{"id":293664,"date":"2025-12-01T20:41:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T20:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/293664\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T20:41:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T20:41:08","slug":"attorney-general-urges-nigel-farage-to-apologise-over-alleged-racism-and-antisemitism-nigel-farage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/293664\/","title":{"rendered":"Attorney general urges Nigel Farage to apologise over alleged racism and antisemitism | Nigel Farage"},"content":{"rendered":"

The UK\u2019s top law officer, one of the most senior Jewish government ministers, has urged Nigel Farage<\/a> to apologise to school contemporaries who claim the Reform UK leader racially abused them while at school.<\/p>\n

The attorney general, Richard Hermer, said Farage had \u201cclearly deeply hurt\u201d many people judging by their descriptions of his behaviour, and that his \u201cconstantly changing\u201d denials<\/a> had been unconvincing.<\/p>\n

Speaking to the Guardian, Hermer said: \u201cThroughout his defensive responses to legitimate questions put to him, not once has Farage actually condemned antisemitism.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Guardian investigation last month reported the testimony<\/a> of more than a dozen former classmates of Farage at Dulwich College, in south London.<\/p>\n

They included Peter Ettedgui<\/a>, who said a 13-year-old Farage \u201cwould sidle up to me and growl: \u2018Hitler was right\u2019 or \u2018gas them\u2019, sometimes adding a long hiss to simulate the sound of the gas showers\u201d.<\/p>\n

Another minority ethnic pupil claimed that when he was about nine years old he was similarly targeted by a 17-year-old Farage.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe walked up to a pupil flanked by two similarly tall mates and spoke to anyone looking \u2018different\u2019,\u201d the pupil said. \u201cThat included me on three occasions; asking me where I was from, and pointing away, saying: \u2018That\u2019s the way back,\u2019 to wherever you replied you were from.\u201d<\/p>\n

More people have come forward since the Guardian published its initial story; about 20 individuals have now alleged that they were either victims of or witnesses to deeply offensive past behaviour by Farage.<\/p>\n

The incidents they described cover the period when Farage was aged 13 to 18.<\/p>\n

The Reform leader has denied anything he did was \u201cdirectly\u201d racist or antisemitic, and claimed all the former classmates were not telling the truth. Hermer\u2019s intervention comes after Keir Starmer accused the Reform UK<\/a> leader of being \u201cspineless\u201d, arguing that he had \u201cquestions to answer\u201d about alleged comments and chants as a teenager that included songs about the Holocaust, and accusations of bullying towards minority ethnic schoolboys.<\/p>\n

Critics have noted Farage has failed to condemn antisemitism and other forms of racism more broadly in his denials.<\/p>\n

They also point to his failure to discipline his fellow Reform MP Sarah Pochin after she complained<\/a> about the number of black and brown people she saw in adverts.<\/p>\n

She later apologised for the comments.<\/p>\n

After the reports on the Reform UK leader\u2019s school days, Hermer told the Guardian that he considered \u2026 \u201cNigel Farage\u2019s constantly changing story about his behaviour to his Jewish classmates [to be] unconvincing, to say the least\u201d.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cArguing that 20 people have somehow all misremembered the same things about his nasty behaviour simply isn\u2019t credible. Throughout his defensive responses to legitimate questions put to him, not once has Farage actually condemned antisemitism.<\/p>\n

Richard Hermer, one of the most senior Jewish government ministers, says Farage\u2019s \u2018constantly changing\u2019 denials about his behaviour to Jewish classmates is \u2018unconvincing\u2019. Photograph: Andy Rain\/EPA-EFE\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\u201cIf he wants to be seen as a legitimate candidate for prime minister, he urgently needs to address the concerns of the Jewish community, and apologise to the many people he has clearly deeply hurt by his behaviour.<\/p>\n

\u201cRacism in all its forms is anathema to the values of this country and we cannot allow it to ever become legitimised in public life.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the days after the antisemitic attack<\/a> in Manchester in October, Hermer had spoken about the fears of the British Jewish community at his own local synagogue, saying that all they wanted was to live and worship freely, without fear.<\/p>\n

In a separate interview with the Guardian, Rachel Reeves said Farage should \u201cspeak out and say something\u201d if he wanted to look like a real leader.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt speaks volumes how little he has to say, and the very careful language that both you and I would recognise as being drafted in a particular way to say something, but also not to say something,\u201d the chancellor said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe just sits there during PMQs, where people put these things to him, and he hides. He says that he\u2019s a real leader of the opposition. Well, a real leader would speak out and say something. He should explain what he really thinks.\u201d<\/p>\n

In legal letters before publication of the Guardian\u2019s investigation, Farage\u2019s lawyers claimed that \u201cthe suggestion that Mr Farage ever engaged in, condoned, or led racist or antisemitic behaviour is categorically denied\u201d.<\/p>\n

Farage later seemingly shifted his position in an interview with the BBC: \u201cHave I said things 50 years ago that you could interpret as being banter in a playground, you could interpret in a modern light today in some sort of way? Yes.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added<\/a> that he had \u201cnever directly, really tried to go and hurt anybody\u201d. Farage subsequently issued a new statement: \u201cI can tell you categorically that I did not say the things that have been published in the Guardian aged 13, nearly 50 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The UK\u2019s top law officer, one of the most senior Jewish government ministers, has urged Nigel Farage to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":293665,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-293664","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/293665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}