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Labour’s Rochdale by-election double-bind: hypocrites or election-throwers?

Azhar Ali: unsafe whatever he does.

Labour has put itself in a double-bind after its candidate in the Rochdale by-election apologised for voicing a well-known claim about the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel.

The party is rumoured to be about to suspend its candidate, Azhar Ali, after he accused Israel of complicity in the raid that killed 1,200 people and led to 250 being taken hostage.

It seems he not only posted about it on the social media but also passed comments on it in a community meeting.

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The BBC reported:

In the recording, which has not been heard by the BBC, Mr Ali is alleged to have said: “The Egyptians are saying that they warned Israel 10 days earlier… Americans warned them a day before [that] there’s something happening… They deliberately took the security off, they allowed… that massacre that gives them the green light to do whatever they bloody want.”

Egypt has indeed said that it warned Israel in advance of the raid. Still, Ali has had to make a grovelling apology to Israel’s supporters after his words were quoted by a hostile UK mainstream press.

Is that enough to save him from suspension, which would effectively end Labour’s Rochdale campaign?

Many think not. Skwawkbox is reporting that

suspending Ali would effectively end Labour’s campaign in the by-election, with no possibility to stand another candidate less than three weeks before polling day. Cynics have pointed out that the political fallout from exiting the election would be less damaging than Galloway beating Ali in a fair fight and accused the party of engineering the default.

But if Ali is allowed to continue, he would still face obstacles:

His willingness to stand for a party led by Keir Starmer, who has supported Israel’s ‘right’ to commit its war crimes against the Palestinians has already seen videos posted of him being ordered to leave doorsteps during his attempts to campaign. Such has been the contrast with the reception given to Workers Party GB leader George Galloway, a firm supporter of the Palestinians, that Galloway’s odds to win the by-election have been slashed from 16-1 to 2-1.

Not only that, but if Ali isn’t suspended, then Labour is endorsing a candidate who has admitted contradicting the party’s line on the Israel/Gaza conflict – and the inferred hypocrisy could be enough to cost it the forthcoming general election.

It seems Azhar Ali is set to lose, no matter what happens.

Source: Labour ‘set to suspend’ Rochdale candidate despite grovelling apology to Israel supporters – SKWAWKBOX


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The Israel/Palestine conflict as seen on (This Site’s) social media

If you’ve been following the Israel/Palestine conflict on the mainstream media (I haven’t) it seems you may have been led to believe that the attack on Israel by Hamas was pure evil.

Palestinians have been accused of kidnapping children, raping women, murdering indescriminately. Has torture been in the mix?

Meanwhile, what has been said about the reasons given by Hamas for launching its attack in the first place? The constant – several times daily – abuse and occasionally murder of Palestinians (including children) by Israeli occupation forces? Anything?

The social media seems to have offered a more balanced view, as I hope to demonstrate below – with one caveat: there has also been a lot of foaming-at-the-mouth hatred – mostly towards Israel. This Writer can’t tell whether that has been by genuine lunatics or bad-faith actors trying to paint supporters of Palestinian independence as genocidal anti-Zionists.

Here’s some of the back-and-forth, as it appeared on my ‘X’ feed:

Let’s start with Keir Starmer saying there is “no justification” for the Hamas attack – and Jackie Walker’s response, explaining that it is a retaliation against Israel’s illegal occupation and colonisation of Palestine, that is itself an act of war:

This is self-explanatory – an Israeli minister evading questions about what her government and its armed forces have been doing to Palestinians:

Armed struggle by Palestinians against illegal occupiers is legitimate under international law:

Double-standards of Israel’s international supporters is demonstrated by their attitude to the same tactic as Hamas has employed, being carried out in Ukraine:

Former Cabinet minister Sajid Javid says Hamas has been proscribed by the UK as a terrorist organisation. The question is: was that decision justified in the light of what Israel has been doing to Palestine and Palestinians?

Israeli journalist Gideon Levy provides more insight into why people in Gaza might want to resist Israel:

Andrew Feinstein at Double Down News shows footage of what Israel has been doing in Palestine and demonstrates that Israel’s supporters in other countries like the UK are supporting this barbarity by silencing comment on it, many because they see Israel as the centre of an ethno-fascist movement of which they want to be a part:

UK broadcaster Adil Ray points out that Israel’s retaliation is not helpful:

Michael Walker of Novara Media points out how Israeli policy has attacked the very existence of Palestine. Why is it forbidden to question the existence of Israel when Israel illegally erodes the existence of Palestine?

Rapper and activist Lowkey explains the reality of the Israel/Palestine conflict:

Right-wing commentator Dan Hodges tries to score points against UK left-wingers by claiming that a movement that should support international peace has support for terrorism as the “price of admission” to fashionability (whatever that means):

An interesting historical note. I haven’t verified this, though:

Senior political correspondent for the Daily Express attacks Labour MP Apsana Begum for supporting Palestinian freedom from Israel. He seems shocked that Palestinians would say the attacks on Israel were due to Israel’s own behaviour:

More than half of British people feel “unfavourable” towards Israel, according to a poll:

Adil Ray (again), while approving of the messages of support for Israel, suggests that Palestinians might welcome support for their right to an unoccupied homeland:

Supporters of Palestinian independence celebrate the attack on Israel in London. Right-wing commentator Nile Gardiner wants them arrested as possible terrorists themselves, or even illegal migrants, on the basis that they support a strike for freedom from occupation.

Keir Starmer wrongly says there is “no justification” for the attack on Israel; we know there is a reason. He says the perpetrators have “deliberately pushed back the prospect of peace agreements”. Was there any such prospect?

Important context is being ignored by the UK’s news media:

Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he’s going to bomb Gaza into dust, and the people there should leave. This commenter asks the obvious question:

It seems the Hamas incursion into Israel included firing on people at the “Supernova Festival” – a rave held near Gaza. The event is being touted as a “festival for peace” by propagandists:

UK right-wing commentators say Hamas has been targeting civilians – raping women and kidnapping children. Here’s a response:

Renowned journalist John Pilger responds to claims that the Hamas attack was “unprovoked”:

Polling suggests more people in the UK want Palestine recognised as a state than don’t – although it is still a minority:

Here’s a 10-minute criticism of the United States for supporting Ukrainian resistance to Russia’s occupation while supporting Israel’s “occupation/ethnic subjugation” of Palestine. Isn’t that appalling hypocrisy?

Right-wingers respond to a tweet pointing out that Palestinians can’t leave Gaza:

This is self-explanatory:

A report on what is happening in Gaza as Israel retaliates. It seems the Israeli military response is not concerned about harming civilians:

Labour shadow minister David Lammy mourns the death of a British citizen who was in Israel and was killed in the Hamas attack, and supports Israel’s response. Former Labour MP Chris Williamson asks an obvious question and makes a pertinent comment:

Labour’s Wes Streeting supports Israel’s response – and then suggests that a peace deal might still be possible.

More will undoubtedly follow.


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Are the Russell Brand allegations proving government is stifling social media businesses?

Russell Brand: after it was revealed that a UK Parliament committee had written to his social media platforms, calling for his income to be cut off – despite the fact that he has not been convicted of any crime – it has emerged that governments seem to be regularly exerting pressure on social media platforms to stifle political commentary that conflicts with their views.

This has escalated quickly – after the Commons Culture, Media and Sports chair wrote to online platforms in a bid to take Russell Brand’s income away from him, her fellow Tories are now clamouring to have GB News taken off-air because of Laurence Fox.

The charge appears to have been led by former Sky News mainstay Adam Boulton:

But he was quickly joined – on the same episode of the BBC’s Newsnight – by Tory MP Caroline Nokes:

Some might say, “Sauce for the goose” – at least GB News is attracting the same opinions as Russell Brand.

But now let’s look at some other reactions to those calls for GB News to close. Here’s Tim Montgomerie, founder of the Conservative Home blog – and therefore also a Tory:

And now Nile Gardiner, former aide to Margaret Thatcher and therefore also a Tory:

So countries that shut down news networks are authoritarian and tyrants?

What does that say about the CMS committee chair, Tory Dame Caroline Dinenage, trying to shut down Russell Brand’s channel?

You might suggest that there’s a bit of a difference between a network and a one-man show, but then, we know Brand isn’t the only social media commentator facing shutdown – don’t we?

Is this acceptable?

Twitter/X keeps trying to take followers away from Peter Stefanovic. Is it because he’s a left-wing commentator who publishes facts that the right wing headbangers don’t want you to know?

If you don’t think so, you need to come up with a reasonable alternative explanation. What is it?

Apparently, this is an international phenomenon. I noticed in a piece on the Brand controversy, a YouTube-hosted show called The Comments Section suggested that its parent organisation, The Daily Wire, had faced calls for it to be de-platformed by the US government.

“Guys, this has been happening – this isn’t new,” said host Brett Cooper.

“Literally a month and a half ago, the Daily Wire found out that the US Government had been writing the Facebook specifically … saying ‘Is there anything you can do to, you know, limit their posts a bit during the election cycle – it’s really not great for us, could you limit them?’ Asking a social media site to censor our posts.

“This is happening; it’s all politicised.”

If you’re a regular follower of Vox Political you’ll know that This Site’s readership has mysteriously plummeted, so I tend to believe that Facebook certainly does have the ability to restrict the readership of particular users/pages.

If this is happening internationally, and to organisations with as much clout as the Daily Wire (it’s quite big, you know), then I think it might be time for us all to get together, pool our information and take it to such authorities as may exist to police such matters.

In the UK, I don’t even know if there is an organisation with a duty to ensure that businesses relying on social media exposure don’t get censored for no reason.

I’ll let you know what happens. While the allegations against Russell Brand are vile, it seems something useful may come from them.


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CALL FOR COMMENT: what do you think of this video idea?

WHERE ARE YOU ALL?

Right before the first Covid-19 lockdown in March 2020, This Site scored its highest-ever hit count with more than 178,000 views.

Now, Vox Political is lucky to get 3,000 views per day.

All those readers can’t have died out in the pandemic, and the site’s quality hasn’t changed, so something must have changed.

Colleagues on sites like Another Angry Voice are adamant that the social media giants – Facebook, Twitter and so on – have used algorithms to divert readers away from us.

They have suggested that this was at the request of right-wing politicians who don’t like our views, or of mass media publishers who were losing readers (and sales) to us.

The latter would amount to interference in the marketplace, so I’m wondering if there is an official course of action to be taken over it…

Alternatively, some have said that our negative coverage of the government’s activities during the Covid-19 pandemic may have triggered political interference intended to put us out of business.

Whatever is true, we need to find ways to reverse the trend – because people need to have factual information about current affairs, now more than ever.

So I’m trying a new thing and I’d like you to comment on it – and that includes all you lurkers who read but don’t usually say anything!

I’m thinking of creating short videos on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok and anywhere else anyone can think of, to compliment articles on the Vox Political website – as summaries of the longer articles here.

The aim is to – I believe the term is ‘funnel’ – readers into the site via alternative routes to Facebook and Twitter.

Here’s a sample I created, using a recent story:

The question I’m putting to you is simple, and twofold: first, is this a good way of generating interest? And secondly, is it worth seeing in its own right?

I’ve used Wave Video’s free generator to make this one; if anyone has recommendations for better options, then I’d like to hear what they are.

Comment, please, down below.


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Did King Charles just troll the leader of the DUP – in front of his face?

The royal and the republican: King Charles III meets Sinn Fein leader Michell O’Neill. The comments about the largest party in Stormont took place seconds later.

Here’s some good – if well-used – advice for DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson from the owner of the Maximilien Robespierre YouTube channel: “Never meet your heroes; you’ll be disappointed.”

He was referring to the moment when King Charles III met the leaders of the two largest political parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly and mentioned to Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill that he was aware that her republican party now has more members there than any other.

It was a direct snub for Donaldson and the unionist DUP, which had been the largest party from the Stormont Assembly’s inception until its most recent elections, and which is now delaying the resumption of devolved democracy there with a row over the Brexit-related Northern Ireland Protocol.

The Monarch’s words may have been unintentionally harsh – or they may have been a hint that democracy should be respected, the power-sharing agreement should be resumed, with Sinn Fein as (nominal) leader rather than the DUP, and they should sort out their differences by other means.

Or we may all be reading far too much into them.

Here’s the Maximilien Robespierre clip…

What do you think?

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Patel insists Rwanda is safe for asylum-seekers – despite expert advice on torture

Priti Patel: she’s not one to listen to advice she doesn’t like.

The Home Secretary has confirmed that she is ignoring the advice of an adviser who said the Rwandan government tortures political opponents, in pushing her policy of deporting asylum-seekers there.

Priti Patel insisted that Rwanda was a “safe country”.

She said the comments had been made by “officials in a different government department”.

She added: “But of course it is the Home Office who has led the economic development migration partnership which is our resettlement partnership to Rwanda. Rwanda is a safe country and all our work with the government of Rwanda shows that.”

She was responding to a High Court judgment that seven statements by an adviser should be made public in advance of a Supreme Court ruling on whether the Rwanda deportation policy is legal.

A judge ruled that a further four statements should not be published as they could potentially harm international relations.

It is not unreasonable – on the face of it – for the government to seek advice and then ignore what it is told.

Governments may take opinions from multiple sources before forming their own opinions and policy.

But this has the potential to blow up in the Tory government’s collective face, if the decision to ignore warnings about this foreign government leads to asylum-seekers being harmed.

Court ruling on Rwanda comments that should be published forces questions on those that won’t

Illegal policy? Priti Patel announced the plan to deport asylum seekers arriving in the UK to Rwanda back in April. But a first flight there was aborted at the last minute as the legality of the scheme was challenged.

The High Court has ruled that a government adviser’s comment that Rwanda’s government tortures and kills political opponents – and six others – should be published ahead of a legal battle to decide whether deportations to that country are legal.

But four further comments by the same person were judged necessary to keep entirely secret because of the damage they would do to international relations between the UK and that country.

This leads to an obvious question:

Given the incendiary nature of the “torture” comment, how damning were the four that are being kept secret? And how can the UK’s Tory government justify sending asylum seekers to Rwanda after being provided with such information?

In his ruling, Lord Justice Lewis said:

“I recognise that there is a strong public interest in not undermining international relations with a friendly state. Nonetheless, that consideration is outweighed by the public interest in ensuring access to relevant information in this litigation and by the extent to which the information is already in the public domain.”

Migrants identified for the first aborted flight, and three media organisations – BBC News, including BBC Two’s Newsnight, The Times and The Guardian newspapers – sought the disclosure of the material.

The judge said given September’s major legal action had to decide whether sending asylum seekers to Rwanda was lawful, the claimants and the court needed to consider as much evidence as possible.

He said some of the official’s comments would have “evidential significance” – and the public interest in disclosing them outweighed the government’s case for keeping them secret.

The government has been allowed time to consider an appeal. If the judgment stands, the comments are likely to emerge in public in September.

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Priti Patel is refusing to pay police enough to do their job & then demanding power to criticise them for it

Here’s the contradictory nature of Tory policy exposed in all its grubby grimness:

Priti Patel has been challenged to explain whether she could “survive” on the salaries she pays to local police officers – and ran away from answering.

Meanwhile, she is demanding the right to interfere in local policing matters – possibly criticising officers for failing to do work she does not pay them enough to manage.

According to Nation.Cymru,

Detective Constable Vicky Knight, a single mother who had worked in policing for more than two decades, asked Priti Patel if she would be able to “survive” on £1,200 or £1,400 a month.

Describing how she is paid “a couple of hundred pounds a month more than the workers in McDonald’s flipping burgers” and less than her “local manager at Lidl”, Ms Knight told how ahead of her most recent pay day she had to borrow £40 from her mother so she could put fuel in her car and buy food for her son’s school lunches “because I had no money left at the end of the month”.

“I went to see an accountant and the advice was leave the police, work for 22 hours a week and claim benefits and you will be better off. How can that be right?”

Patel did not answer the question; we don’t know whether she thinks she could survive on the pay she tells police officers to accept.

But we do know delegates at the annual conference of the Police Federation of England and Wales groaned when she whined that their organisation had not been “at the table” for pay negotiations; it is currently in dispute with her because she has imposed a pay freeze for officers and there were, therefore, no negotiations to be done.

While she is depriving police of the salaries they need in order to be able to do their jobs, it seems Patel is demanding the right to criticise them for any failures.

In a row with Police and Crime Commissioners, she is planning a unilateral revision of rules that define where policing responsibilities lie, in order to grant herself more power to interfere in local services.

She wants to take back power to demand answers from chief constables on local policing matters – and ability that was given to commissioners a decade ago when their role was created.

Obviously the ability to demand answers also provides an implied ability to criticise police services for failings – even though any failures may be because she has not provided the resources to do the job.

According to The Guardian,

The proposed protocol says: “We propose to lower the threshold for home secretary intervention in appropriate circumstances. This would equip the home secretary to intervene earlier as required, thus reducing the risk of failing to deliver effective policing.”

Apparently this is a reflection of a policy adopted by Patel since she became Home Secretary, called “lean in”. Perhaps it would more accurately be phrased as “lean on“.

Another example of this policy would appear to be her demand that chief constables act “in a politically neutral manner”, which has been added to the previous stricture that they must be impartial.

This would restrict them from commenting on public policy that they believe may affect crime fighting – such as the effects of austerity. Nor would they be allowed to speak out publicly on issues of political dispute like tougher sentences or opposing the decriminalisation of cannabis, which is supported by some frontline politicians.

In their response to Patel’s proposals, commissioners said she would need to seek an Act of Parliament to impose them as they are beyond her statutory powers at the moment – “ultra vires”:

“Creation of new powers of strategic oversight can only be achieved through primary legislation and must be subject to the full scrutiny that is required of primary legislation.”

So we see a hardline Home Secretary, attempting to dictate the behaviour of local police forces while denying them the resources to their job.

How ironic that she is currently being restricted with rules imposed by her own Tory forerunners.

Source: Home Secretary confronted by ‘desperately struggling’ North Wales Constable over low pay

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Sabisky quits after journalists unearth WORSE comments than his views on race, women and eugenics

Andrew Sabisky: Gone, but let’s not forget him. His kind of extremism is appallingly toxic.

If you thought the opinions of Dominic Cummings’s advisor Andrew Sabisky were horrifying when This Site published them yesterday, brace yourself.

He has resigned because of comments he made that were even worse:

Scottish newspaper The National dished the dirt:

“In one post, from seven years ago, a man explains that his Mormon wife is reluctant to have sex with him and asks for advice.

“Under the username thedovelamenting, Sabisky responds by urging him to try to “rewire” her brain “to the point where she no longer, consciously or subconsciously sees a conflict between a good Christian woman and serving you up 39 flavours of slut on command”.”

I’ll save you from the particularly vile last part of his comment.

“In another post, he recommends a 26-year-old man looking to lose his virginity pays “lots of money for a really good hooker”.

“When a woman posts about finding “disturbing porn” on her boyfriend’s computer, including erotic fiction about incest, paedophilia and rape, thedovelamenting tells her he doesn’t “see all that much to worry about here.

““Fantasies are strange things. Unpredictable, of uncertain origin, hard to figure how they’ll relate to real life. I have a thing for incest erotica myself despite never having had those fantasies relating to my actual family. So long as he’s not actually breaking any laws and is restricting his viewing habits to girls 18 and up I wouldn’t be too squicked.”

“He then suggests the woman is at fault for not offering her partner the right “kind of sex”, though he admits he “could be way off there.””

According to the article, the offending Reddit posts disappeared right after The National approached Sabisky for comment. Hmm!

Still, it’s a good result, even if it’s just a small part of a much larger picture.

Francis Elliott narrows it down:

Sabisky himself has said he is a victim of “selective quoting” by the media, and claimed to be “in the middle of a giant character assassination”.

But the resignation isn’t even the most interesting part of this story.

The fact that people found it easy to confuse Sabisky with nominal prime minister Boris Johnson – even in jest – is.

The reason it was easy to do is the fact that Downing Street was criticised for refusing to say whether or not Johnson agreed with Sabisky’s views.

This reluctance prompted fury from some Conservatives, according to Sky News:

“Former minister Caroline Nokes said there “must be no place in government for the views he’s expressed”.

“Select committee chair William Wagg declared “there is no way to defend it” and added: “I cannot be the only one uncomfortable with recent Number 10 trends.”

“One Tory staffer told Sky News after the resignation was confirmed: “I’m glad it’s happened but he should never have been hired in the first place. Two days of bad headlines for nothing.””

And it made this comment possible:

And what about this?

But then, we know Johnson is a sexist and a racist – from his behaviour over many years. Right?

Source: Number 10 adviser Andrew Sabisky quits after controversial comments revealed | Politics News | Sky News

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Charlie Brooker becomes next celeb to end his career with a ‘joke’ about Labour and anti-Semitism

Propaganda: It seems the BBC isn’t restricting its political lies solely to news programmes, but has expanded into comedy.

Has it become a contractual obligation that celebrities appearing on the BBC’s Have I Got News For You now have to reel out a duff comment connecting the Labour Party or Jeremy Corbyn and anti-Semitism, and pretend that it’s a funny joke?

It was sad enough when Victoria Coren Mitchell did it, linking Labour with the anti-Semitic trope about a Jewish bankers’ conspiracy. Because the Labour leadership has never suggested it believes anything of the sort, it was in fact she who committed the anti-Semitic slur.

Now Charlie Brooker has used his appearance to link Labour with Holocaust denial:

Did you hear that audience reaction? They didn’t like it at all. That was the sound of a career ending, as Simon Maginn implies here:

And here:

As I say, though, it seems entirely possible that reading an anti-Labour jab from an autocue is now a contractual obligation. But Mr Brooker can’t be so hard-up for cash that he would abandon any principles and ruin his reputation for the sake of 30 pieces of silver from the BBC… can he? We note that he hasn’t exactly been running out to defend himself:

Sadly, Mr Brooker’s (probably-scripted) outburst seems to have achieved what these behaviours often do – and got someone else to join in. Isn’t this Phil Wang from the same programme?

It isn’t satire; it’s just a bad lie. What a way to commit career suicide.

And it seems Have I Got Lies For You may be on its way out now, as well.

There will be plenty of people who like the propaganda-pumping attitude the programme is currently showing – but if enough of us kick it into touch, then maybe the BBC will get the message.

We don’t like lies, and we don’t like people who lie to us.

Worst of all is the probability that Boris Johnson will use this as part of his excuse to axe the BBC’s status as the UK’s public service broadcaster and remove the requirement to pay the licence fee.

Still, the BBC did its best to ensure the Tories won the general election, knowing that this would be on the cards.

The Corporation’s bosses really are like turkeys voting for Christmas.

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.

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