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Birnbaum wrote that he viewed the request as a political “purity test” applied because he was Jewish.
By Shula Rosen
A British rabbi said a family vacation booking in France was canceled after the owners of a holiday rental asked him to state his views on Israel. The owners did not allow him to book the property because he would not condemn the Jewish state.
Rabbi Dr. Yoni Birnbaum, senior rabbi of Finchley United Synagogue, described his family’s ordeal in a Jewish Chronicle opinion piece.
He said he reserved a summer property in eastern France at the beginning of May using his regular email address, which includes the word “rabbi.”
The booking was confirmed and a 50% deposit was paid before the owners contacted him nearly a month later after identifying him as Jewish.
In an email, the owners asked Birnbaum to confirm whether he belonged to “a progressive, liberal Jewish movement” that condemns Israeli military operations in Gaza and territories they described as “occupied.”
They wrote that if he did not oppose what they described as the Israeli government’s “violent and criminal actions,” they would cancel the reservation and refund the deposit.
The owners said they opposed “every form of terrorism, such as that of Hamas and Hezbollah,” but added that they could not provide accommodation to people they believed supported Israeli military actions.
Birnbaum wrote in his op-ed that he viewed the request as a political “purity test” applied because he was Jewish.
In his reply, he said he had never raised his faith during the booking process and argued that he was being judged on the basis of his identity rather than as an individual customer.
He also challenged the owners’ comparison to guests from Lebanon, Gaza, or Iran, writing that he was a British citizen whose grandfather had fought in the British Army during World War II.
The property owners later maintained that they had not discriminated on the basis of “origin, religion, skin colour, etc.”
They said they had questioned Birnbaum “as an individual, not as a Jew, not because you are Jewish,” and defended canceling the booking.
Birnbaum rejected that explanation, arguing the exchange occurred only because his email address identified him as a rabbi.
He said the incident reflected a broader pattern in which Jews are required to justify or distance themselves from Israel before being accepted in everyday settings.
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