Anti-Semitism and the British Left

[bluebeau]

Here they go again. Why does the British Left have such an antisemitism problem?

Labour fringe speaker's Holocaust remarks spark new antisemitism row

A senior Labour MP has said he is shocked at some of the anti-Semitic tweets by party members that come before its disciplinary panel. John Cryer said some of what is written "makes your hair stand up", adding: "This stuff is redolent of the 1930s."

After the Chakrabarti whitewash, I'm not listening to anything Corbyn and the left have to say any more. And don't even get me started on Ken Livingstone. I'll never trust Labour or the left ever again, until they stand up and say, "We allowed anti-semitism to arise within Labour. We just went,'deny, deny, deny' and looked the other way. We were wrong". Then, and only then, will I ever give them the time of day once again.

I doubt it is just coincidental that anti-semitism has only reared its ugly head of late, since Corbyn took over as leader of the Labour party. I'm not saying there was none at all before then, but that was when it got bad. Did you see, a few months back, a Liberal Democrat MP with anti-semitic views started shooting his mouth off? LibDem leader at the time, Tim Farron just turned around and fired him, immediately. That's leadership. Corbyn, on the other hand, has let Labour party anti-semites run riot and basically done nothing. He didn't even deal decisively with Livingstone, who should have been banned from Labour ten times over by now.

Corbyn has damaged forever Labour's reputation as a non-racist party. It took decades to build up that reputation, and just one world class muppet to ruin it.

It would be so easy to stop talk of anti-semitism once in for all by JC publicly stating that he condemns all anti Semitic hate speech.
That he won't unfortunately speaks volumes.
I'm a member of the Labour Party and supported JC in the leadership bid but I can't continue to support him while he stays silent on this issue.

Name changed because some of these people are really nasty. I reported an anti-Semitic holocaust denier to the compliance unit (the bit of Labour that deals with member misbehaviour, I'm a member too). They are still a member. Just a quick google of their name proves what they are. But nothing.

Sam, exactly. If men declared sexism wasn't happening, whites declared racism wasn't happening, straight people told LGBQ that homophobia wasn't happening, we'd be agog. But somehow everyone but Jews get to tell us to just shush as anti-semitism is not a thing anymore and our perceptions are not valid. And if we persist then people trot out "I know Jews who agree with me".

I did find Ken Loach's response on the Daily Politics yesterday very strange. Why is the fact of the holocaust up for discussion? Is the fact of the existence of Henry VIII up for discussion? Of course not - I'm all for a bit of evidence based discussion, but some things are self evidently true and in no need of discussion. God knows there's enough to be getting on with without "discussing" an established fact.

I don't think it's anti-semitic to discuss what's going on in Gaza and the current Israeli government's actions.

I have honestly no idea why Labour has a problem with anti-semitism, and agree - just deal with it, cut it out.

Again, for those wanting information about some of the ways this manifests uk.businessinsider.com/mp-ruth-smeeth-ive-never-seen-anti-semitism-in-labour-like-this-2016-9

And here's a Guardian article about why Jews should be the voice listened to when defining anti-Semitic behaviour.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/27/labour-denial-antisemitism-party-dark-place

Yep militant tendency/now momentum have finally totally infiltrated labour.

It's very frightening because millions of middle of the road politics people, the vast majority of the sensible pragmatic population have no voice and no party to represent them.

Nasty right wing tories or nasty left wing momentum.

Very sad for the country.

And fake news?? The response of dictators to the press.

It's all a lie. You know you are talking bollocks when you copy trump!

So who are going to be the next Gang of Four?

Chuka Umuna
Yvette Cooper
Peter Mandelson
Tristram Hunt??

And what could they call themselves? Thinking a Centrist Democratic Party might work.

Of course there are violent right-wing thugs- the groups mentioned already on this thread, such as the EDL, the KKK, the Golden Dawn and others. What I meant, though, is that hard-left violence is far more widespread - look, for example, at the various riots in London or antifa, or the violence that happens at eg G7: there are a much higher number of participants involved - the vile right wing can only dream of that level of audience participation (fortunately).

On a more cerebral level of unpleasantness, it's not in the Daily Telegraph that you can read soul-searching op-eds on whether it is possible to be friends with a Labour supporter...

All that aside: the State of Israel passed into existence by dint of UN Resolution 181. No other sovereign state (in the legal sense) is called upon to justify its existence - or, for that matter, defend its existence against those who refuse to recognise that it's a legal, geopolitical entity - in the way that Israel is. To criticise Israel is not anti-Semitic (unless it's being done in a way that is anti-Semitic of course) and to criticise any government of Israel's actions is also not inherently an anti-Semitic act either. However, there is an unfortunate pattern within the Labour party of failing to recognise that there is also frequent anti-Semitism passed off as legitimate criticism of the State or Government of Israel, even at Conference, and failing to condemn unreservedly anti-Semitism full stop, whether as identified by Jews or not. But PP's point, that Jews are the only minority who are told that their feelings vis a vis hate crime don't count is indeed correct - both in the Labour party and, I feel, in the wider community as well.

PP mentioned it's a sectarian issue in parts of Scotland - it's precisely the same in Northern Ireland.

On a happier note, let's hope that the Kurdish referendum passes off calmly, and that there will be an independent Kurdistan to look forward to in the near future. I do find it fascinating that Palestine is treated as sui generis almost always, with nations falling over themselves to recognise it, despite the numerous issues over things like economy and borders, yet nations like Kurdistan and Somaliland, which do a much better job at fulfilling the various international legal requirements for statehood, don't raise the same interest or passion in the international arena or amongst the general public. Part of this will be because of lack of general knowledge, and lack of influence in the international sphere, of course - but it is interesting nonetheless.

Whilst I agree that the anti-semitic remarks by some in the Labour Party were hardly ever reported before Jeremy Corbyn became leader, this does not make the lack of action correct in any shape or form. Ironically a man who only became leader because of an electoral system introduced by his predecessor who is of Jewish heritage.

The cult of Corbyn needs enemies to rally momentum against. Class warfare, anti Conservatives, anti red Tories, anti Semitic, anti capitalism, anti America, anti Nato .....

He throws out 100 of Billions of pounds like mana from heaven and hatred of their enemies will blind his followers to the consequences. I am starting to think he is actually trying to bankrupt the country so he can bring down our capitalist democracy and institute a Venezuelan-esque utopia.

Re the comments above about Holocaust denial being pure stupidity or foolishness.

No, really not. Please don't dismiss the Holocaust denial phenomenon as coming from something so harmless.

Admittedly, there's a significant number of people who believe the moon landings were faked. I can come up with no explanation for this other than that they're feeding their emotional need to view themselves as a "rebel", who knows "secrets". So there must surely be people who think like that of other historical events, like the Holocaust.

But with Holocaust denial there is demonstrably a number of people who "believe" there was no Holocaust because that's what they want to believe, for political or anti-Semitic or generalised white-Aryan- supremacist reasons. And there's actually a Holocaust denial industry.

I read Deborah Lipstadt's excellent Denying the Holocaust when it came out in the 1990s, and then watched bog-eyed as David Irving, a denier who had written books on WWII and Hitler, sued her for libel - and lost. The entire Irving Judgement by Mr Justice John Grey was published by Penguin, Lipstadt's original publisher, and is a surprisingly accessible read.

This is paragraph 13.163:
Finding as to Irving's Motivation
"Having reviewed what appear to me to be the relevant considerations, I return to the issue which I defined in paragraph 13.138. I find myself unable to accept Irving's contention that his falsification of the historical record is the product of innocent error or misinterpretation or incompetence on his part. When account is taken of all the considerations set out in paragraphs 13.140 to 13.161 above, it appears to me that the correct and inevitable inference must be that for the most part the falsification of the historical record was deliberate and that Irving was motivated to by a desire to present events in a manner consistent with his own idealogical beliefs even if that involved distortion and manipulation of historical records."

Irving is not a stupid or foolish man by any manner of means. But he is an anti-Semite, and he is dishonest.

BTW, there's a recent film about this, Denial, which I thought good, although it's light on detail because of the constraints of a 90-min feature film.

And there's Jackie Walker, former vice-chair of Momentum www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/03/momentums-vice-chair-removed-antisemitism-row-jackie-walker

Going by the links given above re the Labour Party Conference, the incident referred to seems to be a Jewish Israeli-American speaker, Miko Peled, who is not a Holocaust denier, discussing how to deal with Holocaust deniers.

Labour fringe speaker's Holocaust remarks spark new antisemitism row
amp.theguardian.com/politics/2017/sep/26/new-antisemitism-row-for-labour-over-fringe-speakers-holocaust-remarks-miko-peled

"Speaking at an event on free speech and Israel, Peled is reported to have said: 'This is about free speech, the freedom to criticise and to discuss every issue, whether it’s the Holocaust: yes or no, Palestine, the liberation, the whole spectrum. There should be no limits on the discussion.'

The Daily Mail quoted him saying: 'It’s about the limits of tolerance: we don’t invite the Nazis and give them an hour to explain why they are right; we do not invite apartheid South Africa racists to explain why apartheid was good for the blacks; and in the same way we do not invite Zionists – it’s a very similar kind of thing.'
...
"In an email to the Guardian, Peled pointed out that he himself was Jewish, but was not a member of the Labour party. He said: 'The Holocaust was a terrible crime that we must study and from which we must all learn. I reject the idea that Holocaust deniers, foolish as they may be, should be treated as criminals and I doubt that supporters of Israel should be given the authority to judge who is or is not a racist and antisemite.

'Promoters of racist ideologies should not be given a public platform, and to me that does include people who promote Zionism – which is a racist ideology whose followers have committed and continue to commit crimes against the people of Palestine.

'If we are to do justice to the memory of the millions of victims of the Holocaust, Jewish and Roma and many, many others, then we must engage in robust debate and education about the causes of current, ongoing violence and injustice.'

poppy

Interesting 4 and if only only Yvette had been ejected we wouldn't be in this awful mess.

How on earth in a democracy does a news journalist need a body guard at a party conference?

What have we come to?

Perking, in those quotes, though, Peled is repeatedly equating Zionism with apartheid and Nazism. I care not a fig that he is Jewish, he's still an anti-semite.

Self-determination as a nation is all very well and good it you're Tibetan or Kurdish. If you're Jewish then it's not.

The world's focus on a tiny landmass with just over 8 million people is something I always find a tad fishy.

Perking - it's the Holocaust yes or no bit that is problematic. It is not a crime to deny the Holocaust in the UK, and few people think it should be, but that doesn't mean that the party should allow it as legitimate discourse. It's interesting that Mr Peled (who from his talk is clearly a few sandwiches short of a picnic) believes in listening to Holocaust deniers but considers Zionists beyond the pale.

Elected obviously

PerkingFaintly I saw some undercover film about far right groups recently; Irvine was with one crowd and he was still denying the Holocaust.
Thats the sort of person I associate with Holocaust denial.

joeymaynard why don't middle of the road people vote Lib Dem ? Doesn't have to be Labour or Tory.

I think hollocaust denying should be illegal in Britain actually.

It's a fucking insult to millions who died, it's a matter of pure fact and in this wierd age of conspiracy theories I think ugly facts should be set in stone and defended.

violet

I think they have been too tarnished by clegg. I think maybe if they could merge with like minded proper labour MPs to form a new party that might work?

I'm Jewish, a member of the labour party, have not experienced anti semitism personally (well I have during my life but not from anyone who has professed to be a Labour supporter). I am not naive about anti semitism in politics (I would be surprised if anti semitism is restricted to any one party although clearly in recent years it has been far more public as an issue within labour). I do accept legitimate criticism of the Israeli government as not exclusively anti semitic (not criticism of the state itself, which has a right to exist although I do also believe that the Palestinians have a right to their own homeland too).

I think that Corbyn has reacted far more decisively now to the issue of anti semitism and should the issue rear its ugly head again then I would expect to see him continue to react to it and deal with it. I want to see the Tories challenged because I think that we are reaching a critical stage in where we are going as a country and I fear a future after Brexit where there is significant deregulation, low tax, the state shrinks in terms of public services and a lot of people are left without a safety net.

user

Your experiences are your experiences and totally valid.

I thunj on Brexit only a fool wouldn't be apprehensive about the outcome but what have labour said about it?

We have no proper policy apart from the ridiculous 'stay in the single market' which we can't unless we accept free movement and obviously it's the idiot Tony Blaire accepting free movement that's led to Brexit in the first place.

Don't think the tories have much of a handle on things but neither do labour.

Yeah, I've been trying to work out what he's actually saying, because all the article gives is very short scraps from his speech at the conference, then a bit from an email sent later.

If he's saying that there should be no limits on discussion, and there should be the freedom to discuss everything with criminal charges EXCEPT Zionism, then I'd go with the anti-Semitic explanation.

However the language has actually changed by the time he gets onto Zionism, and he's now talking about "inviting" and being "given a public platform." Which isn't the same as not criminalising.

And he specifically says that Nazis shouldn't be given a platform and invited to explain their beliefs, even though he wouldn't criminalise Holocaust denial.

So either he's very mixed up and talking nonsense, or he's making a careful distinction between two things - ie not inviting speakers, and criminalising speakers - and the reporting has elided the two things.

This is one of these things that would probably become clearer looking at Peled's other work, which I haven't done.