There was a time when setting fire to ambulances parked outside a house of worship would have been universally treated as self-evidently wrong. There would have been no debate, no search for context, only shock and a shared understanding that something had gone very wrong.
That was before everything could be explained, if one tried hard enough.
Early Monday morning in Golders Green, four ambulances were set on fire outside a synagogue. They belonged to Hatzola, a Jewish volunteer emergency service whose crews respond to medical calls and treat anyone in need, regardless of religion or background.
In another time, that detail might have settled the matter. It would have been obvious what had been targeted.
Now it requires explanation.
An Iranian-backed group reportedly claimed responsibility. A Shi’ite organisation called Ashab al-Yamin, “the People of the Right”, released a video on Telegram showing the attack, accompanied by a statement in English, Hebrew, and Arabic describing the synagogue as “one of the main bastions of support for Israel in Britain”.
And there it is. A justification that places a Jewish neighbourhood, a house of worship, and even an ambulance within bounds. Once “Israel” or “Zionist” is introduced, the nature of what is in front of us begins to shift.
A synagogue is no longer simply a place of worship. It is recast as something political, part of a broader category. The same shift extends to anything associated with it. What would otherwise be understood at face value is reinterpreted as something else. The ambulances, in this way of thinking, are not just ambulances. They too are seen as belonging to a system, and systems are treated as legitimate targets.
This is not usually stated outright. It does not need to be. It appears in the way events are framed and in what is left unsaid. It rests on a quiet assumption that certain targets carry a meaning beyond what they are. Over time, that assumption changes how events are received.
Incidents that would once have been met with moral clarity are now filtered through the language of context. The focus shifts from what was done to why it might have happened. The result is not approval, but something closer to explanation, and explanation begins to soften what once felt like a firm boundary.
So when ambulances are set on fire outside a synagogue, the reaction is no longer straightforward. There are statements and condemnations, but they feel rote. And there is also a noticeable hesitation, a sense that the act fits into a larger story.
This is how the line between rhetoric and violence disappears. Not suddenly, but as language reshapes how actions are understood and blurs the line between right and wrong.
Hatzola’s volunteers will replace the ambulances. They will continue responding to calls and treating whoever needs help. What has changed is the environment in which they are doing that work. It is an environment in which even something as basic as a London ambulance can be reinterpreted until its destruction feels, if not justified, then at least explainable.
It is worth asking, quietly, how we arrived here. Because once that shift has taken place, it becomes difficult to say what still stands outside it. And harder still to say what would shock us now.
Aviva Klompas is CEO and cofounder of Boundless, a nonprofit dedicated to fighting antisemitism. She is also the host of the Boundless Insights podcast.
