Mark Wadsworth has not been found to be anti-semitic, but to have brought the Labour Party into disrepute. He was in fact guilty of that. At a sensitive press launch, showcasing a very important report the Party was introducing, Wadsworth thought it appropriate to take the microphone in front of a massive media presence and launch a verbal attack on a Labour MP. Nothing Wadsworth said was anti-semitic, and I quite accept his assurance he had no idea that Smeeth was Jewish. Here was my analysis of the incident written on the day, which I believe has held up well. But Wadsworth’s notion that he was at an appropriate place and time to attack a Labour MP was, at the very least, extremely misguided.
In short, Wadsworth should have saved his justified complaint about the right wing infiltrator Ruth Smeeth’s co-ordination with the Daily Telegraph and pursued it by a more suitable avenue.
Equally, expulsion from the Party is an over the top reaction to Wadsworth’s rashness, and plainly is being done to placate the witch-hunt of “anti-Semites” which is the Blairites’ lead effort to undermine Corbyn.
The impression Wadsworth is “expelled for anti-Semitism” will now be allowed to stand, in the hope it will placate the Israeli lobby who marched 50 parliamentarians strong in a lynch mob to intimidate Wadsworth’s hearing. Corbyn seems to me to have gone down entirely the wrong path. You cannot sate the bloodlust of a witch-hunt by burning a few people you know are not really witches, in the hope the witchfinders will then get bored and go away. Caroline Lucas on Question Time last night, in her assertion that we must not be cowed into failure to criticise Israel and that anti-zionism does not equal anti-semitism, showed more political courage than the entire Labour Party leadership.
Watching that hatchet-faced Friends of Israel mob bear down on the Wadsworth hearing reminded me of the secretly taped meeting between Shai Masot of the Israeli Embassy and Joan Ryan MP of Labour Friends of Israel, where he told her he had over £1 million to give her to influence the Labour Party in Israel’s favour.
So Mark Wadsworth did bring the Labour Party into disrepute, but not nearly as much as Joan Ryan MP, and in about the same measure as every member of the lynch mob whose equally unnecessary intrusion on a party disciplinary hearing gave the media plenty of occasion for knocking copy. But do not expect natural justice to prevail in the UK’s distorted, propaganda-led politics of 2018.
I don’t think that asking why a Labour MP was coordinating with a Telegraph reporter brings the party into disrepute, no matter where it occurs. I do think Labour has a pretty serious anti-black racism problem, and that its right wing needs to be pushed out. The 40 or 50 MPs who advocated for the expulsion of a black anti-racist and BAME diversity advocate have brought the party into serious disrepute. They need to be held accountable for their unconscionable (and racist) actions.
“I don’t think that asking why a Labour MP was coordinating with a Telegraph reporter brings the party into disrepute, no matter where it occurs.”
Can we consider that? Do you think that if he stood out and shouted about Smeeth during a piano recital that would be OK? Or in a labour ward? Corbyn was engaged in a very very tricky exercise of introducing the Chakrabati report to the media vultures, and Wadsworth messed it up. Your rejection of the notion there is ever a time and place to speak and not to speak is silly. Your sympathy for him is well-placed and understandable – he ought certainly not be expelled – but it leads you to take a daft position.
Wadsworth was given a microphone and wasn’t shouting. Her was primarily speaking to the lack of BAME diversity at the event. Was it the best or most appropriate forum to make the accusation about media collusion? Probably not, but that’s a far cry from bringing the party into disrepute, in my opinion. And have you considered why you understand the situation differently from it occurred, attributing shouts where none occurred?
Marc Wadsworth didn’t bring the Labour Party into disrepute. It’s a poor day when telling the truth is deemed to be bringing the Labour party into disrepute. Wadsworth pointed out that Smeeth was working hand in glove with the Daily Telegraph. It wasn’t a verbal attack. The meeting was meant to launch Chakrabarti’s report on anti-semitism – it wasn’t supposed to be a further opportunity for Smeeth to hone the skills she learnt at BICOM.
BBC R4 world tonight news headlines – “The Labour Party activist Marc Wadsworth [was] expelled for an outburst against a Jewish MP at the launch of a report on anti semitism”.
Here’s Tony Greenstein’s take on the expulsion of Wadsworth.
http://azvsas.blogspot.co.uk/2018/04/jewish-voice-for-labour-surrenders-to.html
This anti-semitism drive mostly highlights the anti-democratic and often ludicrous positions of those who push it, inviting the opposite results of those hoped for. Next week’s local elections could see tactical voting and protest votes like we haven’t seen in years, especially after the fictions of Salisbury and Syria and the Blairite attacks on Jeremy when asking for proof. Those events woke up a LOT of people.
One of the supporters of Ruth Smeeth is the MP Luciana Berger who is also Chair of the Jewish Labour Movement [JLM] affiliated to the UK Labour party and the Israeli Labour party, the JLM says it organizes within the World Zionist Organization [WZO] whose goals include establishing Eretz Yisrael as a greater Israel from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean, including the whole of Jerusalem. WZO’s Settlement Division actively supports settlements in the Occupied West Bank.
Israeli Labour Party leader Avi Gabbay and sister party to the UK Labour party also supported by the jewish Labour Movement [JLM] within the UK Labour party called the settlement enterprise “the beautiful and devoted face of Zionism” and said Israel must retain control over the Jordan Valley. The JLM have been calling for zero tolerance in the Labour Party for anti-Semitism, but they themselves support grave war crimes. The settlement enterprise is classed as a grave war crime in Article 49.6 of the Geneva Conventions and in the ICC act UK, 2003. The World court [ICJ] gave its opinion in the ‘Wall Case’ in 2003 when all 15 Judges said ALL the Israeli settlements were contrary to the Geneva Conventions.
Gabbay declared that God promised the Jews the entire land between the sea and the Jordan. That is not quite correct: God promised us all the land from the Euphrates to the River of Egypt. God never made good on that promise.
Gabbay declared that in any future peace agreement with the Palestinians, not a single Jewish settlement in the West Bank would be evacuated.
Several years ago the Bil’in village took the Canadian company Green Park International to court in Canada, here is part of the prosecution case…
“Under international law, it so happens that a breach of Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention is classified as a war crime. The term “war crime” has no clear, universally accepted definition, but essentially war crimes are those violations of the laws of war so grave that they have been specially designated by the international community as an extraordinary class of offence whose reprehensible nature would “shock the conscience of all right-thinking people” (to use the words of Cory J. in R. v. Finta, [1994] 1 S.C.R. 701). Laws against war crimes are generally aimed at atrocities against civilians, prisoners of war, and other non-combatants.
A war crime, to put it succinctly, is a very serious matter. Further, it is easy to see why the offence in question falls into this special category. Article 49(6) is essentially a law to prevent colonialism. One need look no further than the current condition of the indigenous peoples whose domain once spanned the entire expansive breadth of this continent to appreciate the gravity of the consequences territorial dispossession can inflict upon a population. Most war crimes deal with offences against individuals or groups of individuals, but the offence in Article 49(6) is one that threatens the integrity of an entire people. It clearly qualifies as an exceptional offence of higher order that is of grave concern to the global community as a whole” Should the Jewish Labour Movement [JLM] be expelled from the UK Labour Party because they support grave war crimes Should Diane Abbott claim “We are looking at introducing a programme of education quite possibly delivered by organizations like the Jewish Labour Movement. An organization that supports grave war crimes teaching Labour party members the error of their ways. You could not make it up.
the labour friends of israel are traitors to britain – this organisations, which has hed sway for far too long here within labour, should be banned and its members thrown out of the labour party. Rumour has it that 80% of the tory party are similarly affected – it is a cancer, an unseen cancer that holds power in britain – there’s no wonder nobody criticises the actions of a fascist nation which kills people for fun!
I am not quite sure why any party should be friends with any particular other ‘nation’ or country, after all they are really supposed to represent us and not to have specific friendships and loyalties. Labour has several groups which are friends of various countries, not just Israel. The implication is that Labour (and other parties) are not friends with all the rest of the world.
@jazza 07:13
Although I pay reasonable attention to significant world events as and when they occur, I would not claim to be a student of politics, particularly of the ‘left -right’ dichotomy (perhaps because under Blair there wasn’t one?), but late last night I read something in connection with this Walford business that shook me to the core – so much so that I posted a very guarded comment on another thread, which hinted at what you have made explicit.
One has only to set these ‘friendships’ in the context of the Bush administration in the US having been heavily populated by individuals with dual nationality to see the danger. We too invaded Iraq on a pretext and have recently participated in missile strikes against Syria, again on a pretext, and no doubt with Israeli approval (quite possibly applause, if the behaviour of those three cheering observers of the twin towers’ collapse is anything to go by).
“the labour friends of israel are traitors to britain “: classic racist, right-wing antsemitism, plain and simple.
Harry
The problem that is not discussed is that international law and the UN do not recognise god as a real estate registering or donating authority. I wonder who is to blame for this?
Brings to mind the old tongue-twister, ‘The Smeeth—sorry, Leith—police dismisseth us.’
Just had a mass attack on my shit We need to find secure servers before tshtf
https://youtu.be/AjI2J2SQ528
Boardindundee,
Iceland is a great place for Servers. My wife loved the place. You guys are in competition with my son, but he is not complaining.
In case of a Massive Denial of Service Attack, follow these rules
“Björk – Human Behavior (Official Music Video)”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDbPYoaAiyc
Tony
5 minutes ago, that was the Sugarcubes. How did you switch it?
i have always been a hippy stoner , but now it is true there seems to be a war on freedom https://youtu.be/BFQPNApwJGU
I’m afraid that, horrible though it is, Julian has been consigned to the dustbin of what passes for history. Poor brave bastard.
Will Marc go down the same drainhole as Julian?
@ labougie April 28, 2018 at 00:36
Don’t count on it – a lot of things could change if/when Corbyn gets in.
When Craig went to big school he made a determined effort not to attend any lectures
LOL
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=w2M7snEx1zs
I have met her Mum. She is a lovely lady. She just wanted Justice for Kirsty. I empathised completely. She got her head chopped off.
“The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl – Fairytale of New York”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrAwK9juhhY
Tony
I knew an ex-journalist and musician.He invited me to the Justice for Kirsty meeting, though at the time I had almost no interest in politics. I only went to record the event.
https://www.justiceforkirsty.org/
He was the first person to tell me how Princess Diana was assassinated.
He knew.
Tony
I had no choice, Tony. There was only one School in the area, and some pupils only got home at weekends, but it was grand, it was in Dingwall! (i.e. a state school, not a fee paying school).
I read a post on Chris Spivey’s website this week, that contained no off the wall “conspiracy theories”, that he documented almost live when they were happenning, no signs whatsoever of schizophrenia (as if after the grief(getting arrested twice in his home at 2:00 am by the heavy mob) and the court case he was told bluntly by the intelligence services…”Carry on Spiv, but keep using this program, where you will match two people, who look absolutely nothing like each other, and you try and convince your audience that they do”. Spiv’s latest, showed no signs of any of these symptoms. I can’t reply to him except to say…
One of my best friends Children, was diagnosed as being autistic. he was about 3 years younger than my son. They knew each other. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with him at all. He was very sociable to me, When we went to a party, at his parents house…he would come into the garden, and grab hold of my hand, and take me upstairs to his bedroom to show me what he was working on -on his computer. He wanted to know everything my son was doing too. I didn’t think he was even shy. I just thought he was incredibly intelligent – but at school, and then the people he was referred to, he was diagnosed as being autistic..as if he was sub-normal????
Not only did he run his little computer business, but by the time he was 15, he had the most beautiful girlfriend you can imagine…He then goes on to Leicester University and gets a top class degree in Mathematics. I have no idea what he is doing now, cos his Mum and Dad split up, and his Dad has buggered off to Spain. I always thought he was the cleverest and nicest of the family…though his little sister is very successful too. He is probably married now with two kids. There was never anything wrong with him.
I hate these labels, especially when it is the thick ones labelling the bright
http://chrisspivey.org/autism/
“Autism Denial – Einstein Didn’t Talk Until He Was Four”
I have no idea if that is true, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was.
Tony
All Chris Spivey had done, was to analyse stuff that he saw in the mainstream media, and post his own views about it on his own blog. No one was forced to read it. It may have been a total load of nonsense, like most people who write on blogs write.
The police however, were told to arrest him. This was at about 2:00am. He had his teenage daughter and his grandson at home with him.
This is a real terror movie. It is not made up. His daughter recorded this on her mobile phone. No wonder she was terrified – and what about him? He had broken no laws whatsoever. He was merely posting his own views on his own blog in England.
“2nd ILLEGAL ARREST of CHRIS SPIVEY.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWCwUOeBW9M
Tony
Just a tiny chink of light in the darkness that is today’s dysfunctional United Kingdom.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/27/snoopers-charter-investigatory-powers-act-rewrite-high-court-rules
Ah, but lest we forget those Justices are enemies of the people, right??????
Mochyn69,
They knocked on my door, and I thought they had come to clean the gutters. Then I saw the badge, and I asked why are you here? I was in my dressing gown.
They had not come to see me. They had come to speak to my son…
So I shouted upstairs – there are some people here to see you…I still hadn’t let them in, but asked
What has he done?
He came downstairs, and said Dad – let them in..
So he took them into the front room.
I said can I stay as a witness?
My son said, its O.K. I will deal with it.
The chief cop said – its O.K. – Your son has committed no crime. He gave us some information, and we would just like some more details to fully investigate the crime…
I said fine and left them to it.
A lot of it was very technical, but one of my son’s customers had been subjected to significant fraud.
My son had all the evidence, and gave it to them.
He runs an ISP, and doesn’t like his customers being ripped off, so he asked the police to investigate.
He’s a good lad.
Tony
in 2018 nobody should help the police
The current (April) issue of the National Geographic is a special issue called Black And White. The piece on DNA specifically ends with it its summary : THE CONCEPT OF RACE HAS NO GENETIC OR SCIENTIFIC BASIS.
At first glance this article may appear to be off-topic: if you read to the end, you’ll see that it’s not
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/04/26/the-league-of-assad-loving-conspiracy-theorists/
this smacks of appeasement – something ‘had to be done ‘ – the wrong decisions for the wrong reasons – labour are very good at it!! The only benefit goes again to the right wing of the party – which should have, by now, been eradicated but which still, continues, to make gains – but purely for themselves in ideological terms – labour is unfit to govern so we’ll continue with the corrupt and contemptible tories for even longer — what a sham our ‘democracy’ is – no choice, no opposition, no power to the people – it’s embarrassing living here – warmongers and criminals prevail
Israel and specially Nethanyahoo can be criticized, but we should remember that there is only 1 country on Earth that claims to be a Jewish nation, while there are dozens claiming to be Islamic nations. Those who condemn Zionism should therefore first condemn the much wider Dar-el-Islam ideology, which covers also half Europe, Africa and India.
Better support Nethanyahoo’s domestic opponents and get and Israeli Trump in place to get out of this neo-con failure.
“Israel and specially Nethanyahoo can be criticized, but we should remember that there is only 1 country on Earth that claims to be a Jewish nation, while there are dozens claiming to be Islamic nations.”
Of these ‘Islamic nations’you mention, none has expansionist colonising aspirations as the Jewish state has. Also none of them demand exclusivity as the sole representatives of Islam. Moreover we can spend some time discussing what constitutes a nation.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Invention-Jewish-People-Shlomo-Sand/dp/1844676234
Muslim counties occupy ~ 19% of the Earth’s land surface, where as that one Jewish country ~0.015%
http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/groups/Muslim-countries
Judaism wasn’t imperialistic: it did voluntarily go more than a few hundred km beyond it holy city, Jerusalem. For Islam with Mecca it is the opposite.
A nation: an area that developed a unique and distinct culture worthy to preserve itself amongst quite different neighbor cultures.
Your view of religion is very exclusivist. There are not many of those countries that label themselves as exclusively Muslim and seek to remove some of the indigenous populations and destroy their homes and uproot thier olive trees and periodically kill some whilst holding over 1.5 million in a vast open air prison. Peaceful equal co-existence in a country with equal rights of all citizens is what modern democracies are and the current state of Israel does not fulfill these criteria. Replacement of Netanyahu will not alter these facts much as they have been there since the start of this regime.
We’d better also get rid of those pesky fanatical Christian nations, who identify by their religion, like the US (which is why religion is specifically not in their constitution), if we’re going to allow religion to identify a nation.
Is Joan Ryan still a Labour MP?
Yes unfortunately and she is also chair of LFoI. She initiated the most recent anti-semitism debate in the HoC and is often leaping up to add her two pennyworth to the obvious plan to unseat Corbyn as leader.
She is not averse to some extra work on her expenses and flipping her second home. MPs cannot do that now after £hundreds of thousands came out of our taxes to be given to the troughers.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/5336436/Joan-Ryan-expenses-switch-after-4500-spend.html
Relevant to the current discussion is what Jonathan Cook has to say. I find him always spot on in these matters, and does not mince his words.
https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2018-04-26/labour-anti-semitism-mps-lynch-mob/
and I always refer to him as ‘living in the belly of the beast’, in Nazareth with his Palestinian wife. A good human who got out of the corrupt British mainstream media.
Yes he used to write for the Guardian when it was a proper newspaper and so knows it from the inside.
Just have to hope that Mr Corbyn has other, well grounded reasons for wanting to get rid of Wadsworth. Despite his cheery demeanour Mr Corbyn is neither a naif nor does he suffer fools gladly.
He’s been copping the old “I’m more of a lefty than you” from all manner of sads who would do better to get onside than keep with the continual whining about differences in emphasis or Corbyn’s particular triaging of priorities on issues.
It isn’t as if the UK has an alternative ‘better’ humanist waiting in the wings who could gather an nth of the support Corbyn has.
The man strikes me as considerably more trustworthy and ethical than anyone else on offer from anywhere else.
That means if he does turn to shit as many claim he already has, everybody will still be in a better position than they are right now.
neither the tories nor blairites want Corbyn in power and must have scrutinized his past in minute detail for anything whatsoever for ammunition to discredit and remove him, they have found absolutely nothing so resort to deception in fabricating he is anti-semitic, it is clear to see who holds the higher moral ground.
I’ve heard it said that in a government of crooks only the honest man is treated as a criminal.
Craig,
Could you explain clearly why you think Wadsworth has brought the Labour Party into disrepute?
You believe he did something inept, clumsy or whatever, but how does that constitute bringing into disrepute?
I think that is a key step in your argument for two reasons. First, that’s a serious charge and expulsion would often be the appropriate response. At risk of putting words in your mouth, it would be better to say “he transgressed but didn’t bring the Party…” rather than “he brought the party in disrepute but shouldn’t be expelled.”
Second, because under the rule book that was in use for Wadsworth’s hearing, that clause was used for ‘hate crime’ offences, so we still have the implication that it *was* anti-semitism, even though that wasn’t on the charge sheet.
It seems that this may be more than an insinuation. Did you see what was being reported by some of Wadsworth’s supporters, that there was a judgment that what he did would constitute AS if more than one of those who witnessed it thought it was AS?
It’s hard to be sure because the reporting is so incomplete – will a judgment be published? – but this is the real scandal and appalling precedent.
Matt
Matt,
If you want to get technical, “reputation” is in law a matter of fact, and you can easily show what Marc’s interjection did to the reputation of the Labour Party.
That he will be falsely portrayed, probably including by the disciplinary tribunal and party hierarchy, as an anti-Semite I do not doubt. That is not my point.
Of course he should not be expelled.
The person most to blame is whoever decided that, at such an incredibly sensitive occasion as Corbyn’s launch of the Chakrabati Report, where the lines for Corbyn and Sami to take had been so carefully considered, an open mike should be passed around to any old activist who asked for it. That was truly fucking stupid.
Craig,
I’m not sure how you delineate what MW is responsible for, versus RS’s reaction, which I’m sure you would agree was calculated, cynical and dishonest. You may reply that MW shouldn’t have presented the opportunity, but that’s very different from making him alone culpable for any impact to reputation.
More importantly, rules should be applied consistently. Is the reputation clause usually invoked against those who make controversial or clumsy political interventions? That’s a genuine question as I don’t have the data, but I suspect that either MW is being singled out, or there is an insinuation or explicit accusation of anti-semitism.
Craig.
I don’t know what you are all are worried about.
Corbyn is not going to be allowed to govern GB. Why? He and McDonnell said they are going to tax every transaction on the Stock Exchange.
Those who want it all will not allow a Labour Government to muscle into their gravy train, and to give the proceeds to the people. It will never happen.
Mark my words.
Craig,
Surely someone should only be to blame if MW was at fault? Do you believe something he said was wrong but not AS?
Perhaps I have a poor picture of what took place but as I understand MW was actually responding to a question (whether open or directed at him I’m not sure). His comment regarding RS was made because he’d literally just seen RS hand party info to a Telegraph reporter – nothing to do with being Jewish.
As an aside, in the video of the event you can hear what has been attributed by others to editor of Politics Home muttering ‘anti-semitism’ before RS reacts.
If anyone else is interested, MW was accused of 2.1.8 in the Labour 2018 rulebook, which includes AS and other racism under ‘bringing the party in to disrepute’.
“The person most to blame is whoever decided that, at such an incredibly sensitive occasion as Corbyn’s launch of the Chakrabati Report, where the lines for Corbyn and Sami to take had been so carefully considered, an open mike should be passed around to any old activist who asked for it. That was truly fucking stupid.”
You make an important point Craig. The same can be said for scheduling the Wadsworth case in the run up to the London local elections.
what does the purile Woodcock have to do before bringing the labour party into disrepute?
https://skwawkbox.org/2018/04/28/woodcock-defending-rudd-means-hes-finally-jumped-the-shark/
labour eats itself
The Belgian PM, Michel, has smeared Ken Loach, accusing him of making ‘anti-semitic’ remarks.
What about the Israeli army killing unarmed Palestinian civilians?’ – Loach attacks Belgian PM
27 Apr 2018
Ken Loach, the award-winning British film director, has hit back at Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel, after the leader claimed he should not receive an honorary degree because of alleged anti-Semitic comments.
Loach was responding to Michel at a press conference an hour before receiving his honorary degree from the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB). He told assembled reporters that he was shocked to have to make a statement concerning the Belgian PM’s comments, especially as he understood that Michel had studied law at ULB.
[..]
In his rebuttal at the hastily-convened press conference, Loach seemed to question Michel’s understanding of international law when it comes to the issue of Israel/Palestine, suggesting that the Belgian PM is conflating criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.
The film director, a passionate supporter of Palestinian rights and frequent critic of Israeli state policies, asked: “Mr Michel is a lawyer, did he wonder about Israel’s failure to comply with international law? Has he asked the question of colonization of the Palestinian territories? Has he asked the question of unarmed Palestinian civilians killed by the Israeli army? Has he asked the question of refugees living under the protection of the United Nations? There are so many examples of Israel’s failure to respect international law.”
The Belgian PM is yet to respond to Loach.
/..
https://www.rt.com/uk/425295-loach-belgian-pm-antisemitism/
Go Ken!
Istael has just bombed what’s left of the Gaza seaport, damaging boats. That means the fishermen will not be able to work for the time being. They are often shot at by Israeli gunships. The fish they catch is the only source of protein the Gazan people have access to other than what the Israelis allow through.
Yes Craig, but this fromDavid Resenberg, who was at the evening question. The context was that Marc Wadsworth was responding to a comment directed at him.
“After Shami Chakrabarti and Jeremy Corbyn spoke…
“Shami Chakrabarti invited members of the press… to ask questions… not one of them asked about the report itself, or about antisemitism. Instead they abused the privilege of being invited to ask questions by pressing Jeremy Corbyn about extraneous Labour leadership issues, and allegations about Momentum and “Trotskyists”.
The tone was set by a Daily Telegraph reporter (Kate McCann) who referred to someone present who had been handing out Momentum leaflets before the formal event began. I never saw these leaflets. As the exchanges became more tetchy… it became apparent that the leaflet incident…concerned … Marc Wadsworth, who was standing just behind where I was sitting…
Wadsworth made a remark about the Daily Telegraph journalist, whom he said had passed a press release to Labour MP Ruth Smeeth before the meeting. In the meeting Smeeth was sitting not far from the Telegraph journalist (and in clear view of myself). Wadsworth added: “We can see who is working hand in hand.”
This comment was unremarkable given the state of conflict “
A couple of pieces in Lobster magazine, one by a former Labour MP, attempt to put the current “Labour antisemitism” problem in a wider context.
https://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk/issue74.php
I came to the same conclusion as yourself regarding the offence and the remedy, but I don’t believe Corbyn has quite the commanding control of events that you appear to infer, and you should know that the Labour movement at large is getting to the end of its tether at the way this witch-hunt is being allowed to carry on.
There are many, many thousands of us who have a history of fighting all racism, and fully understand the motives behind a good few of the leading players bringing this charge of anti-Semitism specifically towards the Labour Party – an anti-socialism agenda, and particularly, anti-Corbyn.
We won’t tolerate racism, but neither will we tolerate this manipulation.
To coin an over-used phrase, ‘enough is enough’.
Thanks for that link. From Ramsay’s View From the bridge
‘Brillo –
‘Those who know the history of Soviet Russia will know that there is a
strain of antisemitism that has always run through parts of the British intellectual left.’
Thus Andrew Neil, with a classic non-sequitur, during his speech at the annual Holocaust Educational Trust dinner. I am not aware of this strain of anti-semitism and – unlike him – I’ve been in or around the British intellectual left my whole life. Yes, there is an anti-Israel thread among the British left. Looking at the condition of the Palestinians, it would be pretty strange if there wasn’t.’
https://www.thejc.com/news/news-features/andrew- 55
neil-the-scourge-of-antisemitism-is-changing-form-1.446339
PS Brillo = Andrew Neil
But this is all part of the narrative they want to establish, that to be anti-Zionism and anti Israeli is to be anti-Semitic.
Marr has Andrew Gwynne on this morning. Gwynne is a member of LFoI.
Marr is promoting the meme that Corbyn is presiding over an anti-semitic party.
Lucas, Pierce and Doucet reviewed the papers, ie repeated the MSM lies.
Now he has on the chair of the Tories, Brandon Lewis. In addition to his MP’s salary, he is salaried as Tory chair. How much?
Many large donations are recorded plus a contribution to his office from Price Waterhouse Cooper. Many Tory MPs record similar contributions from the large consulting firms such as Ernst Young, PwC, Deloitte, Accenture, McKinsey and KPMG. Handy that. Why? To advance the privatisation of the functions of the state like the NHS..
.https://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=24879
‘Tories give £10,000 salary boost to new vice-chairmen
January 10 2018
The Times
Some of Theresa May’s new vice-chairmen had lost ministerial posts in the reshuffle
Theresa May has angered MPs by paying a “top-up” fee to new Tory party vice-chairmen and women believed to be more than £10,000 in some cases. There had been hopes that the appointment of Brandon Lewis as the party chairman could repair the damage and dysfunction in the relationship between No 10 and Conservative Party headquarters.
++Nine++ Tory MPs, including those who lost ministerial posts in the reshuffle, were appointed to the positions on Monday morning and a ++tenth++, James Cleverly, was made deputy chairman. There were already ++four++ vice-chairmen.
Some such as Chris Skidmore, who was sacked as cabinet office minister, lost the £22,000 pay he received on top of his £74,962 MP’s salary. He was appointed vice chairman for policy.
/..
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tories-give-10-000-salary-boost-to-new-vice-chairmen-hjvpmc6qj
Treeza’s buying her support. Who’s funding it? All those wealthy Tory donors presumably.
Agree entirely.
What has brought the Labour party into disrepute is the right-wing scum floating around at its top, where the memories of anyone or any group who has ever been persecuted for political gain are being seriously abused in a political game.
Given that so much is criminalised in Britain, I am wondering why there is not some law against using and abusing the memory of someone else’s suffering for personal gain or collective point-scoring. It is just utter filfth and subhuman.
Meanwhile, we probably have the most openly racist government in recent decades right under our noses, getting away with deporting people on the basis of their skin or ethnicity, and behaving flagrantly neo-imperialistically in the face of the Middle East and its refugees.
For this reason, those who point spuriously to racism in Labour should appear that much more asinine. What the Tories (and the toilet-paper journalists that work for them in The Guardian) demonstrate very clearly right now is that most forms of racism (with the exception of antisemiticism) are a-okay.
if you take the Ken Livingston stance on Palestine, as many Labour Party supporters on the Left of the party do, it seems to me inevitable that you end up with a position pretty well indistinguishable from an anti Semitic viewpoint, when it comes to the State of Israel and all those Jews in Israel and in the Jewish diaspora, who support its existence. Corbyn has to square the circle on this one which seems to me well-nigh impossible.
Is that code for ‘Don’t criticize Israel’?
I will continue to do so for as long as they kill and injure Palestinians and arrest and jail Palestinian children.
? it was just a comment that it is going to be very difficult for Corbyn to steer a middle way between committed supporters of the Palestinians and committed supporters of the state of Israel.
It wasn’t just that, though, was it. You actually said that a pro-Palestinian stance is “pretty well indistinguishable from an anti Semitic viewpoint”. That’s very different form pointing out some hard-to-reconcile differences.