However, the anti-semitism allegations are long-running in Labour
Indeed. AS has an ancient history, and tension over Israel-Palestine and Zionism is a long-standing problem in Labour as in society.
I cannot agree as you implied, that criticism of the Israeli government is by driven by primarily Muslims within Labour. Imo it’s a widespread international concern, at base a human rights issue, dating back to the 80s imo when Corbyn got involved. The shift in perspective on the Israel government is as much do with their own actions as the influence of Muslims.
While Labour MPs have been reported to have curried favour with Muslims by indulging AS tropes (whether justified I don’t know) - intelligent Muslims would not be impressed by that. The Muslim Council for Britain yesterday condemned AS in Labour as ‘unacceptable’ as is Islamophobia in the Tories.
Of the people who have been in investigated or disciplined for AS only one has been Muslim off the top of my head - Naz Shah - and she is the only one who seems genuinely repentant. Livingstone, Wadsworth, Kenneth Campbell - white British.
The other crucial factor in AS is the hard left conspiracy theories around Jewish capitalist elite control of media and banking etc.
There is a confused cross-hatching of the two issues with “Zionists” “Globalists," "Freemasons” “Illuminati," “international monetary elite" and imperialism and colonialism all jumbled in together. (Worth noting the crossover on AS and Lexit anti-EU imperialism).
At base this is just age-old European and American AS conspiracy with new clothes and fresh impetus.
The specific point I made last night is that there is consensus among MPs - and Jewish MPs are very clear on this - that Labour was not institutionally AS before Corbyn. And that the abuse of Jewish MPs that has become commonplace was not the problem that it is now.
“What has happened under Corbyn is that antisemitism, which was always completely stamped on at the fringes, has been given permission to come into the mainstream and, like a cancer, is infecting and growing through the party,” Hodge
“Under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership anti-Semitism has become mainstream in the Labour Party. Jewish members have been bullied abused and driven out...Anti-Semites have felt comfortable and vile conspiracy theories have been propagated.” Ellman
”As a proud member of the Jewish community I have also seen the Labour Party allow anti-Semitism to take root and fester in a way that is unprecedented in modern British politics” Berger
The real cause imo has been the explosion in size of the Labour Party which has attracted a whole raft of new members with dodgy views. The ideological hard left which now dominates the party has manifest a culture of bullying bigotry and intolerance of diverse views. Weak leadership has fundamentally failed to tackle the problem, whether from sympathy or incompetence its hard to say.
Without that and with a stronger more intelligent leader I do not think that AS would ever have become mainstream and snowballed into crisis. I do believe that once Corbyn and his cabal have gone there will be sea change in outlook.