Published: 19 July 2019
Last updated: 4 March 2024
THIS WEEK HAS BEEN shaming for Labour, as BBC’s Panorama revealed that the leader’s office had interfered in the handling of anti-Semitism cases within the party.
It’s easy to get lost in processes and procedures. But the key question lies elsewhere: why would a party that defines itself as anti-racist have attracted anti-Semites in the first place?
Some try to say that any mass membership organisation will always reflect the wider society, and since Britain includes anti-Semites, so too will the Labour party. But that doesn’t wash. Britain includes a fair number of meat-eaters, but you wouldn’t expect to find any in the Vegetarian Society.
Others say that it must have something to do with the Middle East, as if anti-Semitism is bound to arise when people feel so strongly against Israel and for the Palestinians.
But that misses the fact that huge chunks of the egregious anti-Jewish racism spewed out in left circles and on social media has nothing to do with Israel or Palestine: it’s all bankers and Rothschilds, control of the media and Holocaust denial.
FULL STORY The roots of Labour’s anti-Semitism lie deep within the populist left (Guardian)
UK Labour lords condemn Corbyn for ‘toxic’ anti-Semitism in party (Times of Israel)
After 200 ex-staffers suggest Jeremy Corbyn might need to step down, 60 members of House of Lords accuse him of presiding over ‘most shaming period in Labour’s history’
Photo: Sam Matthews, Labour's former head of disputes (BBC Panorama)
