Number of UK Schools Marking Holocaust Has Dropped by Nearly 60% Since Oct. 7 Massacre

The number of British schools commemorating the Holocaust has plummeted by nearly 60 percent following the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel.

Since Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists perpetrated the largest single-day massacre of Jews since World War II, the number of secondary schools across the UK signed up for events commemorating Holocaust Remembrance Day, which takes place annually on Jan. 27, dropped to fewer than 1,200 in 2024 and 854 in 2025, according to data from the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust.

The figure had been rising each year since 2019, reaching more than 2,000 secondary schools in 2023.

There are about 4,200 secondary schools in the UK.

Sir Ephraim Mirvis, chief rabbi of the UK, commented on the figures in an essay published in The Sunday Times, expressing alarm about an increasingly hostile environment for the British Jewish community.

“I fear for what will happen this year,” Mirvis wrote. “For if we cannot teach our children to remember the past with integrity and resolve, then we must ask ourselves what kind of future they will inherit.”

Mirvis urged readers to put themselves in the shoes of a UK teacher preparing a Holocaust memorial event. “Now imagine that as you begin to organize such an event, you learn that some parents of pupils at your school are unhappy about it,” he added. “One of the claims that Holocaust education is a form of “propaganda”; another insists that the event must not go ahead unless it also highlights the awful suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.”

Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, described to The Times how some students “arrive in the classroom with views shaped by social media trends rather than evidence.”

The European Jewish Congress (EJC) released a statement on Monday reflecting on the drop in UK schools recognizing the Holocaust.

“Holocaust Memorial Day is not about politics. It is about memory, responsibility, and education. It exists to honor the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust and to remind future generations of the consequences of hatred, indifference, and extremism,” the EJC stated. “Avoiding commemoration out of fear of controversy undermines the very purpose of education. When remembrance becomes optional, memory itself becomes fragile.”

The EJC continued, “Now is precisely the moment when Holocaust education matters most: when misinformation spreads easily, when antisemitism is openly visible, and when fewer survivors remain to bear witness. Schools play a vital role in preserving this memory, not only for Jewish communities, but for society as a whole.”

Dwindling commemoration of the Holocaust comes amid a steep surge in antisemitism across the UK.

The Community Security Trust (CST) — a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters — recorded 1,521 antisemitic incidents from January to June this year. This was the second-highest number of antisemitic crimes ever recorded by CST in the first six months of any year, following 2,019 incidents in the first half of 2024.

In total last year, CST recorded 3,528 anti-Jewish hate crimes — the country’s second worst year for antisemitism, despite an 18 percent drop from 2023’s record of 4,296.

“When a trigger event such as the Oct. 7 attack occurs, antisemitic incidents initially spike to a record peak; then gradually recede until they plateau at a higher level than before the original trigger event occurred,” CST stated.

These figures juxtapose with 1,662 antisemitic incidents in 2022, 2,261 in 2021, and 1,684 in 2020.

The struggles of the UK’s educational establishment to counter the rising antisemitism problem mirror the ongoing challenges confronted by its medical institutions.

In November, UK Health Secretary Wes Streeting called it “chilling” that some members of the Jewish community fear discrimination within the NHS, amid reports of widespread antisemitism in Britain’s health-care system.

The comments came weeks after British Prime Minister Keir Starmer unveiled a new plan to address what he described as “just too many examples, clear examples, of antisemitism that have not been dealt with adequately or effectively” in the country’s National Health Service (NHS).

One notable case drawing attention involved Dr. Rahmeh Aladwan, a trainee trauma and orthopedic surgeon, who police arrested on Oct. 21, charging her with four offenses related to malicious communications and inciting racial hatred. In November, she was suspended from practicing medicine in the UK over social media posts denigrating Jews and celebrating Hamas’s terrorism.

Other incidents in the UK included a Jewish family fearing their London doctor’s antisemitism influenced their disabled son’s treatment. The North London hospital suspended the physician who was under investigation for publicly claiming that all Jews have “feelings of supremacy” and downplaying antisemitism.