thoughts and prayers and ‘so sorry’ and ‘horrific’ but what are you actually doing?"

Diana says she isn't "necessarily protesting against the prime minister".

"I just want to live in a safe environment and feel that Jews can be safe here, and he hasn't done that. So he may not be responsible on his own. He's got a government and other people to appease, but he's not listening to us."

She lives in Golders Green, and have family in Israel "who have asked me if I'm okay, because they feel more worried about me here than I do about them in a war zone".

She says she has thought about leaving the country: "But I was born here. My parents were Holocaust survivors and I think the country should be safe for us here. I don't want to run away."

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent, reporting from Golders Green

A group of protesters holding signs and chanting "Keir Starmer, Jew Harmer" gathered outside the Hatzola offices as the prime minister arrived for a visit in Golders Green.

There was a heavy police presence.

Protesters jeered and shouted "traitor" at him as the car drove in.

The volunteer Jewish medical charity had the ambulances that they run for all communities set on fire in an arson attack in Golders Green last month. Their paramedics were on the scene at the stabbings yesterday.

Those who gathered said they were scared to be Jewish in the UK and more needed to be done to protect British Jews. Some said they would consider leaving the country due to the rising antisemtism here.

One woman said she wondered at what stage they would need to think about it: "I wonder if my parents felt like this in the 1930s."

Image source, Reuters

Image source, PA Media

The stabbing of two men in Golders Green on Wednesday comes after a spate of incidents in recent months targeting Jewish communities.

Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis, who represents Britain's largest Jewish community, said the attacks show "that if you are visibly Jewish you're not safe".

Here's a reminder:

• 2 October 2025: Two Jewish people were killed and three left in a serious condition after a car ramming and stabbing attack outside a synagogue in Manchester

• 23 March: Four Jewish charity-owned ambulances were set on fire in the car park of a synagogue in Golders Green, north London
• 15 April: A brick and two bottles thought to contain petrol were thrown at the Finchley Reform Synagogue in north London
• 17 April: Suspicious items, later found to be non-hazardous, were found near the Israeli embassy in London. A video posted to social media claimed the embassy was going to be attacked by drones

Image source, PA Media

• 17 April: A bag containing bottles of fluid was lit in the doorway of a building in Hendon, north-west London, that was formerly occupied by the charity Jewish Futures
• 18 April: A bottle containing a type of accelerant was thrown through the window of Kenton United Synagogue in north-west London

• 27 April: A suspected arson attack was carried out at a memorial wall in Golders Green. The wall displayed tributes to protesters killed by the Iranian regime during anti-government protesters earlier this year, as well as some of those killed in the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel
• 29 April: Two Jewish men are stabbed in Golders Green, in an attack declared a terrorist incident by the police

Ed Davey, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, has written to the prime minister, urging him to take "immediate and visible action" to protect British Jews.

He sets out three demands to Keir Starmer: to launch a new action plan to tackle antisemitism, to provide additional security to the Jewish community, and to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).

"This is a national emergency. Jewish people must be safe in our United Kingdom. Violence and intimidation against them must stop," Davey writes.

Daniel Sandford
UK correspondent

"We can confirm the suspect was known to the Prevent programme and was subject to a Prevent referral in 2020, which was closed in the same year," the Metropolitan Police says.

"Given the investigation remains ongoing, we will not be providing any further information in respect of this matter at this time and we remain focused on securing justice for the victims of this attack."

• For context: We reported earlier that the BBC understood the suspect had been referred to the Prevent programme. Learn more about what Prevent is here

Harry Low
Reporting from Golders Green

Image source, Reuters

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, speaking in Golders Green after yesterday's attack, says he thinks "this is going to be a long battle".

"The government needs to send some very strong, firm signals," he says outside the Golders Green branch of the kosher Grodz bakery.

"I’m very, very clear there is a differentiation between what is right and what is wrong. We currently allow terrorist organisations with hateful motives to exist as legal organisations, to raise funds, spread their messages and the first thing the government ought to do is proscribe those organisations as indeed do Muslim countries in the Middle East."

Earlier, Farage told BBC News that the situation regarding antisemitic attacks is deteriorating "very rapidly", calling it an "emergency".

Harry Low
Reporting from Golders Green

Edith Binstock has lived in Golders Green for more than 70 years and says when she was young it "was the most amazing place to live in".

The 80-year-old, whose parents are Holocaust survivors, says: "We all lived happily and the non-Jewish neighbours were really cordial to us and everyone got on, and over the last years it's got worse and worse.

"My mother got in at the last minute to England - she thought it was a life of paradise here, but now it's just so awful.

"I know I'm a Jew but I can tell you, England would be a worse place if we all go."

She says she is "not scared" but it's "shocking" that the targets yesterday were "people going about their normal business".

She goes on: "Why do we have to live like this? I have a son in Hatzola [a Jewish charity ambulance service], I have two nephews in Hatzola and they'd do anything to save lives, even somebody who's ready to knife them.

"I don't know how it's got to such a state… I don't know when it's going to get better. I doubt it."