Tag Archives: Owen Jones

Keir Starmer’s bizarre definition of ‘working-class’ people will astonish you

Keir Starmer: yet another own goal.

Even Owen Jones is wrong on this one – although less so than Keir Starmer, the leader of the so-called Party of the Workers.

Starmer got totally lost on this question because he doesn’t understand the difference between working-class and middle-class people.

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Let’s look at what he said, coupled with Jones’s response:

Starmer’s failure to distinguish between working- and middle-class people may be partially attributed to political ambition; he was trying to talk about “aspiration” – the desire for people to climb the so-called ladder of success and cross the boundary between one class and the other.

In that, he is selling Snake Oil; it is harder to cross the class boundaries now than at any time in the last 40-50 years, due to political policies that he supports.

Jones is more accurate. Both working- and middle-class people need to work if they want to make a decent living, but the difference is that working-class people do not have a choice about the work they do.

If you are middle-class, you are part of a profession. This Writer is a journalist, so I am middle-class. My mother was a teacher, so she was middle-class. My father was a mechanic in a garage – skilled work, to be sure, but then lost his job and had to take one in a brewery; so he was working-class.

The extra element that Jones missed was that most jobs taken by working-class people are now so poorly-paid that they have to claim benefits in order to make ends meet,

This makes nonsense of a much-repeated Tory line, that “work is the best way out of poverty”. It isn’t.

It might be more accurate to say “middle-class work may get you out of poverty” – but no politician (middle-class) is going to tell you that because they’re basically saying that much of their work over the past half-century has been to elevate themselves to safety and then pull up the ladder so that you cannot do the same.

If you believe that Keir Starmer really has a working-class background, then he is one of the worst offenders. Do you really want to vote for this class traitor?


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Israelis are caught lying about the lethality of their bomb attacks on Gaza

Eylon Levy: he has been caught lying YET AGAIN. UK media should de-platform him to improve the factual accuracy of their reporting.

Israel’s liar-in-chief, Eylon Levy, has been caught again.

This time he has been found lying about the number of Palestinians who have been killed by Israeli airstrikes.

He reckons 22,000 bombing raids have taken place, meaning that – when one uses Palestine’s official death figures – only 0.8 people have died per attack.

He then compares this with bombing campaigns on other places in an attempt to show that Israel’s current campaign is much less lethal.

But he isn’t comparing like-for-like.

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Here’s his post on ‘X’. Notice that the graph to which he refers has been removed now:

And here’s Owen Jones with the reason Levy’s figures are false and the Israeli spokesman is lying:

The man who runs the charity from which Levy took his data about other attacks has denounced Levy’s claim as false. He might know a bit about it!

We are all victims of the most concentrated campaign of propaganda and lies that This Writer has witnessed. This Writer’s best advice is not to believe a single claim coming from Israel and its supporters.


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Owen Jones goes to the movies – and Israel’s cheerleaders scream

Owen Jones: he has been slated by Israel’s cheerleaders and warmongers, for expressing views that should be held by all of us.

Last night – November 28 – This Writer was asked by a very young friend (she’s 21) which side I’m on in the Israel/Hamas conflict.

My answer surprised everyone who was there. I said I’m on the side of peace.

They had not considered that as an option. It won me applause all around – in contrast to what happened when a left-wing journalist said the same thing after watching Israel’s film that purportedly shows Hamas atrocities committed during the October 7 attack.

Owen Jones created a YouTube clip describing his feelings, which you can find below. I urge you to watch it before drawing any conclusions about the comments it attracted.

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In it, he says he was invited to a screening of the film, which the Israel Defence Forces specifically stated was intended to drum up support for their onslaught against civilians in the Gaza Strip.

He acknowledges from the start that the film confirms that Hamas committed war crimes (along with members of other groups who crossed the border on the same day, one assumes, although that isn’t actually made clear in the clip). He makes it clear that the taking of hostages is itself a grave war crime. It should be emphasised that he does not attempt to hide or minimise the fact that war crimes were committed. As I have mentioned several times in articles about Israel and Hamas (quoting Paul Newman in another – Hollywood – movie): “There are only murderers in this room.”

He emphasises the principle that “no cause on Earth justifies the killing of civilians”. This indicates that, no matter what Jones saw in the IDF film, it was never going to sway him into supporting the IDF’s operations in Gaza that are now said to have killed more than 14,800 people, including 6,000 children (Jones himself suggests more than 20,000 people – 20 times as many as the number of Israelis killed on October 7 and one per cent of Gaza’s population, including more than 8,000 children).

He makes the point that the 43-minute film is a selection of what the IDF says are thousands of hours of material, and concludes that it is likely to show the worst events the Israeli authorities were able to find. This is logical as they are trying to trigger outrage in their chosen audience of journalists and influencers, and support for ongoing slaughter in Gaza.

But it means the material is biased, and all footage gathered by the IDF should be submitted to independent inspection; this is basic journalistic practice – a genuinely independent journalist or historian would not be able to say they could accurately assess what happened on October 7, based only on this selection. For balance, Jones adds that some horrors may not have been recorded or be in the captured material.

The footage does not support some of the most serious claims made by Israel and the IDF in the weeks since October 7. So:

  • There is no material suggesting that babies were beheaded. There are beheadings – one of a dead soldier (therefore not an execution) and one attempt to behead a dying Thai migrant worker that fails.
  • There is no evidence of torture.
  • There is no evidence of rape and sexual violence. Bodies found without underwear do not constitute conclusive evidence of such crimes, as Jones states.
  • Some have claimed that there is material showing children being killed but Jones could find no evidence of this.

Jones makes it clear that this is not to say that none of these things happened. It simply doesn’t prove that they did.

The images are coupled with audio recordings, purportedly of Hamas communications that were intercepted. Jones questions their veracity. Other such clips have been released by Israel/the IDF in the past weeks, and have been dismissed as fake by experts. There is no reason for this material not to be passed on for independent assessment.

Some of the most shocking footage was of bodies burned beyond recognition – but we have learned that hundreds of them belonged to Hamas personnel, according to Israel spokesman Mark Regev. These people would not have been burned by their colleagues in Hamas – so Jones asks the obvious question: who burned them and how?

He also asks how many people were killed by reckless fire – from either side, although he does qualify this by saying evidence only suggests two incidents involved IDF forces allegedly killing Israelis – at Kibbutz Be’eri and at the Nova rave (and the rave claim is hotly disputed). This Writer would add the IDF’s Gaza Battalion headquarters, where the commanding officer, safe in a bunker, ordered an airstrike on the surface where his troops were engaged in combat with Hamas personnel.

Jones moves on to examine articles by other journalists, including one saying the film shows Hamas are worse than the Nazis – which he correctly describes as “insulting” and “ahistorical”, belittling the horrors of the Holocaust.

Then he tackles criticism of his own behaviour, and his words (found at around the 15-minute mark in the video clip) are worth quoting here: “The roots of my politics is a revulsion at human suffering. That is the entire point of all of my work. You might not believe it, you may have invented a perverse, bogeyman caricature in your head, of who I am, but that is the point of everything that I believe in.

“Watching this film of horrors – and they are horrors – does not lead me to want to support other horrors. Watching innocent civilians being killed in Israel does not make me more likely to support killing more innocent civilians in Gaza. Indeed, several times over more innocent civilians.

“The fact that this is controversial – and I know that … those who supported this screening and its purpose find this controversial – is absurd.

“Now, you have a choice, when you learn of the horrors that humans are capable of inflicting against each other. You either allow these horrors to deepen your humanity or you use those horrors to numb your humanity so that you can be complicit in even more, and indeed even greater horrors.

“This is a very basic and fundamental lesson from human history, which is never learned, with a grave human cost.”

He returns to this later in the clip: “It’s that point at which you either look at horror, you see horror, and you deepen your humanity – or you numb your humanity; you allow your humanity to be chipped away.

“And here’s how I understand the purpose of the screening can be used for just that, is that when attendees see what is happening in Gaza, the thousands of innocent civilians, many thousands of little kids among them, as well as maimed little toddlers, newborns suffocating to death, and feel horror and anguish – and then we are meant to think back to what we saw at those screenings, to remember those poor, injured little boys crying for their dead father, and then to wipe away the horror and anguish we feel about Gaza’s innocence, so that we continue – we can continue – to support a military onslaught which will take many more lives.

“This has happened throughout history, where you are encouraged to break down your empathy for the suffering of others by selectively focusing only on the suffering of some.

“I won’t do that.”

He continued: “Those behind the screening would rightfully regard even one of the killings of Israeli civilians which I saw as intolerable. I did.

“But 20,000 dead Palestinians, many thousands of them children – that’s entirely tolerable?

“Well, there we differ in our responses to the horrors that we saw.”

He concluded: “Throughout the tortured history of our species, horror at atrocities has long been used to build consent for yet more atrocities.

“I left that screening, yes… ashen-faced, horrified, disgusted, repulsed – and more determined than ever to spare innocent people from violent deaths and suffering. That should be your response too.

“No cause on Earth justified crimes committed against innocent civilians. And those crimes don’t justify collective punishment and the mass slaughter that the people of Gaza are now suffering.”

Here’s the clip:

The response Jones received for this display of humanity in the face of horror has been, itself, horrifying.

Here’s a selection, so you can see for yourself, and put names to those who have numbed their humanity and allowed themselves to become complicit in more and greater horrors:

I answered this one:

None of the people attacking Jones in the tweets above deserve any of your attention. They present as bloodthirsty warmongers intent on the annihilation – not of Hamas, but of Palestine and all Palestinians.

If you can remember all the way back to the beginning of this article, you may recall that when I was asked whose side I take in the Israel/Hamas conflict, I said I was on the side of peace.

You don’t get peace by invading somebody else’s country, subjugating them, stealing their land, walling in, oppressing and murdering them for 75 years – as Israel has discovered.

You don’t get peace by breaking through the walls and murdering your oppressors in a vain and (proportionately) tiny act of rebellion – as Hamas has discovered.

All you get is a perpetuation of the cycle of violence.

International law says Palestine has a right to resist the occupation of its land and the oppression of its people by Israel. But that does not give it a right to commit a single act of violence against a civilian.

Israel has a right to defend itself against acts of violence that are committed against its civilians. The issues are muddied here because it is questionable whether those acts of violence were committed on Israeli land or land that has been stolen from Palestine, in which case those civilians had no right to be there. But in any case, that does not give it a right to commit a single act of violence against a civilian.

Both sides are in the wrong. Both have committed war crimes. Both have committed atrocities.

In fairness, both have also been trying to whip up support for further atrocities. That’s why my friends were so surprised when I didn’t say I supported Israel or Hamas (or Gaza, or Palestine) but wanted peace instead.

The only way to get peace is to put the weapons away, sit down with the people you’ve been fighting and talk about how it can be achieved.

The longer that moment is delayed, they harder it will be to achieve that peace.

And yes, every one of us has a responsibility to seek that peace. You don’t get it by cheerleading for war and its atrocities.


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Gary Lineker causes controversy again by saying the obvious about Israel’s genocide

Gary Lineker: once again he is a target; once again it is for supporting a well-argued position.

The Israel apologists really don’t like being made to face the facts.

Today (November 22) they are attacking Gary Lineker for sharing a YouTube video by Owen Jones, discussing an Israeli academic’s assessment of that country’s onslaught against Gaza as a “textbook genocide”:

I pointed out that this was a genocide, weeks ago, and the points made by Professor Segal are those that I made. His illustrations are persuasive, although you may need to see the whole video to realise that:

Jones notes at the end that Israel’s supporters were likely to pile in and attack – and he’s right. He may not have realised that he would not be the main target.

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Instead, it was Mr Lineker – and the principle form of the attack seemed to be against his intelligence:

They also attacked him as a person:

I’m sure there are many other attackers on the social media.

All I can suggest is that these people receive the kind of treatment they would like us to give Mr Lineker.

That is, they should be blocked on the social media and ignored if they turn up anywhere else.


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This is how UK politicians and media control the narrative on Israel and Gaza

Don’t believe the gaslighters: babies are dying in Gaza – not because of anything Hamas did, but because Israel chose to deny power to the hospital that was caring for them. That isn’t Israel defending itself; it is Israel murdering babies. Only a few weeks ago, Israel was asking us to sympathise with its people on the basis of a lie that Israeli babies had been murdered by Hamas. Do you see how this works?

I know he’s divisive but this YouTube clip by Owen Jones is right on the button.

It immortalises an exchange – more like a confrontation – between the Guardian columnist and primarily Ed Balls, former (useless) Shadow Chancellor who now podcasts with the man who was the UK’s actual Chancellor, George Osborne (see how cosy these guys are?)

And it wasn’t over the horrifying carnage being wrought in Gaza – upon, as Jones rightly states, babies as much as everyone else; it was over the way the vast majority of UK politicians and the mainstream media have been trying to gaslight us all into thinking that Israel is somehow in the right.

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The behaviour of all those in the studio around Jones – but Balls in particular – is highly instructive:

At the end of the day, we all know that Israel is wrong to do what it is doing.

We are watching genocide.

If Israel had any interest in removing Hamas, it would have run an espionage operation to spy out all that organisation’s hiding-places long ago, and then after the October 7 attacks, it would have carried out surgical strikes on those hiding-places. It would also have engaged in international diplomacy to expose and remove Hamas from its bases in other countries. That did not happen.

Instead, Israel has waded into Gaza and is piling up the bodies of innocent people.

Politicians from Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer down have lined up to say Israel has a right to do this because it is defending itself, despite the fact that Israel has already murdered many times the number of innocents that Hamas killed on October 7 (most Israeli casualties were military, remember) without making any real dent in the organisation that it claims is its real enemy.

And when commentators like Jones point out the falsehoods in their arguments, media interviewers like Balls turn up to pick holes in the claims, on the basis that any tiny inconsistency in what Jones says under pressure must mean his entire line of reasoning is wrong. ‘Tisn’t.

You saw it very clearly in the clip, when it was claimed that people on Saturday’s (November 11) peace march were preaching hate – so that meant everybody on the march had to be a racist and an anti-Semite. They very obviously weren’t.

Owen Jones is right. The UK’s politicians – and their client media (and let’s be generous here and agree that it doesn’t include every single member of the UK media establishment – just most of them) – are trying to gaslight us into believing a lie that Israel has to commit genocide in Gaza in order to defend itself.

And he’s right about another element of this: history will judge those people harshly.


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George Osborne’s ‘confetti’ incident: what a lot of fuss over such a little thing!

Unbelievable: this innocent sprinkling of confetti at George Osborne’s wedding has been likened by former Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls to the murder of Jo Cox.

The furore stoked by politicians and the mass media over a smiling pensioner throwing confetti over George Osborne at his wedding must defy belief.

Confetti-throwing is a well-loved tradition that one may usually expect to see after any wedding ceremony.

Ah, but this confetti was orange, meaning it – and the lady who threw it – were instantly linked with climate protesters Just Stop Oil. And they’ve continued to be linked to that organisation, even after it denied any connection:

It said: “The lady who threw confetti in Bruton yesterday was upholding a tradition that is common across many cultures. We absolutely defend the right for people to throw confetti (of whatever colour) at weddings and other celebrations.

“If it was a form of protest – which is yet to be established – we applaud it and thank the person concerned. It was peaceful and not especially disruptive, but got massive media attention for Just Stop Oil’s demand.”

But it continued: “However, as much as we applaud the use of orange confetti at this wedding, we were not responsible.”

That seems as straightforward as it gets.

So why is the incident still being linked to the protest group, and why are politicians from the Labour Party getting on the bandwagon to support George Osborne who, together with David Cameron, is the most directly responsible for the austerity policies that have been destroying the British way of life since 2010?

Here’s Rachel Reeves – who, as Shadow Chancellor, should be intimately familiar with Osborne’s economic recklessness – ignoring the fact that if it weren’t for demonstrations of protest at highly-publicised events, she might not have the right to vote today, let alone the right to be a member of Parliament who’s eyeing the second-highest office in the land:

What are the “better ways” that Labour is using to tackle the climate emergency, after party leader Keir Starmer cancelled its environmental policy and told us all that he hates “tree-huggers”? It doesn’t have any – that are visible to This Writer.

How about former Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls who, as a co-presenter of ITV’s Good Morning Britainshouted down guest Owen Jones for daring to point out that Osborne’s austerity policies led to the deaths of many, many people:

Did you notice how Daily Mail columnist and GB News presenter Andrew Pierce tried to stop Jones being heard when he realised what the subject would be? “You’re losing the room, Owen” – he was saying the other people in the TV studio would not be interested in the mass deaths of many people who could have been watching their show today if not for the Tory policy that he (Pierce) supported then and probably supports now.

And then Balls opened his big mouth so Jones could not get a word in edgeways. And Jones – controversial though he may be – was the one in the right. Balls defeated his own aim by overtalking him; clearly the former Shadow Chancellor wanted to defend his former political enemy (leading us to question whether Osborne was ever really Ed Balls’s political enemy) and didn’t want the opposing view to be heard.

And wasn’t Ed Balls invited to George Osborne’s wedding?

Not satisfied with what he had already done, Balls made himself even more ridiculous by equating the practice of throwing confetti at a wedding with the murder of the late Labour MP Jo Cox. “Cremant Communarde”‘s comment is pertinent:

Again, Owen Jones was in the right: “It belittles [the death of Jo Cox at the hands of a far-right-wing extremist] to conflate the two.”

You have to question why Balls tried.

Was it because, as Aaron Bastani of Novara Media tweeted, “We have a political and media elite with no sense of proportion or common sense”?

He continued: “How can you start talking about Jo Cox in the same breath as someone throwing confetti? You can think both are wrong, fine, but this is obscene.”

Valid point.

Over on LBC, Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy – in his actual day job (clearly representing his constituents is only for spare change) – bemoaned the fact that some confetti may have fallen on Osborne’s (latest) bride, Thea Rogers.

He considered it “unacceptable” that Ms Rogers (Mrs Osborne?) was subjected to this wedding-day tradition. Go figure.

And Pamela Fitzpatrick makes a much more valid point: Lammy was defending somebody who introduced measures that killed tens of thousands of people – hundreds of thousands, if you go with Owen Jones’s figures.

Those people can’t have weddings, or confetti; they no longer have lives. That is what’s unacceptable, in any matter concerning George Osborne and his ilk.

Why have we been subjected to this display of outrage by some of right-wing Labour’s most prominent flapping mouths? Is it because not only Ed Balls but also his wife, current Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, was at the wedding?

Knowing this, isn’t the real issue whether any of these right-wing Labour luminaries were ever really opposed to Osborne and his austerity policies?

To This Writer, what’s unacceptable in this situation is a current or former Opposition MP socialising with a person who is responsible for such mass death. As a protest symbol, orange confetti isn’t nearly strong enough.

And there are other controversies that the above has masked. How about this one?

So this One-Rule-For-Us Tory was happy to inflict poverty on millions, while gracing his then-paramour with an enormous pay rise.

And then there’s the so-called “poison pen” email that landed the night before the wedding. I won’t quote it here – look it up yourself – but it suggests that not only was Osborne romancing Ms Rogers while he was still married to someone else but also that he is a serial love cheat who had physical relationship with other women while he was with her.

If it’s true, then coupled with everything else we are presented with the history of a creature who deserves nothing but revulsion and rejection from any right-minded person. One questions the judgement of a Labour Party whose leaders defend him.


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France has public ownership of energy. Why can’t the UK have that too?

The problem: energy prices are set to have quadrupled within a year and the Tory government is doing nothing about it.

Controversial as he may be in many respects, Owen Jones makes a lot of good points in this short clip from an appearance on Jeremy Vine’s show.

Firstly, because the energy firms are private companies, their shareholders have received £200 billion in dividends since 2010 – money that could have been used to reduce bills instead, or to free the UK from dependence on fossil fuels provided by foreign suppliers (this would have eliminated the price shock that has sent our bills skyrocketing today).

We’ve been told profits have increased fourfold because of the price increases – and very little of that is likely to go into energy independence; 60 per cent of these new profits will go to shareholders.

The energy industry is a natural monopoly which should never have been privatised. The solution to the price problem is to re-nationalise the industry and impose stern pricing controls on bills sent to the public. Windfall taxes on the companies are not enough.

See/hear for yourself:

Sadly, nobody in any position to affect the energy crisis is even thinking of re-nationalisation, despite the example of France, where price increases are pinned at an affordable four per cent.

Even Labour leader Keir Starmer thinks the energy firms should remain in the hands of billionaires – a position that sets him against the vast majority of his party’s members.

But then, who cares about that? Starmer’s party “reforms” have ensured that the opinions of Labour members won’t have any impact on party policy in the future. The membership exists to service the desires of the party’s elite MPs, candidates and other high-level representatives.

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Man assaulted Owen Jones out of hatred for his political views and homophobia, court rules

Abuse: Owen Jones has experience of dealing with abuse from the far right. This shot shows him being pursued by James Goddard in January last year.

This Site reported the assault shortly after it happened. It’s good to see justice done and know that the far-right crazies can’t get away with anything they like, just because another far-right crazy is in Downing Street.

I don’t agree with Mr Jones about everything he says but he certainly should not be threatened with violence over the opinions he expresses.

A man has been found guilty of aggravated assault against the Guardian columnist Owen Jones because of hostility to his leftwing political views and homophobia, following a two-day trial at Snaresbrook crown court.

Anne Studd QC, the presiding judge, concluded at the end of the hearing that Jones was the victim of a “wholly unprovoked assault” outside a central London pub last August because of “his LGBT and his leftwing beliefs”.

The defendant, James Healy, 40, had “far-right” views, Studd added, as evidenced by a collection of memorabilia found at his Portsmouth home, including items with logos or mottos from far right group Combat 18, white supremacist groups and hooligan groups associated with Chelsea football club.

Healy had already pleaded guilty to assaulting Jones last August outside the Lexington pub in King’s Cross, north London, at about 2am. But he was on trial to determine whether his actions were motivated by homophobia and hostility to Jones’s leftwing views.

Healy is one of three men who have admitted being involved in the incident. He and Liam Tracey, 34, from Camden, north London, and Charlie Ambrose, 29, from Brighton, all pleaded guilty to affray last month. Healy also admitted a further charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

Sentencing for all three men is due to take place next month at the earliest. Healy will receive a greater than normal sentence because of the aggravating factors.

Source: Man found guilty of aggravated assault against Owen Jones | UK news | The Guardian

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Lefty journo Owen Jones beaten in ‘blatant premeditated’ assault

Abuse: Here’s James Goddard doing his best to rile Owen Jones.

Left-wing journalist Owen Jones has suffered injuries to his head and back after a “blatant premeditated assault” as he was celebrating his birthday with friends.

Mr Jones, who has reported the incident to the police, tweeted that he was “in no doubt as to what this is”, pointing out that members of the political far right had tried to intimidate him in the past.

Here’s his account:

How cowardly of the attackers – to approach from behind and hit their victim in the back.

He later added: “What happened – to be clear – is they spotted me in the pub, waited for us to leave, and then launched their attack when we were away from the pub – it was planned, not a random attack.”

This attack is symptomatic of a terrifying trend in the UK – possibly provoked by successive Conservative governments that have weakened our police while stoking hatred with divisive rhetoric.

We’ve seen Mr Jones and Anna Soubry (and possibly others) threatened by right-wing demonstrators on College Green, outside Parliament.

We have also seen a rise in intimidating behaviour from groups claiming to represent British Jews; consider the treatment of venues in Brighton that considered hosting Chris Williamson’s recent speech there and remember that Mr Williamson has not been found to have committed any anti-Semitic acts.

Jewish Voice for Labour has called on the Board of Deputies of British Jews to condemn this behaviour but that organisation – which sent representatives to Brighton to protest while Mr Williamson was making his speech (were they responsible for the filming of attendees?) – had not responded at the time of writing.

Who else will be emboldened to threaten the rest of us?

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Gobby Brextremist Goddard arrested again – for threatening photographer

Gobby James Goddard: His tendency to let his mouth run away with him keeps getting him arrested.

Remember James Goddard, the pro-Brexit fanatic who got arrested after intimidating incidents involving Anna Soubry, Owen Jones and others on College Green, Westminster, last month?

No?

Well, it’s hardly surprising.

It’s even less surprising that he has been arrested again – this time for threatening a press photographer.

It seems a recording exists of him telling Joel Goodman, “I swear to god when there’s no police around here, I’m going to take your head off your shoulders, and all the football lads will as well, your card is marked … Trust me, next time you’re in London mate, you’re finished.”

The full details are available on Zelo Street.

As intimidation attempts go, it’s not very convincing. As a propagandist, this guy doesn’t hold a candle to Lord Haw Haw. Or even Lord Snooty.

Perhaps we might call him Lord Snotty?

Or perhaps we should refuse to give him and his ilk the time of day.


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