Jake Wallis Simons, a veteran foreign correspondent and former editor of the Jewish Chronicle, is one of the most articulate defenders of Israel in Britain. Many readers of this site will have seen him on television putting Israel’s case or read his articles on the subject.
By his own admission the sales of his last book, Israelophobia (reviewed by me here), benefited hugely from a grotesque stroke of luck. His examination of hatred of Israel as a new form of anti-Semitism was first published in September 2023. A month later Hamas launched its murderous pogrom, killing almost 1200 people and kidnapping 251, in southern Israel. As a result interest in his book surged and he was in great demand to put Israel’s case in the media.
Although Never Again is not officially billed as a sequel to Israelophobia it can be seen as an attempt to set the argument in a broader canvas. It is a brave but ultimately inadequate attempt from an avowedly conservative (small c) perspective to explain the main ills of contemporary western societies. Simons places greater emphasis in his explanation on the elite’s abandonment of fundamental values such as patriotism, faith and family. Along the way he seeks to identify how this same trend has fuelled the resurgence of anti-Semitism in recent years. He has won numerous high profile plaudits for the work including from Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform, and Kemi Bedenoch, the Conservative leader.
The main enemy for Simons is what he calls centrist fundamentalism. That is essentially the view that societies are best ruled by experts without any particular loyalty to the countries in which they live. It takes a dim view of nation-states as obsolescent and is dismissive of national governments as outdated relics whose proper role should be to serve elite needs.
On the other hand, it tends to celebrate transnational institutions such as the European Union, the United Nations and human rights organisations. This transnational outlook means that fundamentalists tend to be hostile to the patriotic values held by many ordinary people. Centrist mums and dads, as Simons sometimes refers to them, are typically disimissive of traditional religious beliefs and family values.
This ideology is the mainstream outlook of contemporary western beliefs. Although the public generally rejects its claims that does not put off the centrist fundamentalists from pushing their agenda.
The next stage of Simon’s argument is that the rise of centrist fundamentalism leads to the removal of protection against what Simons refers to as three "viruses": Islamist extremism, progressivism and national chauvinism. The final one is more prominent in America than in Britain.
Traditional national institutions, Simons argues, provides a buffer against the rise of such pernicious ideas. But the weakening of national government and patriotism opens the way for such forces to thrive.
Simons argues such radical ideologies threaten the West in different ways. Islamist extremism - which Simons recognises is different from Islam - is the most violent. The progressivism left is unremittingly hostile to traditional values. National chauvinism promotes older forms of bigotry up to and including neo-Nazism.
In Simons' account Jews get caught up in these developments in various ways. For centrist fundamentalists they represent the hated values of attachment to nation, faith and family (although he accepts not all Jews hold these values). The three radical trends he discusses each have well known animosities to Jews and the Jewish state.
Simons provides a useful, if sometimes flawed, framework to understand some of the most pressing problems of contemporary western societies. Centrist fundamentalism, or what is perhaps better described as technocracy, is indeed a fundamentally flawed form of rule. And the three ‘viruses’ he discusses are a threat to Jews and more generally.
Although there is much truth in Simon’s arguments there are also significant weaknesses. The most fundamental problems is his lack of radicalism. That is not necessarily in a political sense but in his analytical approach. He tends to accept descriptions of political trends at face value rather than probing more deeply to better understand them. This includes in relation to the resurgence of anti-Semitism where he does not properly grasp its dynamic.
This shortcoming is most clear in his treatment of the relationship between contemporary progressivism and the surge in anti-Semitism. Simons fails to see that what used to count as left wing ideas are fundamentally different from those of the past.
The old left tended to have a universalist outlook. It believed social divisions could be transcended because the working class worldwide had an interest in creating a better society. Of course in reality these dreams often ended in disaster but that should not blind us to the fundamental differences with contemporary progressivism.
While the old left, broadly speaking, wanted to transcend social divisions the progressives believe they are entrenched. In their view society is divided into immutable identity groups which can be based on different characteristics such as skin colour and religion.
The next step in this identitarian view of the world is to brand some groups as privileged and others as oppressed. Whites are cast as inherently privileged while Muslims and people of colour are seen as oppressed.
While this outlook is often referred to as identity politics it is better understood as a modified form of racial thinking. It is true that it studiously avoids the old pseudo-scientific language of race which was central to political debate before the second world war. Instead it typically describes social divisions in cultural terms. Neverthless it once again sees societies as plagued by divisions which cannot be overcome.
It is a view that in its fundamental premises was historically more associated with the chauvinist right whereas it is now prevalent on what passes for the left. It is better seen as deeply conservative rather than radical.
The rise of identity politics is also central to explaining the resurgence of anti-Semitism since about 2000. It all too easily casts Jews as hyper-privileged members of the white elite. From there it is a short step to see Israel as an expression of western supremacy over the Muslim world and beyond. From this perspective – if the wholly erroneous premise of identity politics is accepted – then anti-Semitism becomes justifiable as long as the old language of race is avoided. Indeed an unhinged animosity to the Jewish state comes to be seen as a defining characteristics of radical movements.
Never Again is a valiant attempt to understand key shifts in western societies and how they relate to the resurgence of anti-Semitism. Unfortunately it fails to dig deep enough to properly grapple with the key trends at play.
Jake Wallis Simons. Never Again? How the West betrayed the Jews and itself. (Constable 2025).