Labour leader Keir Starmer is facing calls to acknowledge and make amends for discriminatory treatment of Jewish party members.
A legal letter to the party from Bindmans LLP on behalf of Jewish Voice for Labour sets out compelling evidence that Jews who disagree with the current leadership about Israel, Palestine, Zionism and antisemitism suffer disproportionately from the Party’s harsh disciplinary regime. Jewish members are 6 times more likely to be investigated and 9.5 times more likely to be expelled from the Labour Party for antisemitism than non-Jewish members (see Annex B).
The letter, copied to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, says the Party has failed to understand the diversity of opinion among British Jews and misconstrued criticism of Israel as antisemitism, illegitimately restricting the free expression of Jewish views on Israel and on Zionism. Associated restrictions on the rights of all party members are contrary to Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights and to the Party’s own rules.
Such practices undermine the Party’s commitment to eliminating antisemitism and are in conflict with Labour’s history as the party that pioneered laws against racial discrimination such as the Race Relations Acts of 1965, 1968 and 1976 and the Equality Acts of 2006 and 2010.
The letter notes the exclusion of non-Zionist Jews from consultation on and implementation of Labour’s complaints and disciplinary procedures, as referenced by Martin Forde KC in his report (pp. 110-12) on these matters.
The letter invites the Party to acknowledge that it: “is in breach of the Equality Act 2010 by discriminating unlawfully against its Jewish members and unlawfully harassing them in (a) the manner in which it investigates complaints made against them and (b) its failure to investigate complaints made by them.”
Details are summarised in a new update to the ongoing Crowd Justice appeal set up by Labour Activists 4 Justice.
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Floating concentration camp: Bibby Stockholm (pictured) is a floating mirror of the camps built by Nazis for groups they considered undesirable. How many Jewish asylum-seekers and refugees have been forced to board it?
Here’s a sad reminder of the lengths by which the Conservatives have regressed UK society:
This is one eighteenth-century invention I didn't expect to see coming back to 21st century Britain: the prison hulk.https://t.co/Aey1gkssi1
Professor Roberts is only slightly inaccurate; while the Bibby Stockholm and any other converted prison barges are reminiscent of those ships from centuries ago, they are more accurately described as concentration camps – a label most commonly associated with the Nazi extermination of Jews, Romanies, homosexuals and other proscribed groups in the 1930s and 40s.
One cannot help but feel that this was an intended aim of Tory immigration policy; they did not have to let the issue of refugees migrating across the English Channel happen at all – it used to be well under control but successive legislative changes by the Tories changed that.
Is it a sinister message to the people of the UK? “Do as you’re told or you will be next?”
Does anyone else feel indescribably gutted and saddened at seeing images of the first asylum seekers being sent onto that prison barge? I feel like this will be a moment that future Historians look back on and condemn.
The Conservatives themselves have been strident in their support of a policy that imprisons people who have done nothing wrong, with a view to deporting them to a foreign country with a highly-questionable human rights record.
But they have (deliberately?) got the tone all wrong. Their party’s deputy chairman, “30p Lee” Anderson, actually used obscene language when referring to asylum-seekers – which implies that he considers them to be a form of life that is below him (this is impossible; as a Tory, Lee Anderson is already lower than vermin).
The associations with other far-right political organisations were quickly identified, but Anderson has been defended by other high-ranking Tories:
On BBC R4, Justice Sec Alex Chalk defends Tory Dep Chair Anderson who said migrants can “F off” back to France if they don’t like barges. These ‘go back to where you came from’ messages take us back to 70s NF racism. Is this incitement and language where our politics needs to be?
The party of Pitt, Peel, Disraeli, Churchill, Macmillan and Thatcher is now the party of Farage, the EDL, the BNP and cruel foul-mouthed racists everywhere https://t.co/gxvdIu54aY
In fairness, the attitude is being challenged – and you can judge the pitiful response from Justice Secretary Alex Chalk for yourself:
Nick Robinson: Lee Anderson has said migrants should fuck off back to France if they don't like barges.. is that the Tory policy?
Alex Chalk: "Lee is expressing himself in salty terms & is something that people well understand… his central point is not unreasonable"#r4todaypic.twitter.com/Frg4xlngVf
There isn’t a queue to jump, of course. The UK government picks and chooses who it allows in and, if you are from a wide array of countries that includes territory the UK has bombed within the last 13 years, there is no legal route for asylum open to you.
People who believe they must seek sanctuary in the UK – and remember, France takes three times as many refugees as this country has; German takes 10 times as many – have no choice but to do as they have.
Here’s Chalk again, showing that he shares Anderson’s fascist views about foreigners:
Does Tory Deputy Chairman Lee Anderson 'speak for the party' when he says migrants who don't like barges should 'f*** off back to France'?
If asylum-seekers and/or refugees refuse to take places on the Bibby Stockholm floating concentration camp, they won’t be sent back to France but they will lose financial support from the UK government, which will not provide accommodation for them.
People who refuse to board the Bibby Stockholm barge are being told that if they do not accept the 'offer' their government support will end, leaving them homeless.
The government’s intention is clear: to make all refugees feel unsafe, unwelcome and unwanted.
Shameful.
— Breakthrough Party 🟠🌤️ (@BThroughParty) August 8, 2023
So let’s be clear on this: they’ll still be in the UK, but out on the streets, unmonitored? Isn’t that what they want?
So the Tory plan to deal with these asylum-seekers and refugees is either to make them put up with conditions similar to those faced by concentration camp victims in Nazi Germany or to flood the UK’s streets with them – something politicians like Lee Anderson and Alex Chalk have been strenuously opposing for a long time.
Where’s the sense in that?
Meanwhile, on the other side of the House of Commons, we see no opposition at all:
‘A staggering £1.6 billion contract has been handed to a controversial Australian travel firm to establish the ships, bridging accommodation and travel services, it has been reported.’https://t.co/X3vgjvGxUY
— #RejoinEU ⭐️ #WeAreTheOppositionNow 🇪🇺💙🕷 (@Angie_RejoinEU) August 8, 2023
So: £800 million per year. But that’s not instead of the cost of hotels – it is in addition to that cost.
And what are we – and asylum seekers/refugees – getting for that cost? Edwin Hayward has researched it:
Get to Know the Bibby Stockholm…
– 500+ single adult men crammed onto a barge with a capacity of 222 in normal use (e.g. as accommodation for oil workers)
Single rooms: – 2 strangers, sharing an austere metal bunk bed – TV (as mocking and useless as a paperweight: they've…
The best word on this whole sorry affair has come – as it usually does – from the most unfairly-vilified politician in Westminster: Jeremy Corbyn. He reminds us that the UK used to have a human immigration and asylum system, before the fascists and racists who currently call themselves Conservatives (and their counterpart cuckoos in Keir Starmer’s party) came along.
And look at the comment on his words, below:
The sad irony is, Jeremy Corbyn is one of the few politicians in Westminster today who would have welcomed Jewish refugees fleeing persecution in Nazi Germany with compassion and dignity. Those who accuse Corbyn of "antisemitism", would have shoved Jewish refugees on barges. https://t.co/q8llOAAIn6
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush🥀🇵🇸🇾🇪 (@OwenPaintbrush) August 7, 2023
We have come full circle.
UK policy on refugees and asylum-seekers is not only vile and inhumane; it reflects that of the Nazis to the minorities they persecuted.
Lee Anderson, Alex Chalk, Keir Starmer and Stephen Kinnock (it seems clear) would have put Jewish refugees from the Nazis in concentration camps, if they had been alive and in Parliament at that time. And how many of those currently aboard Bibby Stockholm are Jewish, anyway?
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Diane Abbott: she has suffered more racist abuse than anybody you can name, due to the colour of her skin – and has now lost the Labour Parliamentary whip for attacking a newspaper article that apparently tried to minimise racism against people of colour.
First they came for Jeremy Corbyn…
Then they came for his grassroots supporters…
Then they came for left-wing Jews…
Now they are coming for members of the Socialist Campaign Group – and Diane Abbott is the first to be targeted.
She is an easy target because she has an unfortunate turn of phrase and often fails to think carefully before going public with her words.
This time, it has cost her the Labour whip, after the Observer published the following letter:
Diane Abbott must know what happened to Jews and gypsies in Germany in the 1930s and across Nazi occupied Europe during WW2. She must know about the Pale of Settlement and pogroms of the Russian empire in the C19. This is such a strange letter. pic.twitter.com/kDVoZCuPYF
For those who can’t read images, here‘s the letter in full:
Racism is black and white
Tomiwa Owolade claims that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people all suffer from “racism” (“Racism in Britain is not a black and white issue. It’s far more complicated”, Comment). They undoubtedly experience prejudice. This is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable.
It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice. But they are not all their lives subject to racism. In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus. In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships. Diane Abbott
House of Commons, London SW1
Anybody can see what she was trying to do: she was pointing out that people of colour suffer racism far more often in their daily lives than those who might be defined as “white/European”, because the difference is visually obvious.
(It is also misleading. I have a friend who is white and Welsh, but whose face might seem to have a Middle-Eastern look about it to those who live by stereotypes. He tans very easily, and tells me that, when he has been on holiday abroad (lucky fellow!) he is habitually picked out for a “random” bomb check on the way back into the UK, by security officials who think he looks like an Islamic terrorist.)
Nobody who knows her history could deny that she has a very strong point; if I recall correctly, Ms Abbott receives more racist hate mail than all other MPs put together.
She tried to make a distinction by saying people of colour suffer racism while Irish people, Jews and Travellers (the GRT community), suffer prejudice instead – and that’s where she went wrong.
It’s all racism. Jewish people (for example) were originally Semitic (hence the word for hate against them: anti-Semitism), and the fact that their culture, like Christianity, has been successful in absorbing people from other races does not stop hatred being directed at them because they are different.
I was going to suggest that she could have used the word “xenophobia” to describe the hatred of people of colour in this context – the so-called “dislike of the unlike”. But that does not only refer to race/skin colour but also to culture, so it might be a better umbrella title for the prejudice faced by all the groups she mentions.
The problem here is simply finding the right word for the distinction she intended, which is that the other groups can avoid abuse on occasions because their skin colour means they can blend in with what, for want of a better word, I’ll describe as the majority.
But it was enough for the usual suspects to spring to the attack – presumably secure in the knowledge that nobody is about to ask them to compare the amount of abuse those of them who present as white/European receive against Ms Abbott’s.
(Indeed, judging from the abuse that Ms Abbott has received over this letter, it seems some of them may even have perpetrated some of it.)
At the end of the day, it was a valid point made in a very clumsy way.
Ms Abbott has apologised for it, claiming that the letter published in The Observer was a draft that should not have gone out. That’s still her mistake, though – and one she should not have made. Here’s what she said:
I am writing regarding my letter that was recently published in the Observer.
I wish to wholly and unreservedly withdraw my remarks and disassociate myself from them.
The errors arose in an initial draft being sent. But there is no excuse, and I wish to apologise for any anguish caused.
Racism takes many forms, and it is completely undeniable that Jewish people have suffered its monstrous effects, as have Irish people, Travellers and many others.
So she accepts that she was at fault and has apologised.
If she was a member of Keir Starmer’s gang, that would be the end of it. But she isn’t, so she has lost the whip and there will undoubtedly be attempts to push her out of the party (or at least out of ever again being able to stand for election to the Hackney Parliamentary seat).
But some good has come of the row, because alongside the screaming, some people are discussing her points in a reasonable way. And they have good points to make:
Oh, Diane Abbott. What a daft thing to say. Travellers and Jews of course experience racism. But here's a few honest points I think very few people are actually honest about.
It’s possible to foresee difficulties for Keir Starmer, though, as the suspension can be seen to carry a meaning that is harmful to him:
Barry Sheerman, Steve Reed, Neil Coyle, and more got away with racist remarks by being on the right of the Labour party and issuing boilerplate apologies.
What are the odds Diane Abbott's apology will not be accepted?
Ever since DA became an MP she's had to work harder to prove she belongs, unlike every White MP. Every error she makes has been over-scutinized and analysed for days. And Corbyn-supporters will note a swift apology was not good enough for Starmer and his White team.
She's wrong, obviously, but she's being treated way worse than any other MP who says something stupid has been treated and that's because people don't want to engage with what she's saying about institutional racism against Black people.
And this is an important point about the online wolves who are currently baying for her blood:
That should read “hypocritical scum”, obviously.
— Jack likes films #JoinAUnion (@JackHancock1983) April 23, 2023
At the end of the day:
Diane Abbott overreacted to a newspaper article and published hasty words and, while that reflects badly on her, she has apologised, and that goes in her favour. The Labour Party that has suspended her – and the critics and abusers who have lined up to pour hate on her – will need to justify any action taken against her in that context – and I don’t think they’ll be able to.
It is they who will come out of this smelling like bull manure – not Ms Abbott.
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Jeremy Corbyn: he doesn’t talk about his own religious beliefs, describing them as “personal”, but he does say there is a Jewish element in his ancestry – probably from Germany. So why is a Jewish Chronicle writer apparently using him to incite hatred by Jews against Christians?
An article in the Jewish Chronicle attacking Jeremy Corbyn has been reported to the police as a religious hate crime.
Here’s the offending passage, re-presented for us by Aaron Bastani of Novara Media:
What an appalling paragraph to publish. Christians don't view Jewish people as their 'enemy' in this country – why incite religious division like this?
It was reported to the police by Simon Maginn, whose It Was A Scam hashtag about the anti-Semitism hysteria whipped up against Mr Corbyn generated considerable hatred towards him personally.
He tweeted:
I've reported this (Gold says in it 'Christianity [has] an enemy in Jews') as a religious hate crime. 'Religion and belief' are protected characteristics under the 2010 Equalities Act: Gold's statement is plainly hateful towards Christians *as a group*. https://t.co/WVfVqrdR2L
Then he had a short dialogue with the article’s author…
Hi @TanyaGold1 I've reported your @JewishChron piece (below) as a religious hate crime. You say 'Christianty' has 'an enemy in Jews': that's hate speech directed against Christians. Just thought you should know. You'll be kept informed of developments. https://t.co/G0GzaDFcyQ
Do you think I'm wrong? Would you care to explain what you mean by 'Christianity [has] an enemy in Jews' that isn't overtly hateful towards the entire Christian community?
Oh but I have. So you stand by your claim that billions of good, decent Christian people are Jew-haters? And *John's Gospel* is your legal defence? Interesting case.
I see @TanyaGold1 has now blocked me. Apparently, her legal defence against religious hate crime is going to be 'the Gospel of John', and I for one wish her every possible success with that innovative and obviously bombproof legal strategy. What could possibly go wrong…? pic.twitter.com/7V9vn0XSmH
Personally, I think any claim that Jews are enemies of Christians, that is based on words in the Bible, would need to be justified in a modern context.
Of course, if Ms Gold is stating that Jewish people – as a group – actively consider themselves to be enemies of Christians, and is able to justify that statement in the way I have described, then the Jewish people she mentions are definitely in breach of the Equalities Act 2010 and should be punished under UK law.
If the matter goes to law, my instinct tells me only Ms Gold will be found to have infringed the law – but her words, published in a newspaper, may be considered incitement.
Put it all together and I can see the JC picking up yet another judgment against it.
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James Cleverly: has he ever read a history book – or, indeed, any book at all?
Look at the state of this:
Nick Ferrari: For those that say the illegal migration bill is cruel, inhumane & has echoes of Nazi Germany of the 30s… how would you respond?
James Cleverly: Some people want attention by using offensive language… they should read their history books more carefully#LBCpic.twitter.com/y85kg8Om6O
People should indeed read their history books more carefully – he’s right on that! – but if they do, they’ll find that the UK is not – historically – a welcoming country.
See for yourself:
Amidst all the "small boats" chat yesterday I randomly came across this image: British police try to deport Oskar Goldberg, a Jewish refugee from Czechoslovakia, in March 1939.
Goldberg was eventually allowed to stay, but tried in vain to obtain visas for his family. pic.twitter.com/mItXM7tKde
Louise London has shown that roughly 80,000 Jews were granted refuge in the UK by September 1939. At least half a million, probably significantly more, had sought it unsuccessfully: "escape to Britain was an exception for a lucky few; exclusion was the fate of the majority."
AFAIK no one has tried to work out how many people who were denied refuge in the UK died in the Holocaust. But the cruelty of the small boats bill is probably best understood as the latest episode in this island's long history of cowardice and callousness toward refugees
So half a million Jewish people were denied entry into the United Kingdom in the 1930s, despite the obvious cruelty of the Nazi regime in Germany – including Oskar Goldberg’s family who died at Auschwitz as part of the Nazi Holocaust.
And – how convenient! – nobody knows how many of the others, who were turned down or turned away, also died in the Nazi Holocaust.
And now Suella Braverman – with the support of the rest of the Tory government including Cleverly – wants to turn away similar numbers of refugees, behind a smokescreen that she is foiling “criminal gangs”.
How many of them will suffer and die on foreign soil, after being denied safety here? How can anyone with a conscience look at the UK’s own history and support this inhumane and internationally illegal policy?
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Keir Starmer: he may have opened the door for people who don’t like his persecution policies to leave, but some of them aren’t going. They want him to show the world how prejudiced he is by making him force them out.
“The door is open and you can leave,” said Keir Starmer about changes he has made to Labour Party procedures that make it easier for him to expel left-wing Jews.
It is an anti-Semitic policy because it attacks Jews more than non-Jews. It’s also anti-socialist, and therefore an attack on the Labour Party’s wider voter base. Starmer is relying on them voting for his party because he thinks they simply don’t have anywhere else to go.
And it has drawn the following response from a left-wing Jew who lives in his constituency, who has challenged Starmer, and who he has ignored.
Why has he ignored her? Would it put him in an awkward position?
Have a listen to her words and see what you think:
'Come and expel me, Keir' 👉How long before this Jewish Labour member in Starmer's constituency gets her anonymous 'Disputes' email from Labour HQ? Watch the whole video here👇https://t.co/9VZKT47F44pic.twitter.com/QAoUQreqsf
As @xpressanny tweeted: “Yet another Jewish lady being harassed and abused by Labour and Keir Starmer. This lady is IN Starmer’s constituency and he won’t even speak to her. What kind of leadership is this supposed to be? It’s an utter sham of a party. Tory in all but name.”
Meanwhile, it’s being reported that Starmer is saying the “vast majority” of Labour members back him, despite complaints that he has ditched all of the “10 pledges” he made to the party when he was pretending to be a socialist in order to be elected party leader.
I was one of those who commented on his betrayal of his leadership promises recently, and I can only agree with the following:
I think he just means the handful of members left after most have us have left in disgust or been kicked out for being left of Blair pic.twitter.com/i7tQyFR4Pq
If there’s a majority, there must also be a minority. Presumably that consists of people like the lady in the video clip, hanging on to their party memberships as a challenge to Starmer to expel them.
What a ridiculous position for a party leader to create for himself. Starmer looks like a fool.
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The content of this video is self-explanatory. I think it should be shown to anybody deluded enough to think that Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is now a safe space for Jews.
It’s only safe for very right-wing Jews whose allegiances belong to the fringe groups that have received the Labour leadership’s stamp of approval.
Anybody else can go hang, apparently. Isn’t that the very definition of anti-Semitism?
Have a look at the video; it’s packed with facts – I’ve already commented on the Smeeth/Anderson/whatever-she’s-calling-herself clip myself:
Shocking stuff.
More shocking because it comes with the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s seal of approval, despite having received complaints about anti-Semitism in Starmer’s Labour for years.
Which of course suggests that the EHRC is a racist organisation too.
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“Keith”: this is just one comment on the way Starmer treats members of his own party who support the values on which Labour was formed, rather than the twisted parody that he leads.
Labour has become a farce under Keir Starmer; its false-flag attack on party members is once again accusing Jews of anti-Semitism – some of them for a second time.
A quick glance down the list of those accused (see this Skwawkbox article) provides familiar names: Leah Levane, Jenny Manson, Graham Bash, Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, Mike Cushman, Glyn Secker, Jonathan Rosenhead, Stephen Marks, Diana Neslen, Marion Roberts, Tony Booth.
Some of these have been targets of the Labour witch-hunt for years. In supporting this latest offence (and believe me, despite his claim to be stepping back from disciplinary matters in accordance with EHRC demands, he’s in this up to his armpits), Keir Starmer is disgracing himself, the disciplinary farce over which he presides, and every single member of the Labour Party who is allowing it to continue.
Also in the news recently:
Petition launched for Boris Johnson to fix the social care crisis – because he still hasn’t
Yes, Johnson has increased our National Insurance contributions by more than 10 per cent on the pretext that he will use the extra cash to fix social care – but he hasn’t offered any details of what he was going to do.
So the Guideposts Trust, a charity working in local communities with people who have dementia, learning disabilities, autism, and long-term mental health issues, and carers, has launched a petition.
It calls for “a real plan to solve the social care crisis that our community has been living with for years”.
And it makes suggestions:
Give social care staff the pay and respect they need.
Level up social care to the same level as the NHS.
Improve benefits and support for people trying to live independently.
We should not be surprised that Boris Johnson isn’t concerned about rocketing gas bills; he doesn’t pay his own, after all (that’s if Downing Street even has gas).
Global gas prices have spiked, just as millions of people across the UK are facing the loss of £1,040 per year with the removal of the £20-per-week Universal Credit “uplift”.
And Johnson had the nerve to say: “I don’t believe people will be short of food – and wages are actually rising.”
He said gas prices surging was a “short-term” effect of the global economy re-starting. Is that right?
The obvious solution is to re-nationalise gas – but neither Boris Johnson nor Keir Starmer would dream of doing that; they represent the people who are profiting hugely from the increases.
(What, did you honestly think they give a fig about your best interests?)
As a result of this – and all the other erosions of our rights and earning power – the UK is facing a Winter of Despair. See for yourself:
Alok Sharma, asked about gas price rises, says there are already plenty of things in place to help poorer families keep the heating on this winter.
Like the new NI rise? Like the £20pw UC cut? Like Brexit price hikes?
National insurance increases. Universal credit cuts. Food price inflation. And now major gas and electricity price increases. This is going to be a winter of despair for a great many, without adequate NHS support. And all wholly unnecessarily.
“Home Secretary Priti Patel is being taken to court over plans to keep asylum seekers in grim barracks for another four years.
“285 migrants are sleeping 14 to a dorm in Napier Barracks in Folkestone, Kent, where Covid outbreaks are rife.
“The High Court ruled in June that the Home Office had acted unlawfully by placing refugees in the barbed wire ringed facility – where fires broke out amid unrest in January.
“Ms Patel had used emergency planning laws to take over the MoD base for 12 months.
“Full planning permission was needed to continue using it beyond September 21. But she has secured it for four more years with a Special Development Order, avoiding local authority scrutiny and public consultation.
“Now one volunteer who supports residents is challenging the decision in the High Court as a breach of planning control – and has crowdfunded £35,000 to fight the case.”
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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Keir Starmer: he has bankrupted Labour. Could Pamela Fitzpatrick’s lawsuit over false claims of anti-Semitism finally push him out the door?
Bad news for a Labour Party desperate to avoid any more large legal bills: Pamela Fitzpatrick is suing.
In respect of the Labour Party threat to auto exclude me from the party for giving an interview in 2020 to Socialist Appeal. I have now instructed Solicitors who have today written to the Labour party to put them on notice of potential legal proceedings.
You can understand her reasons. I mean, the hypocrisy of Keir Starmer is overwhelming.
What kind of party is he leading, where being interviewed by a left-wing magazine that was not blamed for anything at the time is worse than being the editor of a far-left magazine that would certainly be proscribed by Keir Starmer’s Labour, even though he himself is the editor in question.
BREAKING NEWS: Sir Keir Starmer gets emailed an automatic exclusion letter for editing 'Socialist Alternatives' magazine, a front magazine for the International Revolutionary Marxist Tendency, beteeen 1986-88. pic.twitter.com/Ovs4d5BuQc
So, let me see if I've got this right, if you gave an interview to a socialist magazine years before it became "proscribed" by Labour you will be expelled from the Party – but its OK to have been a Tory MP for 22 years and become a Labour member? ………
Of course, it’s entirely possible for a lifelong Tory to have a Damascene conversion, see the light and switch to Labour – but in these days of entryism, it is very dangerous for socialists to accept such changes unquestioningly.
Starmer has gone the other way, of course. From editing a Marxist periodical, he is now, for all intents and purposes, a Tory himself.
His attitude to the manufactured ‘anti-Semitism’ crisis that was created with lies and is being perpetuated with lies is an indication of the kind of man he is. Let’s get back to Pamela Fitzpatrick for her opinion on that:
I am starting to wonder, given my line of work, as to whether the practice of introducing laws with retrospective effect, the presumption of guilt until proven innocent, the denial of appeal rights and lack of fair process is to be future Labour policy for our justice system.
Did you read all that, in Michell Laufer’s tweet? “As a Jewish member of the Labour Party whohas had to watch other Jewish members abused, suspended and expelled as antisemitism has been weaponised,” she asks of Starmer, “is he going to be honest about “the gerrymandering of party democracy, the silencing of members of criticise apartheid Israel, his fawning obedience to the Board of Deputies who do not represent the views of the majority of Jews in this country and the imposition of antisemitism training by the Zionist Jewish Labour Movement?”
Of course he isn’t.
He’ll have to be made to admit it all.
One organisation doing its best to raise awareness of the threat to Jewish people posed by Starmer and his racists is Jewish Voice for Labour, which has taken up the issue with the Equality and Human Rights Commission, also sending the facts to the Forde Inquiry (which is still apparently ongoing, as the report has not yet been published):
As @JVoiceLabour shows in their superb report, Starmer’s Labour discriminates against Jews because they r Jewish & left wing. Most, lifelong anti-racists, have been personally affected by the Holocaust but r now treated as pariahs by the reactionary party leadership. Indefensible https://t.co/GToIAoEO00
Supplementary Submission by JVL to the EHRC and the Forde Inquiry | Jewish Voice for Labour – https://t.co/qpk80ST5pp Since our first submission the situation has continued to deteriorate. @ukLabour disciplinary action is grossly disproportionately targetting and bullying Jews.
The latest submission – of August 24, three weeks since the previous one – states:
“We have become aware of seven new investigations of Jewish Party members. Notifications of new investigations and auto-exclusions are arriving on a daily basis.
“This means it would appear that over four times more Jewish than non-Jewish Labour Party members have faced actioned complaints of antisemitism. The disproportion is even greater in relation to JVL Committee members and officers. The staggering numbers suggest that these Jews are nearly three hundred times more likely to be investigated than non- Jewish Labour Party members. In all these cases the charges of so-called antisemitism are deeply offensive.
“There has been significant further evidence of our being treated harshly as Jews.
“Dozens of Jewish members are now being targeted by Labour as antisemites, for voicing an understanding of antisemitism that is a direct product of our Jewish political and personal heritage.
“The effect of rejecting or ignoring complaints made by JVL members of antisemitism; our experience of bullying and harassment; and the refusal to consult or involve JVL in, for instance, the EHRC required Action Plan; all show disdain for our status and roles as Jews.”
There is currently a campaign to raise awareness of the weaponisation of anti-Semitism against left-wing Labour Party members – and particularly left-wing Jewish party members, called #ItWasAScam. The position it takes is right, and it is this:
Calling out weaponisation of antisemitism against political enemies isn't 'problematic' it's the right thing to do. It's a scam, to discredit good people
Call out antisemitism *and* call out the scam without fear because it's an obstacle in the fight against antisemitism
And this is the reason Starmer will lose when Ms Fitzpatrick drags Labour to court.
He’ll put the party even further into debt.
And the problem isn’t anti-Semites; it’s him – and the entryists who are supporting him because they know falsely accusing Labour socialists (the people for whom the party was originally created) of a heinous offence will make the party unelectable, leaving the way clear for the Tory corruption that we have seen under Boris Johnson.
I think it’s just a matter of time until this particular house of cards comes crashing down around Starmer and his allies.
I’ve already got the popcorn on order and am now just awaiting the opportunity to use it.
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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“Keith”: this is just one comment on the way Starmer treats members of his own party who support the values on which Labour was formed, rather than the twisted parody that he leads.
This is excruciatingly poor behaviour by Keir Starmer.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid has caught Covid-19, just days into his new job, and it means PM Boris Johnson and Chancellor Rishi Sunak have to go into self-isolation too – after humiliating themselves with an attempt to avoid it by saying they were on a ‘pilot’ scheme with daily testing.
Covid-19 infection rates are now regularly topping 50,000 a day; around around 50 people are dying of the disease every day as well – but it is against this background that the Tory government is ending social distancing restrictions that have helped ensure more of us don’t catch it!
With COVID infections and hospitalisations soaring, you might think the main opposition party would have better things to do. https://t.co/C1wC0Y9KnE
The Tory plan for another top-down restructuring of the NHS, that will restrict access to vital healthcare services because private companies will be taking your tax money for their profits, is well on its way through Parliament.
Also progressing towards becoming law are oppressive and racist plans to restrict our right to make political protests, arrest members of certain ethnic groups on sight (on the assumption that their existence means they will commit crimes), and force refugees to their deaths rather than allow them into the UK.
What is Leader of the Opposition Keir Starmer doing about all this? Nothing. He’s more interested in decimating his own party.
Under Starmer, Labour supports the lifting of social distancing rules – he backed the Tory re-opening of schools to the hilt, remember?
He made only token resistance to the NHS restructuring – and it has been widely speculated that this is because he receives donations from private healthcare. He isn’t interested in protecting your right to protest, either.
As for helping ethnic minorities, as far as Starmer is concerned, almost all of them can go hang. His support for ethnic minorities extends only to those members of the Jewish community who support hard-rightwing Zionists and those of that political shade who inhabit the government of Israel. It seems he is related to such people by marriage.
So, for example, he thinks this is okay:
Israel just destroyed the oldest known Canaanite cemetery in Palestine, a 4,200-year old site, to build an Israeli-settlers-only road.
This is a war crime.
The occupation regime is literally erasing Palestine’s history as the world looks on in silence. pic.twitter.com/kW17EqYVx4
Keir Starmer is set to expel 1000 left-wing Labour members to stamp out what he says is 'toxic extremism' yet he is happy to let this man back into the party. pic.twitter.com/xqNtApSXjQ
And that is why, instead of attacking the Tories’ many failures, Starmer is planning to purge more than 1,000 members of the Labour Party in the days before Parliament goes into summer recess.
Their crime? Not being right-wing enough to remain in an organisation that still describes itself as a “democratic socialist” party.
So much for Labour’s “broad church”.
According to the Mirror, which seems to be taking his side, he is attacking four groups: Resist, Labour Against the Witchhunt, Labour in Exile and Socialist Action.
Their crimes appear to be claiming that many anti-Semitism allegations, for which Labour members have been suspended or expelled, were blown out of proportion and politically-motivated; welcoming such expelled or suspended members into their own ranks; and demanding the re-admission of Jeremy Corbyn into the Parliamentary Labour Party.
The Mirror quotes one Labour source:
“Under Corbyn those from the far left fringes with poisonous beliefs and warped world-views were welcomed into the party. Keir is right to stamp out anti-Semitism and toxic extremism and get the party back into the decent mainstream of Labour values.”
The mainstream of Labour values – when This Writer was a member – included respecting the right of all ethnicities to self-determination. That includes Palestinians, who have been persecuted, murdered, and forced out of their homes and land by armed Israelis on the orders of a government that enforces racist, apartheid laws – a government that Keir Starmer slavishly supports and endorses.
It is not poisonous to believe that the Israeli government is wrong to murder Palestinian children.
It is poisonous to suggest that people who protest against such murders have “warped world-views”.
But Starmer won’t be concerning himself with the lies put forward by the Mirror‘s source; he agrees with them.
He may even agree with toxic Labour MP Neil Coyle – who has called for the expulsion of Jewish Labour members who do not share Starmer’s extreme – and I mean fanatical – right-wing views of what Israel should be:
Not far enough. JVL should be gone too. And other outright Communists who have their own political party/ies they can ruin. https://t.co/sLRk33dv17
There’s no reason to suggest that Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL) are Communists. Or that any of the organisations Starmer will purge are “poisonous”, “toxic” or “warped”.
But it is easier to persuade doubters with emotive language than it is to actually provide a reasoned argument for the unreasonable thing Starmer is about to do.
Coyle’s tweet is anti-Semitic. JVL argues that the purge of Labour Party members on grounds of anti-Semitism is false – from a Jewish standpoint. Coyle is therefore prejudiced against these Jews because they are Jews, which is the classic definition of anti-Semitism. And Starmer is perfectly happy with that, meaning that he is also an anti-Semite, notwithstanding his familial connections to Judaism.
It’s all about politics, you see.
People who support Palestinians against a brutal hard-right regime that persecutes them are socialists. They want a better deal for everyone, so that people all over the world – including the UK – can live in freedom and be able to pursue their own prosperity without fear. Starmer isn’t interested in any of that.
Starmer’s only interest is in his own prosperity, which he considers to be best pursued by stamping on the faces of those of us who stand for traditional Labour values – the political priorities on which the party was founded, back in 1900.
So he will pretend to be on the side of the Jews – while actually attacking more of them than he supports.
He will pretend to stand up for Labour values – while crossing his fingers behind his back and telling himself that neoliberal “New Labour” (Tory) values are Labour values too.
And he will pretend to be a beacon of decency standing out against the chaos he says was created by his forerunner as Labour leader.
The trouble is, he isn’t any good at the pretence.
My response to the news that Keir Starmer is about to enact a purge of left-wing members of the Labour Party – egged on by the people who made up such accusations against Jeremy Corbyn. pic.twitter.com/xKB9FVChWR
The Zionist witchfinder general Keir Starmer , aided by proposed right wing leader of Unite Gerard Coyne continue the subjugation of socialist members of Labour, particularly Jewish folk. The dossiers compiled on them were produced by Assaf Kaplan, Israeli Spy. This is Labour.
— neil flek waugh . revolutionary socialist/marxist (@sammythedog1989) July 18, 2021
Every left critic of Starmer has been completed vindicated. Worth everyone remembering in future who got this right & who got it so disasterously wrong.
Keir Starmer wasn’t lying when he said he wanted to unite the Labour Party – it’s just that his strategy is to simply kick out anyone who disagrees with him.
Q. Why does Keir Starmer consider it acceptable for a Labour MP to call for the mass expulsion of socialist Jews from the Labour Party?
A. Because it's not about antisemitism. It never was. It's about purging genuine socialists, Jewish and non-Jewish, from the Labour Party. https://t.co/nBuMY5HsLw
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush 🟨🟥🥀🇵🇸 (@WarmongerHodges) July 18, 2021
— leftworks #WeAreCorbyn #IStandWithJeremyCorbyn (@leftworks1) July 18, 2021
Oh, and if you think I’m exaggerating the toxicity of Labour under Starmer, consider this attack on Owen Jones by a StarmerLabour supporter and former Labour councillor:
Absolutely disgusting.
This chap needs to be expelled. If I can be expelled for saying I’d vote for Thelma Walker then there is no excuse whatsoever when it comes to this.
Most harmful of all is the fact that Starmer won’t gain anything by this monumental act of Labour Party self-harm – for a simple reason summed up in this tweet:
The irony of mass expulsions is that the main messages that will be conveyed to the electorate will be that the Labour Party is both irredeemably fractured & brimful with dangerous extremists.
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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