Long-Bailey’s sacking tells us all we need to know about Keir ‘double-standard’ Starmer and his racist Labour Party

Racist anti-Semite: Keir Starmer’s sacking of Rebecca Long-Bailey shows support for Israeli organisations teaching US police how to subjugate – and in the case of George Floyd, kill – black and minority ethnic people. Paradoxically, he also supports the presence of anti-Semite Rachel Reeves in his Shadow Cabinet.

This is the end of the Labour Party as an inclusive, anti-racist organisation.

Keir Starmer has sacked Rebecca Long-Bailey from the Shadow Cabinet after she retweeted a link to an Independent interview with one of her constituents, the actor Maxine Peake.

Starmer’s excuse is that Ms Peake’s article includes an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. He is lying in one of the most disgusting ways possible.

Here’s the passage in Ms Peake’s interview that has caused the offence:

“Systemic racism is a global issue,” she adds. “The tactics used by the police in America, kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, that was learnt from seminars with Israeli secret services.”

It is not anti-Semitic to suggest that. She wasn’t saying, “The Jews taught police to kneel on George Floyd’s neck.”

In fact, it seems widely accepted that Israeli organisations do indeed teach tactics to US police.

So this isn’t anti-Semitic to Keir Starmer:

Baltimore law enforcement officials, along with hundreds of others from FloridaNew Jersey, Pennsylvania, CaliforniaArizona, Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, North CarolinaGeorgiaWashington state as well as the DC Capitol police have all traveled to Israel for training. Thousands of others have received training from Israeli officials here in the U.S.

The U.S. Department of Justice published a report … that documented “widespread constitutional violations, discriminatory enforcement, and culture of retaliation” within the Baltimore Police Department (BPD).

Nor is this, which you should note is from the Jerusalem Post:

A city in North Carolina has become the first municipality in the United States to ban training and other forms of exchange between its police department and Israel’s military or police.

“The Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Police have a long history of violence and harm against Palestinian people and Jews of color,” [a] petition stated. “They persist in using tactics of extrajudicial killing, excessive force, racial profiling and repression of social justice movements. Such tactics have been condemned by international human rights organizations for violating the human rights of Palestinians.”

But Starmer seems to think that Ms Peake’s comments are anti-Semitic – despite their factual accuracy.

Doesn’t that suggest that Starmer is himself a… you know… racist?

He has deliberately attacked people who have exposed the way racists in one country – “The Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Police have a long history of violence and harm against Palestinian people and Jews of color” – have been teaching their methods to racists in another  – “’widespread constitutional violations, discriminatory enforcement, and culture of retaliation’ within the Baltimore Police Department”.

Anyone who genuinely wants to fight racism would be thanking Ms Peake and Ms Long-Bailey for bringing this issue to public knowledge. Instead, he has sacked his MP from the shadow cabinet.

Meanwhile, Rachel Reeves – who made public her own support for a very well-documented anti-Semite – remains in the Shadow Cabinet with Starmer’s full support:

It seems clear that in Starmer’s Labour, racism and anti-Semitism are supported, and their opponents are opposed – all while the Labour leader glibly mouths platitudes claiming the exact opposite.

For those of us who have been contesting decisions to expel us from membership of Labour, this presents a thorny problem.

I had always intended to return to the party and campaign for reform, after I win my court case against Labour, which is now set to take place in October.

But I think it would harm my position if I were to say that now, because I do not want to be associated with any organisation that can be clearly identified as a racist, anti-Semite endeavour.

And Labour under Starmer is a racist, anti-Semite endeavour in a way that the party under Corbyn never was.

Or so it seems to me.

Ms Long-Bailey has put her side of this story in a Twitter thread:

This puts a nastier complexion on the matter still, because it seems Starmer used this issue as a pretext to eliminate Ms Long-Bailey – one of the last left-wingers, if not the last, from the Shadow Cabinet. He could have given her a chance to do as she suggested but he didn’t. That says it all.

Well, he should be gratified to know that we’ve all got the message. Take a look at some of the responses on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/TheMendozaWoman/status/1276082599388160001

https://twitter.com/AmmarKazmi_/status/1276157080819372037

https://twitter.com/TheMendozaWoman/status/1276177973431894016

https://twitter.com/williamwallbook/status/1276163966574776323

https://twitter.com/simonmaginn/status/1276177278007939072

It does.

If Ms Peake does decide to sue Starmer, I would certainly consider helping fund her case.

Alternatively, Starmer could put us all out of our misery by making a full apology and resigning his membership of UK Labour with immediate effect.

Source: Maxine Peake: ‘People who couldn’t vote Labour because of Corbyn? They voted Tory as far as I’m concerned’ | The Independent

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/


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6 Comments

  1. Jeffrey Davies June 25, 2020 at 6:07 pm - Reply

    Stammer the spammer isn’t true labour but untill they gone which even Corbyn couldn’t rid himself of these blairites the crap goes on

  2. kateuk June 25, 2020 at 6:30 pm - Reply

    Starmer just used any old trumped up excuse to get rid of RBL. Disgusting.

  3. G Millward June 25, 2020 at 6:55 pm - Reply

    The ‘offending’ information comes from Amnesty (though @Independent have now cut that bit from the article) and was a reference to the Israeli forces linking to a wider point on the international nature or racism.
    To sack an MP for retweeting that is ludicrous.

  4. Stu June 25, 2020 at 11:55 pm - Reply

    Just one more step back towards Blairite Conservatism making Labour unelectable for another 10 years at least – no wonder the right-wing press love Sir Spanner !

  5. Bal S June 26, 2020 at 2:55 am - Reply

    Any legitimate criticism of the Likudist regime has effectively been outlawed in Britain.

    If you do criticise Israel (and it’s non-stop illegal settlement building pogrom on Palestinian territory) the Westminster clique, the vast bulk of the Fourth Estate and right wing botheads on social media will come after you and try to shut you down, one way or another.

    How long has Sir Keir been leader? 3-4 months?….the Corbynistas who are still paid up members of Blue Labour should put their pennies to better use. If the treatment of RBL isn’t a blatant wake up call, nothing else will be.

    • Julia June 26, 2020 at 4:19 pm - Reply

      I thought the writing was on the wall when Starmer was announced leader and on the very same day he sent a grovelling letter to the BoDs. Nothing he has done – or not done – has made me think differently but this is utterly shameful and is indeed the last straw. My membership, which ironically is up for renewal this week, has now ended. I am very sad but as you say our hard earned pennies can be put to better use….

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