Prince Harry has described rising antisemitism in Britain as “deeply troubling”, saying that while people were entitled to feel anger over events in the Middle East, there could be no justification for hostility towards individuals or faith communities.

The Duke of Sussex appeared to make a veiled criticism of the Israeli government, while stressing that legitimate protest should never tip into hatred.

“Across the country, we are seeing a deeply troubling rise in antisemitism,” Prince Harry wrote in the New Statesman. “Jewish communities – families, children, ordinary people – are being made to feel unsafe in the very places they call home.”

The number of antisemitic hate crimes recorded in April in London was the highest in two years, recent data showed, as the Metropolitan police committed to deploying 100 extra officers to protect Jewish communities.

Among the offences were attempted arson attacks at Finchley Reform synagogue on 15 April and at the former premises of the charity Jewish Futures in Hendon three days later. A further attempted arson attack targeted a memorial wall in Golders Green on 28 April. Golders Green was also the scene of a double stabbing on 29 April that is subject to a terrorism investigation.

Some politicians and Jewish community leaders have argued that antisemitism has been inflamed by extremist rhetoric at some pro-Palestinian protests, and called for the marches to be banned.

In his article for the New Statesman, Prince Harry, wrote: “There is deep and justified alarm at the scale of loss in the Middle East. Images from Gaza, Lebanon and the wider region – of devastated communities and entire neighbourhoods levelled and reduced to rubble – have shaken people to their core. For many, the instinct to speak out, to march, to demand accountability, to call for an end to suffering – is both human and necessary.”

But, he added, “these two realities are being dangerously conflated. We have seen how legitimate protest against state actions in the Middle East does exist alongside hostility toward Jewish communities at home – just as we have also seen how criticism of those actions can be too easily dismissed or mischaracterised.”

The prince also condemned rising Islamophobia, writing that when anger leads to attacks on “communities – whether Jewish, Muslim, or any other – it ceases to be a call for justice and becomes something far more corrosive.”

The prince, who now lives in California, has been criticised in the past for wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party 20 years ago. In 2009, he was also criticised for describing a Pakistani member of his platoon while serving in the army as “our little Paki friend”.

In his article, he acknowledged these mistakes, writing: “I am acutely aware of my own past mistakes – thoughtless actions for which I have apologised, taken responsibility and learned from. That experience informs my conviction that clarity matters now more than ever.”

Harry’s intervention comes as the archbishop of Canterbury used a visit to the Sternberg Centre for Judaism to warn of a “horrifying increase in antisemitic violence over the past few weeks, months and years” in Britain, saying it was “completely unacceptable” that Jewish communities lived in fear and with heavy security.

Speaking at the centre, Sarah Mullally said it was “it was impossible to ignore the distressing truth about Jewish life in Britain today.”

She added: “This is not a problem for the Jewish community to solve. It’s on all of us – every single member of our society – to call out antisemitism whenever we see it, and to oppose it without hesitation or qualification.”

The Church of England, Mullally said, knows acts of solidarity must also mean action, as well as words. “We are committed to serve the whole nation by working together to tackle hatred in all its forms, knowing that violence against one group wounds us all.”

The black-cab rapist John Worboys has been denied parole for the second time.

The Parole Board told his victims on Thursday that it had decided against either releasing Worboys or allowing him to move to open conditions within prison.

Open conditions in prison means offenders are held under minimal security and can work in the community.

Worboys, 68, was convicted in 2009 after being found guilty of assaulting his victims after drugging them with spiked drinks. He was found guilty of sex offences against 16 women, but police say he could have had more than 100 victims.

The Guardian understands there is not a fixed date for his next parole hearing, but that the board thinks it could be in about one to two years. The date is dependent on a decision from the Ministry of Justice and the work the offender would have to complete to be eligible for parole.

A Worboys victim who remained anonymous during the campaign to keep him behind bars, known as Sarah, told the Guardian: “Thank goodness the right decision has been made and the Parole Board have recognised what a danger he is. We can all sleep lighter knowing he is still behind bars.”

Worboys coaxed his victims into taking drug-laced drinks from him after they got into his cab for a ride home. He would claim to have won the lottery or from betting on horses, showing his victims a bag of cash and offering them champagne.

Carrie Johnson, the wife of former prime minister Boris Johnson, testified against Worboys after taking a drink from him that she believed was spiked. She has been campaigning against his release from prison.

Johnson said: “It has been a hugely anxious wait knowing that Worboys was up for parole again. The relief I feel knowing that he will remain behind bars is hard to put into words. Women and girls across Britain are safer as a result of this decision.”

She had previously campaigned to keep him behind bars in 2018 after the Parole Board decided Worboys could be freed from prison after serving nearly 10 years. The decision was reversed after a legal challenge by his victims.

After the challenge, the Parole Board decided he should remain in jail because of his “sense of sexual entitlement”, among other reasons. A subsequent probation report in August 2019 found he was “potentially just as dangerous now as the point of the first sentence”.

Four more victims came forward in 2019, and Worboys was handed two life sentences, with a minimum term of six years.

This comes after the release of a new ITV drama Believe Me, which focuses on Sarah’s story and how the victims were failed by the Metropolitan police.

In 2018, the supreme court ruled that the police owed human rights damages to two of Worboys’s victims after they reported being assaulted in 2003 and 2007, and he was failed to be arrested or charged. Due to what the court said were significant errors, officers failed to charge the London cab driver at that stage. Worboys went on to assault as many as 100 more women.

The Ministry of Justice has been contacted for comment.