Clueless again: Starmer’s hypocrisy in sacking one shadow minister but not another, for the same false accusation, shows his hypocrisy – and also confirms to all of us that he was using anti-Semitism as an excuse to sack Rebecca Long-Bailey.
This is a bit of a tangled web.
Keir Starmer has been criticised for failing to take action against his shadow Communities and Local Government Secretary, Steve Reed, over two tweets which have been said to be anti-Semitic.
One suggested that property developer and former porn baron Richard Desmond, who is Jewish (who knew?) is “the puppet master for the entire Tory cabinet”.
The other was a retweet of an article referring to an “Israeli billionaire” influencing Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick.
Neither of these tweets are anti-Semitic in any way.
One presumes those making that suggestion about the first are referring to the anti-Semitic trope of Jewish conspiracies running the world – but there’s no implication that Desmond is representing the entire Jewish ethnicity in his behaviour; it doesn’t even mention his ethnicity.
As for the other – try replacing “Israeli” with, I don’t know… “Australian”. Would it be racist against Australians to say that one of them was influencing Jenrick? Of course not. And an Israeli isn’t necessarily Jewish so, again, anti-Semitism cannot be rightl applied.
However:
It is only a matter of days since Starmer sacked now-former shadow Education Secretary Rebecca Long-Bailey under the pretext that she had retweeted a link to an interview with actor Maxine Peake containing an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory.
It didn’t – the claim has subsequently been proved accurate – but the damage was done and RLB is out.
The issue with Starmer is hypocrisy. Neither of his shadow ministers did anything anti-Semitic, both were accused, but only one lost their job.
The issue has made the Labour leader’s position even less credible than it was before; this guy just doesn’t have a clue, and has turned Labour’s position on racism into nonsense.
He has to go. It’s only a matter of time until he does.
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Late last month, Keir Starmer sacked Rebecca Long-Bailey as shadow Education Secretary after she tweeted a link to an interview with actor Maxine Peake which he claimed featured an “anti-Semitic conspiracy theory”.
It seems the Labour leader believes it is anti-Semitic to state that Israeli military/police personnel taught members of the US police the choke hold that was misused to kill George Floyd, triggering a wave of protest across the world.
Last week, This Site found and published details of an organisation, run by Israeli ex-forces personnel, that provides exactly that service: the Israeli Tactical School.
A representative of the organisation even commented on the article to say that George Floyd’s death was caused by mis-application of the hold taught by its representatives.
And this is perfectly reasonable. There has never been any implication that Israelis trained US police officers specifically to kill black people.
Nevertheless, it seems the site has been altered since my piece was published, to remove evidence that Israeli Tactical teaches this particular hold.
The content of the law enforcement page was deleted in just the last few days, with the amendment dating to after the Long-Bailey sacking. It is now blank.
The about page has been radically amended – with the ‘knee on neck’ image removed and the text altered.
The question is: Why?
Screenshots of the original pages are available – Skwawkbox publishes them in its article – and This Writer has taken copies of them. The evidence showing not only that Israeli personnel taught this technique but that it is an established technique used in Israel is clear.
So why even try to hide it? Doesn’t that just make the technique, the teaching and the organisation look suspicious?
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Dithering and indecisive: and we were told he would sweep Labour back into power!
Keir Starmer is now in serious trouble.
His tone-deaf description of Black Lives Matter as a “moment” – along with a series of other race-related mishaps – has upset a multitude of voters – not just black or from ethnic minorities but everybody – and heralded a mass exodus that he seems ill-equipped to stem.
And the mass media are full of stories about it.
Here‘s black, working-class woman – and now-former Labour member – Evie Muir in Metro:
When Starmer took over this year, I was open to the change in leadership. His voting record on social issues mirrored my values and I was hopeful that this would be reflected in his actions moving forward.
But over the past few weeks, I’ve found myself distancing from the Labour Party at an evolving pace.
Starmer … positioned himself as aleader who will not be exploring [racism] for the party’sconstituents. He is not only gatekeeping a problematic institution, but also failing to recognise the nuances within the relationship between the police and Black communities in the UK.
After the statement [on Black Lives Matter] went viral, former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, notorious for his unapologetic bigotry, right wing rhetoric and anti-multiculturalism stance, tweeted that he ‘heartily agrees’ with Starmer’s condemnation of the BLM organisation.
I immediately cancelled my Labour Party membership.
I am not the only one to abandon Labour. My social media feeds, WhatsApp groups and DMs sprung to life with likeminded friends telling me they feel equally betrayed.
Questioning the validity of the only organisation that advocates for Black people, questions the validity of all Black people.
If the Labour Party is not prepared to listen to the needs of Black people, unapologetically support these and advocate for our rights to be heard, then the party is no longer a safe place for us. You are either with us or you are against us, there is no room for debating our humanity, excusing our oppressors or talking over us. This only puts us in further danger.
Starmer’s statement othered us so completely that I no longer feel like we have a home in the party, and as an avid and loyal Labour advocate, this turnaround is humiliating.
I won’t be forgetting Starmer’s comments, and I won’t be returning to Labour under his leadership.
This article has been endorsed by at least one black Labour MP:
The clock’s ticking @UKLabour. Start stepping up to the challenge of structural racism or watch as yet more voters step away. Voters we can’t afford to lose. https://t.co/WTuWuO25Ei
This photo showing Labour's race problem – Starmer speaking to an almost all white audience in Tottenham! BLM asking victims of Labour anti-Black racism to report it. Do it. Do it. Do it.https://t.co/8oWpz8n3O3
If you click on the link to the article, you’ll see that BLM is asking Labour members to report anti-black racism within the party – including, presumably, that of its leaders – to their regional offices, with contact details included, hence Jackie Walker’s exhortation for people to do it.
Here’s a tweet identifying two more issues alongside the Black Lives Matter fiasco:
Starmer
1. Minimises racist & misogynistic talk revealed in Labour Leak, effectively as banter 2. Insults #BlackLivesMatter and thinks an apology is end of matter 3. Sacks RLB for retweeting article in which phrase complained of was clearly NOT antisemitic
The first point refers to the way party officials allegedly defended “racist, sexist and abusive” messages about colleagues, as seen in the leaked Labour report on the party’s response to allegations of anti-Semitism.
One third of the National Executive Committee’s members, including representatives from four trade unions, wrote to the Labour leader this week accusing his office of misleading them about how the party dealt with leaked WhatsApp messages by senior officials detailed in a controversial internal report.
The messages, which included senior officials saying they wished a prominent Labour activist would die in a fire, calling a left-wing staffer “pube head”, and commenting that female advisers had “stopped wearing bras” in meetings, provoked widespread anger in the party when they came to light earlier this year. The party’s NEC ordered an investigation, which is still ongoing.
However, last week Labour’s press office provided a statement to journalists covering the story that defended the comments, describing criticism as “po-faced” and stating: “These were messages exchanged between co-workers in the expectation that they would remain private and confidential and the tone of the language used reflects that.”
The comment outraged NEC members, who called for an apology and retraction at a meeting of the body on Tuesday, but Sir Keir’s office is understood to have told them that the statement was not intended for publication and said it had been provided by the party’s lawyers.
But the offending statement, which The Independent has seen in full, was sent to journalists at the OpenDemocracy website from the Labour press office’s main email account and refers to “the party’s lawyers” in the third person. Although clearly written in legal language, it has the subject line “Re: URGENT: Right of reply offer pre-publication”, suggesting it was issued in response to a request for comment.
Labour has launched an inquiry into the contents of the leaked report, but NEC members – rightly – pointed out that this was now prejudiced by the press release:
In their letter to Sir Keir, the 13 NEC members said: “The Labour Party’s statement was not only inexcusable in defending the racist, sexist and abusive comments in the WhatsApp groups, it also directly prejudged the specific issues that Martin Forde’s inquiry is considering. This prejudices Martin Forde’s inquiry and thereby undermines its independence.
“It is clearly unacceptable for party officials or officials in the leader’s office to politically interfere with or compromise the integrity of the independent investigation that the NEC has commissioned. As members of the NEC, we therefore ask that you issue an immediate apology for this Labour Party statement and retract it completely.”
No such apology or retraction appears to have been made. A statement that the quoted comments “do not in any way represent the party’s position in relation to the contents of the leaked report overall and do not prejudge the outcome of those investigations” is unconvincing; we can judge those words for ourselves.
The storm over the sacking of Rebecca Long-Bailey has been well-documented on This Site and elsewhere.
All in all, it seems Starmer has dug a hole for himself and seems determined to sit in it.
Perhaps he thinks this will all blow over and he’ll be able to carry on as though he hasn’t made a damn fool of himself and everybody who follows him.
It won’t.
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This is awkward – for everybody like Keir Starmer who insisted that it was anti-Semitic to claim that members of the Israeli police/military taught US police the choke hold that killed George Floyd.
The image above is from a promotional video by an organisation calling itself Israeli Tactical. This firm has been providing training in the United States since at least 2013, when its Twitter account was set up by one Tomer Israeli who, according to Israeli Tactical’s website, is “A veteran captain of the Israeli Defense Forces with over 20 years of both combat and instructional experience… [who] founded Israeli Tactical School as a premium security and counter-terror training organization that would meet the growing demand for a higher level of protective services”.
The website states: “Since the inception of Israeli Tactical School, Mr. Israeli has had the privilege of training law enforcement officers from over 45 agencies, including U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Berets), U.S. Army Rangers, Baltimore County Police Department (BCoPD), U.S. Secret Service (USSS), Baltimore Police Department (BPD), Pentagon Police, Howard County Police Department (HCPD), Maryland State Police (MDSP), Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), U.S. Capitol Police (USCP), Montgomery County Police Department (MPD), D.C. Metropolitan Police (MPDC), U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), U.S. Delta Force, Swiss Army Delta Force (G7), French SWAT (RAID), Shanghai SWAT (SPU – unit training), Royal Thai Commando Unit (CSD – unit training), and many more.”
I’m sure some nitpickers will want to argue but it seems clear that Israeli experts do provide this training.
I think Keir Starmer and his cronies have a lot of apologising to do.
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Ed Miliband has claimed his boss Keir Starmer was right to sack Rebecca Long-Bailey – while also claiming the party isn’t purging itself of left-wingers.
The two claims are incompatible. Long-Bailey was the continuity left-wing candidate in the party’s recent leadership election and Starmer has used a flimsy excuse related to anti-Semitism to sack her.
Many other left-wingers are either being suspended for the same flimsy reason or have already been expelled (like This Writer) – but Miliband is insisting that there is no purge.
He has just incinerated any credibility he had left. Nobody should believe a word of it.
Look at this nonsense:
Miliband, the shadow business secretary and a former party leader, said Long-Bailey was a decent person and not antisemitic but that Starmer was right to sack her.
The reason the Maxine Peake interview was a problem “is not that it had a criticism of the state of Israel. I’m a big critic of what the Israeli government has done on a number of occasions. It was that it was a false criticism of the state of Israel, or rather the Israeli Defence Force, linked to the death of George Floyd, wrongly, saying that somehow tactics that killed George Floyd were linked to the Israelis,” Miliband told the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show.
“The problem is that over the centuries when calamitous things have happened, Jews have been blamed. That’s why there’s an antisemitism issue in relation to this and that’s why I believe Keir took the right decision. I think she made a significant error of judgment.”
Notice the wording: “When calamitous things have happened, Jews have been blamed.” Not “Jews have been wrongly blamed”.
It would be anti-Semitic to blame Jews – in this case, Jewish people working for the Israeli police or military – for something they haven’t done.
But we know that police from many US states have been trained by the Israeli police and/or military. And we have photographic evidence of the Israeli police/military – well, see for yourself:
Choke hold: Israeli armed forces using the same ‘knee on neck’ technique that was used to kill George Floyd. But we’re being asked to believe Israel never taught that technique to US police and it is anti-Semitic to suggest that one country’s armed forces could teach such techniques to another’s police.
It is in the face of this evidence that the Israeli authorities – not the Jews – are claiming their forces don’t teach these methods to US police.
It is not a credible position, therefore neither is Miliband’s.
So his other claim – that left-wingers in the Labour Party aren’t being subjected to a purge – must also fall. He said on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show:
Allies of Ms Long-Bailey who have criticised her sacking – such as former shadow chancellor John McDonnell and ex-party chair Ian Lavery – would not be disciplined for doing so.
He dismissed concerns expressed by some on the left of the party that this was a prelude to a further distancing from the Jeremy Corbyn-era and that legitimate criticism of Israel would be frowned upon.
“I heard something… about how Keir wants to purge these people. He is not about purges. He wants to change the country by not having the Labour Party mired in issues which, frankly, provide a stain on us. Keir took very strong action [against Ms Long-Bailey] and now we need to move on and deal with the issues of anti-Semitism we face.”
This Writer doesn’t believe that for a moment.
By sacking Long-Bailey and forcing left-wingers to reconsider whether they have a future in the Labour Party, he has plunged Labour even deeper into the mire.
He has not proved that criticism of Israel over this issue is not legitimate. All the evidence suggests that it has a very strong factual basis but Starmer seems determined to put his hands over his ears, shut his eyes, shake his head and mutter, “No, no, no,” like a petulant schoolboy whenever anybody tries to point this out. I have no doubt that Miliband will do the same.
It is this attitude that worsens Labour’s position. In refusing to take serious issues seriously, the party makes a mockery of its own position on anti-Semitism; how can it take a firm stand on the issue if it can’t accept the difference between anti-Semitism and justified criticism of a foreign government?
Left-wingers – including many who have not yet been smeared with accusations of anti-Semitism that are based on Labour’s bizarre misinterpretation – are quitting the party in large numbers, or seriously considering it, because of this pig-headed idiocy.
If there is a stain on the party, it is on Starmer and – despite his own Jewish heritage – Miliband.
They could put a stop to it by admitting their fault, accepting that Israel does have a prima facie case to answer (even though we may never have accurate facts because it is in that government’s interests to lie if its forces have been providing the disputed training), and resetting their claims about anti-Semitism to fall in line with accepted definitions of it.
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Choke hold: Israeli armed forces using the same ‘knee on neck’ technique that was used to kill George Floyd. But we’re being asked to believe Israel never taught that technique to US police and it is anti-Semitic to suggest that one country’s armed forces could teach such techniques to another’s police.
Quite a few, it seems.
Let’s start with the biggie: Israel is due to launch a major invasion of Palestinian territory next week, targeting in particular areas containing the aquifers that make life possible in these parched places.
It may just be coincidence or the sublime consequence of divine providence but the parts of "Judea and Samaria" (sic) that the Israelis intend to annex control the aquifers in this desperately water stressed region.
— JewishVoiceForLabour (@JVoiceLabour) June 26, 2020
Starmer’s sacking of RLB is a warning to Labour Party members that he will not tolerate the voicing of any dissent against this racist military action.
Note the timing Days before Israel’s illegal annexation of large parts of the West Bank
Any comment that he dares to make will be entirely ineffectual:
Here is a prediction for you.
Next week, when Israel illegally annexes much of the Palestinian West Bank, Keir Starmer will join Boris Johnson and call on "both sides" to "enter dialogue" to "avoid violence", as the iron will of the occupier is brutally enforced upon the victim.
Labour has a policy that all people have a right to self-determination. Israel’s right to self-determination has been used as a stick to beat party members accused of anti-Semitism. Palestine’s right to self-determination goes unrecognised under racist Starmer.
The global community has to find a spine.
Within days, Israel will illegally invade and annex 30-40% of the West Bank.
Britain used to have an opposition that would condemn illegal acts of terror.
But let’s not stop there. Starmer has also taken the heat off Robert Jenrick, whose corrupt manipulation of the planning system to save Richard Desmond £45 million in return for a small bung for Conservative funds was causing trouble for the Tories.
Kier Starmer helping knock the Jenrick story off the front pages! It’s almost like the establishment control both parties and leaders
This morning, Sir Keir Starmer declined to say whether corrupt Tory MP Robert Jenrick should be sacked.
This afternoon, he sacked Rebecca Long-Bailey for sharing an article in which Maxine Peake criticised the brutality of US/Israeli police officers.
Glad I didn't vote for him.
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush (@WarmongerHodges) June 25, 2020
By failing to call on Robert Jenrick to stand down Sir Keir Starmer has shown his fellow landlord more solidarity than any of the members in his own party.
Those in Labour who sent the most vile racist abuse to Diane Abbott have not only not been sacked but still hold important positions, Rebecca Long-Bailey though was sacked
Make no mistake, Sir Keir Starmer's actions have nothing to do with anti-racism – its a PURGE of the Left
— The Pileus #RefugeesWelcome (@thepileus) June 25, 2020
Finally, let’s bear it in mind that Starmer has no interest in opposing the Tory government’s genocidal policy on handling the Covid-19 pandemic…
65,000 dead and @Keir_Starmer is more concerned about keeping the BOD happy than opposing this murderous mad government. Good innit? #LabourRIP
… and, come to that, the people to whom he is pandering – the Board of Deputies of British Jews and all those other right-wing supporters of the Likud government in Israel – never criticised successive Tory governments for killing huge swathes of the UK population either:
successive Tory governments, despite a religious imperative in Judaism, to do so.
Underlying all of this, remember: The claim RLB was sacked for – in an interview with her constituent Maxine Peake – is accurate. Israeli forces do indeed train United States police. And Starmer’s claim that it is anti-Semitic to say this loses any force when one realises that Jews know about it and oppose it:
Israeli forces train US forces and vice versa. Specifics aren't important. Which knee they use to kill the victims of the racism they both share isn't an issue. The impunity both enjoy is an issue as is the racism the drives them to kill without remorse. #ZionismIsRacism#BLM
This from 2019 shows a possible link in increased violence by police against PoC and their training by Israel’s security forces. It needs investigating, not silencing. https://t.co/88O5LbahLq
"Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed rejected a demand from groups affiliated with the movement for Black lives to halt Israel’s training relationship with local police departments"#IStandWithRLB#EducateYourselfhttps://t.co/pPTBnlPwi2
— redsarah99 #BlackLivesMatter #IStandWithJere 🖐️🌹 (@redsarah99) June 25, 2020
Here’s the last word – it should be the last word on Starmer’s catastrophic leadership of the Labour Party (but it won’t, because these creeps cling like limpets):
The idea that a shadow secretary can or should be fired for someone else’s misunderstanding is neither a serious approach to tackling antisemitism nor to leadership. But it’s the kind of decision you reach when you’re more worried about The Telegraph than anti-racism.
Racist anti-Semite: Keir Starmer’s sacking of Rebecca Long-Bailey shows support for Israeli organisations teaching US police how to subjugate – and in the case of George Floyd, kill – black and minority ethnic people. Paradoxically, he also supports the presence of anti-Semite Rachel Reeves in his Shadow Cabinet.
This is the end of the Labour Party as an inclusive, anti-racist organisation.
Keir Starmer has sacked Rebecca Long-Bailey from the Shadow Cabinet after she retweeted a link to an Independent interview with one of her constituents, the actor Maxine Peake.
Starmer’s excuse is that Ms Peake’s article includes an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. He is lying in one of the most disgusting ways possible.
Here’s the passage in Ms Peake’s interview that has caused the offence:
“Systemic racism is a global issue,” she adds. “The tactics used by the police in America, kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, that was learnt from seminars with Israeli secret services.”
It is not anti-Semitic to suggest that. She wasn’t saying, “The Jews taught police to kneel on George Floyd’s neck.”
In fact, it seems widely accepted that Israeli organisations do indeed teach tactics to US police.
The U.S. Department of Justice published a report … that documented “widespread constitutional violations, discriminatory enforcement, and culture of retaliation” within the Baltimore Police Department (BPD).
Nor is this, which you should note is from the Jerusalem Post:
A city in North Carolina has become the first municipality in the United States to ban training and other forms of exchange between its police department and Israel’s military or police.
“The Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Police have a long history of violence and harm against Palestinian people and Jews of color,” [a] petition stated. “They persist in using tactics of extrajudicial killing, excessive force, racial profiling and repression of social justice movements. Such tactics have been condemned by international human rights organizations for violating the human rights of Palestinians.”
But Starmer seems to think that Ms Peake’s comments are anti-Semitic – despite their factual accuracy.
Doesn’t that suggest that Starmer is himself a… you know… racist?
He has deliberately attacked people who have exposed the way racists in one country – “The Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Police have a long history of violence and harm against Palestinian people and Jews of color” – have been teaching their methods to racists in another – “’widespread constitutional violations, discriminatory enforcement, and culture of retaliation’ within the Baltimore Police Department”.
Anyone who genuinely wants to fight racism would be thanking Ms Peake and Ms Long-Bailey for bringing this issue to public knowledge. Instead, he has sacked his MP from the shadow cabinet.
Meanwhile, Rachel Reeves – who made public her own support for a very well-documented anti-Semite – remains in the Shadow Cabinet with Starmer’s full support:
@JennieGenSec Will @UKLabour be suspending this party member for her very clear support of a known anti-Semite, and therefore of anti-Semitism in general? If not, why not?
It seems clear that in Starmer’s Labour, racism and anti-Semitism are supported, and their opponents are opposed – all while the Labour leader glibly mouths platitudes claiming the exact opposite.
For those of us who have been contesting decisions to expel us from membership of Labour, this presents a thorny problem.
I had always intended to return to the party and campaign for reform, after I win my court case against Labour, which is now set to take place in October.
But I think it would harm my position if I were to say that now, because I do not want to be associated with any organisation that can be clearly identified as a racist, anti-Semite endeavour.
And Labour under Starmer is a racist, anti-Semite endeavour in a way that the party under Corbyn never was.
Or so it seems to me.
Ms Long-Bailey has put her side of this story in a Twitter thread:
https://t.co/XyTPHR40Qd I retweeted an interview that my constituent and stalwart Labour Party supporter Maxine Peake gave to the Independent. Its main thrust was anger with the Conservative Government’s handling of the current emergency and a call for Labour Party unity.
5.I could not do this in good conscience without the issuing of a press statement of clarification. I had asked to discuss these matters with Keir before agreeing what further action to take, but sadly he had already made his decision.
7.I am clear that I shall continue to support the Labour Party in Parliament under Keir Starmer’s leadership, to represent the people of Salford and Eccles and work towards a more equal, peaceful and sustainable world.
This puts a nastier complexion on the matter still, because it seems Starmer used this issue as a pretext to eliminate Ms Long-Bailey – one of the last left-wingers, if not the last, from the Shadow Cabinet. He could have given her a chance to do as she suggested but he didn’t. That says it all.
Well, he should be gratified to know that we’ve all got the message. Take a look at some of the responses on Twitter:
It's either true or false that 'Israeli Secret Services' train US police to use chokeholds. If it's true, it can be proven to be true, and if false, proven false.
Neither has anything whatsoever to do with antisemitism.#RebeccaLongBailey
The witch hunt is going after Maxine Peake for highlighting the role of Israeli forces in training US cops. This is fact, not “antisemitic conspiracy theory”. Anyone saying otherwise is ill-informed or wilfully weaponising antisemitism for political ends.https://t.co/aStgheo1s4
— Kerry-Anne Mendoza 🏳️🌈🏴 (@TheMendozaWoman) June 25, 2020
Long Bailey being sacked is clearly absurd, & shows a clear double standard with many others. In 2005 the party were set to run Fagin posters, recently Rachel Reeves commemorated Lady Astor. And yet…
For the left it should be an educative moment, the right don’t want ‘unity’.
Keir Starmer sacking Rebecca Long-Bailey is an utterly disgraceful decision. It undermines the position the Labour Party has insisted on all along that it’s possible to criticise Israeli policy without being antisemitic. Shameful, shameful stuff.
Sacking Rebecca Long-Bailey for sharing an interview in *the Independent* with one of Britain's most celebrated actors because of a sentence uttered by Maxine Peake which the Independent initially justified with a link to an Amnesty International report is an absurd overreaction
In fact, Israeli training is so associated with police violence in the US – in particular against black people – that cities have begun to ban it.https://t.co/PPZD0HOucI
— Kerry-Anne Mendoza 🏳️🌈🏴 (@TheMendozaWoman) June 25, 2020
So can somebody explain to me where the 'anti-semitic conspiracy theory' is in this article? Calling the stuff about Israel AS is conflating the state of Israel and Jews – they are not the same thing.
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Poser: this image of Keir Starmer suggests that he supports the right-wing idea that it is better to present the appearance of a leader than to actually be one.
At long last, the Labour leadership election is about to end.
Members have been voting since long before now, so This Writer won’t be influencing the result by pointing out:
If a right-winger like Keir Starmer or Lisa Nandy is elected, the party will be unelectable – and here’s why: It’s attitude will be wrong.
You see, right-wing Labour is small-minded and vindictive, and also unimaginative.
In policy it is too close to the Conservatives – and we already have them, so Labour won’t win more votes from that party than it will lose by alienating, or driving out, socialists who came back when Jeremy Corbyn took the leadership.
And the right-wingers have already made it perfectly clear that they intend to expel as many socialists – the people who carry the torch for the party’s original mission – as they possibly can.
Consider this:
Do not be sentimental. This is the time to purge the party machine and put your own people in charge. Sack the general secretary and all the place people immediately. Don’t believe them if they pledge allegiance – either they are being duplicitous or, worse, they mean it: if they rat now, won’t they re-rat in the future? As we said when we expelled Militant, there’s no problem with a witchhunt when there really are witches to hunt.
It’s part of an article claiming to be a Memo to Keir Starmer from John McTernan, in the expectation that Starmer will win.
McTernan was very much yesterday’s man during the Corbyn years – a right-wing loony with views that were rightly considered certain to drive the electorate out the door.
Now here he is, trying to ingratiate himself with his preferred candidate for the leadership by urging him to follow Hitler’s example and have his own Night of the Long Knives, to consolidate his victory and paint it – as Hitler did – as a way of preventing a future coup.
Look at the way he suggests that it would be worse if the people in place at the moment mean it when they pledge allegiance than if they were being duplicitous. He thinks it would be wrong to be loyal to the Labour Party. For McTernan a leader must stand at the head of his own cadre of cronies. No doubt McTernan expects himself to be a member of that gang.
The lack of belief in the honesty of the current Labour party officers says much about McTernan’s own trustworthiness. Isn’t there a song that tells us “It’s no secret that a liar won’t believe anyone else”?
How about this part, which is subtitled “Punish the losers”:
There’s an old saying in the Australian Labor Party: “magnanimity in defeat, vengeance in victory.” Make it your motto. Continuity Corbynistas like Rebecca Long Bailey and Richard Burgon must be exiled to the back benches for the rest of their parliamentary careers, which should be as brief as possible. Victory has to be absolute.
This is duplicitous in itself. The Labour Right was never magnanimous in defeat! Backstabbers like McTernan (and many others) did their level best to undermine the Corbyn project at every opportunity.
And the desperation to remove socialists from any position of authority denies the possibility that the public might consider them to have opinions worth sharing.
Abraham Lincoln had a “team of rivals” running his government, and he was one of the most successful US presidents of them all.
Most importantly, though, McTernan is urging Starmer to alienate a vast number of loyal party members by abandoning their politics. He states:
Punishing Burgon and Long Bailey will alienate a portion of the membership. Good. Let them return in disgust to the fringe parties where they should have been all along… Restore party conference to its proper role — a loyal leadership rally.
This will certainly reduce Labour’s national vote to below eight million – and keep it there for many years to come if loonies like McTernan get a chance to take, and consolidate, power.
His comment about the party conference suggests that he wants to reduce the membership to a tiny core of mindless, obedient Nazis – and the Parliamentary party to a club of pseudo-Tories, grinning encouragingly at the real thing as they vote through law after law to elevate themselves and stamp the rest of the population into the dirt.
That’s McTernan’s vision of the Labour Party’s future. And I don’t think you can trust either Starmer or Nandy to reject it.
Pauline Hammerton, a long-term Labour activist from Hulme, in Manchester, had been expelled on February 4 under one of the fast-track processes I described in my article.
It seems she had been unaware that the party had been planning to expel her, and was left distraught by the decision.
It is believed that the shock triggered a haemorrhage that killed her.
Those who knew Ms Hammerton (I did not) have described her in glowing terms.
Here‘s The Critique Archives: “I had met Pauline a few times at demos and other meetings, and so, although I did not know her well, her death has come as a shock, to me personally, and to other activists across the north-west. Her dedication to justice was tremendous, and the callous mistreatment she received from a party that she had given so much to must have been the bitterest blow imaginable.”
And this is from Tony Greenstein’s blog: “A cursory look at Pauline Hammerton’s Facebook page shows that she was anything but a racist. She was a decent, kind, concerned person who hated all kinds of oppression. Pauline was Chair of Manchester Socialist Health Association… Pauline was the kind of person who should be welcomed and respected.”
Mr Greenstein has also been expelled from the Labour Party on trumped-up charges of anti-Semitism, as has This Writer.
I can’t speak for him, but I have had more than a quarter of a century’s experience as a reporter, and know the kind of backstabbing that can take place.
But not everybody is made of such stern stuff. False allegations alone can cause a huge amount of stress, especially on people whose health is not the best – and tangible harm as a result of such lies, like expulsion from a political party to which one has devoted a large amount of one’s life, can end a life. That is what we have seen.
But we cannot expect the Labour Party to own up and apologise. Nor can we expect any of Ms Hammerton’s false accusers to take anything like the honourable course of action.
They’ll be covering their tracks. If you don’t believe me, consider The Sun and the way that publication rushed to delete a story attacking the late TV presenter Caroline Flack after her apparent suicide (again on February 15).
Ms Flack had been under huge pressure after being removed as the host of a piece of ITV fluff called Love Island amid allegations that she had assaulted her boyfriend.
She had been due to go on trial in March. She had called the period after her arrest and departure from the TV show “the worst time of my life” and had since admitted that she was still having a “really rough time”.
But that didn’t stop content providers like The Sun from hounding her. The headline on the deleted story was “Brutal Caroline Flack Valentine’s Day card mocks troubled star with ‘I’ll f*** lamp you’ message”.
I don’t personally know what happened between Ms Flack and her significant other and I’m not the kind of person to rush to judgement, but I’m sure many people seeing that headline would have believed that it depicted her as a woman of extreme violence and that this was the impression it was seeking to give.
Put yourself in the position of a woman at the sharp end of messages like that – and who had been subjected to a constant stream of them for many months.
And now at least one candidate to be leader of the Labour Party (remember Labour?) is threatening to open up a new set of floodgates for false accusations, by supporting a call to expel members who express transphobic views.
And just who would decide whether these views were transphobic or not? The same kind of people who decided that simply being accused of anti-Semitism meant members had to be guilty of it?
Labour has a piss-poor record on disciplinary matters and this will make it much, much worse.
Yes, I know that there is a huge argument raging between the so-called TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists) and people who, as I understand it, are demanding a widening of the definition of transsexual people.
Neither side seems to have much to recommend it. I fell foul of some particularly odious people who claimed to be representative of the trans community on (again) February 15; they seemed to be just as bigoted and intolerant as those they claimed to be defending against.
And Rebecca Long-Bailey is taking their side.
Wouldn’t it be better to tell both gangs to pipe down, and follow a policy that ensures the maximum protection for everyone?
Beastrabban has written an extremely informative piece on this matter, which is not simple and it is vulnerable to takeover by agents of malice and hate.
Coming back to the fact that people are dying over false anti-Semitism allegations, I can say that I wish to raise this when my own case against the Labour Party comes to court on May 26.
It’s a long time to wait, because justice is a slow process, and I’m sure that Labour will try to obstruct my case as much as possible (those who were at the hearing earlier this month will know what I mean).
But it’s the best I can offer. What will you do?
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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Labour’s remaining leadership candidates: will you ask them to reject the demands of a group that represents, at best, a minority of a minority and ask them to embrace a wider, better version?
A blogger who posted her own alternatives to the ’10 pledges’ – demands the Board of Deputies of British Jews tried to foist on the Labour Party – has won the support of thousands of readers.
This Site reported on Kay Green’s alternative pledges here – and she acknowledged the boost in a follow-up piece, calling for action to make Labour’s would-be leaders take notice.
Send a link to your chosen leadership candidates, and ask them what they think.
Send a link to your MP, and ask him/her if they endorse them.
Send a link to Jennie Formby, and ask her to tell the NEC we prefer them.
Send a link to ALL the NEC members!
Present OUR Ten Pledges to your CLP as a motion to the NEC.
Ask your CLP to put them forward as a motion for conference (and/or women’s conference).
Present them to your Trade Union branch, socialist society or local assembly, and ask them to recommend them to the Labour Party.
Send them to your favourite lefty blog or newspaper (mine’s the Morning Star) and ask them to write about them.
Share this blog on different social media, and in your favourite groups, and ask them for more ideas about how to promote OUR Ten Pledges in the Party.
Promise yourself you’ll never forget that leaders can be led. Whoever becomes leader, and whatever they may personally sign up to, if a membership of half a million are clear and politely persistent about wanting something different, different will happen.
And do please keep in touch. If you do any of these ten things, or if you think of other things to do, please pop back to the Ten Pledges blog post and leave a comment to let everyone know.
They may have knocked Jeremy Corbyn out (for now) but they can’t kill the movement he inspired unless we decide to do nothing.
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.
Vox Political needs your help! If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers) you can make a one-off donation here:
Here are four ways to be sure you’re among the first to know what’s going on.
1) Register with us by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ (in the left margin). You can then receive notifications of every new article that is posted here.
And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
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