A London synagogue is raising funds to convert part of its premises to accommodate a refugee family from Syria.

UK unlikely to reach target of resettling 20,000 Syrian refugees Read more

The South London Liberal Synagogue, in Streatham, is planning to make a two-bedroom flat available to a family being resettled in the borough of Lambeth. It needs to raise £50,000 to refurbish a disused caretaker’s flat in the building, which is a former school.

“This is a very personal issue for a lot of our members,” said Alice Alphandary, the synagogue chair. “There is a sense that we as Jews have benefited from sanctuary in the past. For example, my father was a refugee in the 1950s. Now we want to repay that welcome to a new generation.”

The synagogue – part of the Liberal Judaism movement – is a member of Citizens UK, which campaigns on behalf of refugees and other social justice issues. The London borough of Lambeth has committed to accommodating 20 families under the government’s programme that aims to see 20,000 vulnerable refugees from Syria resettled by 2020.

So far six Syrian families have been housed in the borough, including a couple and their four children who are living in a cottage in the grounds of Lambeth Palace, the home of the archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby. Two more families are expected to be housed next month.

Last July, Welby and home secretary Amber Rudd unveiled a national scheme to encourage members of the public, community groups, faith organisations, charities and businesses to sponsor refugees. However, only two Syrian families have been resettled under the scheme in the past six months. The government has said that rigorous checks needed to ensure the safety of refugee families have slowed the process. Councils have struggled to find suitable accommodation for families, which must be self-contained and meet certain standards. Private landlords are paid a local housing allowance rate, which in Lambeth is currently £302 per week.

“We will get rent from the local authority, so it will provide some income for the synagogue,” said Alphandary. She added that the disused flat needs refurbishment, including a new kitchen and bathroom. “It has to be somewhere that we ourselves would be happy to live in.”

The synagogue has 220 adult members, and Alphandary said the project has generated an interest and enthusiasm among some of those who were not usually so active. “People see it as a great opportunity to make a difference.”

The plan has been called the “Abraham’s tent project” after the biblical story of an open-sided tent created by Abraham to welcome strangers. “Hospitality is almost a religious obligation,” said Alphandary. Other synagogues in the UK, along with churches and mosques, have also raised funds for and supported refugees.

Danny Rich, the senior rabbi of Liberal Judaism and co-chair of the National Refugee Welcome Board, said: “Liberal Judaism has been a leading partner in the campaign to bring Syrian refugees to Britain. We have done so not only because our own history reminds us of the fate of families whom the world abandons, but because the single most repeated ethical injunction in the Hebrew Bible is: ‘You shall love the stranger because you know the experience of being a stranger in the land of Egypt’.”

The synagogue will launch its fundraising drive at an event next month, and is to set up a donations page on its website next week.