A man has been arrested after a Jewish family, including three young children, were subjected to anti-Semitic abuse on the London Underground.
The suspect was held in Birmingham on Saturday night on suspicion of committing a racially aggravated public order offence and remains in custody.
His arrest follows a video circulated widely online, which shows a man reading anti-Jewish bible passages to two young boys in skullcaps while they were travelling with their family on the Northern Line.
The man can also be seen threatening a man off-camera after he tries to intervene before a mother in a hijab – Asma Shuweikh – steps in.
The mother-of-two from London told the PA news agency she “wouldn’t hesitate to do it again”.
“I would have loved more people to come up and say something, because if everyone did, I do not think it would have escalated in the way that it did,” she said.
She explained that she knew she “had to confront him” as soon as she saw what was unfolding in front of her.
“Being a mother-of-two, I know what it’s like to be in that situation and I would want someone to help if I was in that situation,” she said.
By intervening, she said, she was hoping to deflect attention away from the couple and their three children who were being targets,
She said: “He was quite aggressive and was getting in my face.”
Fellow commuter Chris Atkins took the video after catching the Tube heading south on the Charing Cross branch of the line at midday on Friday.
“I would want someone to help if I was in that situation””
“The Muslim woman didn’t take any shit from him and really, really took him to task, very firmly and persistently,” Atkins said.
“In this day and age we are told how intolerant everyone is and all religions hate each other and there you had a Muslim woman sticking up for some Jewish children.”
He uploaded the video of the incident to Twitter shortly after in took place, and within minutes social media users were hailing Shuweikh as a “hero”.
Shuweikh said she got off the Tube after two stops and did not realise the video was going viral until a friend texted her to say she had seen her on Twitter.
She created a Twitter account so she could see the reaction.
She said: “It was so heartwarming to see the responses and see what people were saying. I can’t take all the credit because a lot of other people were involved.
“I would not hesitate to do it again.”