Sitting smug: racist anti-semite Keir Starmer probably thinks he can get away with accusing other people of his own crime because the Labour Party is hopelessly biased against attacking right-wing members for anti-semitism, the EHRC isn’t interested and the police think MPs are above the law. Is he right?
It’s good to see some people aren’t brainwashed by Keir Starmer’s misinterpretation of what constitutes anti-semitism.
Starmer, along with several cronies in the Parliamentary Labour Party, has falsely accused Rebecca Long-Bailey of tweeting a link to an article containing an anti-semitic conspiracy theory.
The problem is that, while the interview with Maxine Peake included a disputed claim that members of the Israeli police/military trained US police to use the choke hold that killed George Floyd, it is not anti-semitic to do so.
The claim relates only to the government of Israel, its police and its military – not to all Jews.
On the other hand, it is anti-semitic to confuse Israel, its government, police and military, with all Jews – as Starmer did.
The complaint referenced in the Prole Star article (link below) also accuses Ed Miliband, Margaret Hodge, Nia Griffith, Stella Creasy and Wes Streeting.
It has been lodged with both Labour and the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).
Independently, the owner of the Skwawkbox blog has also lodged a complaint with the Labour Party.
This Writer doubts that any complaint against Labour will be given the time of day.
The party has apparently failed to take any action against the alleged racists among its officers who baited Diane Abbott, for example.
And the EHRC also seems a dead loss, if we are to judge it by its recent decisions.
Personally, I think the only way to explain the error of their ways to people who would cynically exploit the ignorance of others about anti-semitism, is a private prosecution under the Public Order Act 1986.
Nobody said the Jews were responsible for teaching the choke hold that killed George Floyd to US police – until Keir Starmer.
His words may be construed as incitement to racial hatred under the terms of the Act as it was he who put the idea into the public consciousness.
I don’t think the police or CPS will consider acting against a member of Parliament – even one belonging to the Labour Party – because it is (by now) well-established that MPs are above the law.
And a private prosecution will probably cost a lot of money.
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Champagne socialist: Keir Starmer got himself elected on a raft of socialist promises, but they seem to be false pretences as he has promoted only Blairites and hard-right-wingers to his shadow cabinet.
Oh dear. Keir Starmer hasn’t put a foot right since he was elected Labour leader.
His latest move has been to finish appointing the members of his shadow cabinet – and it is almost entirely formed of Blairite right-wingers.
Labour socialists have been scandalised at the appointment of Wes Streeting, Jess Phillips and Stephen Kinnock to shadow ministerial roles.
Wes 'pile-on a pensioner' Streeting appointed to the shadow treasury. Jess 'Stab him in the front' Phillips gets the domestic violence brief (yes, really!) Stephen 'What lockdown' Kinnock goes to shadow in the foreign office.
Rewarding nastiness in the name of unity Sir Keir?
More damning for Starmer, perhaps, is the support he has received at a time when he is trying to claim some credibility for fighting anti-Semitism. Consider this:
Keir Starmer’s reshuffle is impressive – the Marxist nutters are out; moderate left are in. When this crisis is eventually over, and politics is resumed, the Tories are going to find that the 5 years when there was no opposition and no alternative has come to an abrupt end
The comment itself is nonsense. Osborne knows that if Boris Johnson can weather the coronavirus crisis that he created for himself, the remainder of his five-year term will be plain sailing with a compliant right-winger pretending to lead the opposition.
Worse is the fact that Osborne commissioned, published and promoted one of the most grossly blatant pieces of anti-Semitism any of us have seen in recent years – referring to Ed Miliband’s return to the shadow cabinet:
Keir Starmer has purged many BAME figures from the frontbench, not put a single black person in his Shadow Home Office team (I mean, seriously?!), and has promoted an assortment of Islamophobes, anti-Traveller racists, and TERFs to his frontbench.
It seems many are cancelling their membership of Labour, adding to those who walked out after Starmer won his election last weekend:
I just left the Labour Party The new shadow cabinet was deliberately designed to insult Jeremy Corbyn & throw all the hope, all the good he's done, all the work & compassion we need so much in this tired little country, back in his face. It's contempt. I am disgusted
After seeing who @Keir_Starmer has brought back into @UKLabour I'm cancelling my direct debit and membership. I'm going to give the money to @sensecharity instead. A wonderful charity, who support ppl who are deaf/blind
I cancelled my DD 2 weeks ago and my membership has now lapsed. No regrets, and the freedom to express myself, without wondering if some minion is scrolling through my tweets looking for a reason to expel me, is wonderful. I'll miss the man tho.
— Brigadier Bell love#NHS❤🌈🖐 (@SamBell43371625) April 9, 2020
I've just cancelled my membership. Enough is enough.
On the subject of “no opposition” from Jeremy Corbyn, I find this most illuminating:
Which bit of “No Opposition” was your favourite, though? Was it the government losing more votes in Parliament than any since 1945, or was it when Theresa May called an election and lost her majority? Corbyn didn’t win an election but history will record he was an effective LOTO! https://t.co/8iMH09ntwf
Some have advocated remaining in the Labour Party – because no new party could gain enough support to topple the Tories and it is better to stay and try to mitigate the damage being caused by Starmer.
This Writer can’t argue with that; I joined Labour in 2010 to help bring it back to genuine Labour values. I didn’t do too badly – until I got pushed out on a false claim of – guess what? – anti-Semitism, of course.
But it is clear that, until Starmer quits as leader – or is defeated in a leadership challenge – the Labour Party, as it should be, is dead.
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Labour MP Wes Streeting, who has been vocal in his attacks on fellow party members accused of anti-Semitism, has become the third high-profile witch-hunter to receive the same treatment.
He joins Tom Watson and Margaret Hodge in having an anti-Semitism complaint aimed at him.
Here’s Skwawkbox to explain:
The Orthodox Jewish member, who asked not to be named, has made the complaint with regard to tweets and retweets by Streeting labelling Charedi Jewish member Shraga Stern as ‘homophobic’ and ‘anti-LGBT’ for his campaign to maintain sex education as a matter for the parents of Orthodox children, as well as his assertion that Orthodox Jewish values are not Labour values. The complaint includes copies of a number of social media posts.
The complaint states:
Below and attached are five antisemitic attacks, smearing me for the one and only reason for being an Orthdox Jew and wanting to uphold Jewish tradition…
Attacks… are clearly for the reason that I intend to hold on to my Jewish traditions.
The above is original antisemitism via inciting hate against religious Jews and has caused to the killing of millions of Jews throughout the years.
I am anxious about this hostile environment and racist attacks by some individuals within the Labour party… This is extremely dangerous and needs to be dealt with as a matter of urgency.
I am hurt by all this and wonder if Labour is the neutral home for visible Jewish People.
Being attacked by an official elected Labour MP for being Jewish needs to be taken as a wake-up call and rooted out of the Labour party. Every Jew has the rights to be a Jew and all need to be treated the same at the Labour Party.
I urge the Labour Party to suspend him until the investigation is over.
Labour Party rule 2.1.8 makes it clear that: “The NEC … shall regard any incident which in their view might reasonably be seen to demonstrate hostility or prejudice based on … religion or belief … as conduct prejudicial to the Party.
As with the Watson and Hodge cases, it will be interesting to see how the party’s leaders rule on this.
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Vindicated: John McDonnell was lectured by Labour colleagues Lisa Nandy and Wes Streeting on Robert Peston’s ITV talk show – but he was right and they were not.
A bid to backstab Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell backfired in the faces of Lisa Nandy and Wes Streeting after all three appeared on Robert Peston’s ITV chat show yesterday (February 27).
Ms Nandy and Mr Streeting were keen to suggest their own party had failed to act appropriately in the early days of anti-Semitism accusation against members, citing the case of their colleague Naz Shah as an example.
But Mr McDonnell contradicted them, saying he had intimate knowledge of that matter as Ms Shah was his Personal Private Secretary (PPS) at the time.
Here’s part of the discussion – and note how Peston describes it:
Labour’s @wesstreeting and @lisanandy tell @johnmcdonnellMP that he is not telling the truth on how previous cases of antisemitism were dealt with within the Labour Party.
The impression you are intended to get is that Mr McDonnell was in the wrong. But he was right.
James Mills is a former director of communications for Mr McDonnell and the Shadow Treasury Team (STT). He tweeted his recollection of events to put the record straight:
There was only 3 of us in the room at this stage, I was asked for my opinion on the matter and I gave my honest opinion, which was that I wouldn't defend it & she had to go. There was not any difference of opinion from anyone. Naz was asked to come in and JC with JM informed her.
Isn’t it interesting that we can see the same pattern here as faced Diane Abbott on the BBC’s Question Time a few weeks ago, when she rightly said that Labour was doing well in the opinion polls but other panellists – and even host Fiona Bruce – ganged up on her and gaslighted her with false claims that she was mistaken?
We can learn several things from this:
Firstly, the backstabbers in the Parliamentary Labour Party are now lining up to make their treacherous intentions known to the general public. Wes Streeting was already on my list; now we can add Lisa Nandy (unless she wants to plead stupidity; this is doubtful as she argued with Mr Mills on Twitter, pushing a claim that he was wrong). They probably thought they could get away with this story because the sequence of events was not reported when Ms Shah was accused in 2016. More fool them.
Secondly, we should also be making a list of mainstream news reporters who can’t be trusted to report events fairly and accurately. Again, I have to say that Robert Peston was already on my own list.
Finally, the reason this was being discussed is a claim by Ms Nandy and Mr Streeting that nothing has changed in the nearly three years since Ms Shah was accused. Their story was that the Labour leadership had to be challenged before any action was taken – as it was in the case of Chris Williamson yesterday.
But Chris Williamson’s case is different from that of Naz Shah. Ms Shah admitted that she had made a series of Twitter posts with anti-Semitic intent as a reaction to the deaths of many Palestinians during “Operation Protective Edge” in 2014, after the tweets were brought to light by the Guido Fawkes blog two years later. In contrast, Mr Williamson has made it abundantly clear that he opposes anti-Semitism; his statement that Labour has been “too apologetic” over accusations arose from a desire to support innocent party members who have been wrongly accused.
And that is the heart of the matter. For some reason, some MPs and officers of the Labour Party are desperate to hide the fact that party members – and former party members, like myself, who have been wrongly expelled – have been treated unfairly.
That is why they keep telling these tall stories.
It is also why they keep coming unstuck. Please draw your own conclusions regarding what this means about Chris Williamson, Jeremy Corbyn and Labour’s “anti-Semitism” row.
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Luciana Berger: “No confidence” motions against her were about her attempts to undermine the Labour leadership. Why is the Labour leadership trying to defend her?
Labour’s leadership shot itself in the foot yet again at the end of a disastrous week for relations between the executive and rank-and-file members.
Earlier in the week, general secretary Jennie Formby’s refusal to suspend Wes Streeting and investigate his behaviour after he launched a despicable attack on a 70-year-old female member, using faked evidence and publicising her true identity which she keeps hidden, put her in hot water – with members telling her in no uncertain terms that the complaints system was not fit for purpose, prioritising representatives over the people who put them there.
Then Wavertree CLP cancelled two ‘no confidence’ votes about the behaviour of that constituency’s MP, Luciana Berger. The first was withdrawn by its proposer, and the second by the CLP itself after it emerged that the member proposing the motion will be out of the UK on the day planned for the debate. This Writer’s understanding is that both motions referred to the actions of the MP, whose false claims of anti-Semitism within the party have caused deep offence.
Yet some within the party hierarchy have made reference to abuse that the MP receives (Ms Formby), to the fact that she is eight months pregnant (Harriet Harman – and what does that have to do with anything?)…
We criticise Berger for being anti-Labour. She's Jewish so we must all be antisemitic, she's a woman so we're all misogynists, now she's up the duff so we're all anti equality. What's she going to bring up next? Maybe she has a secret disability and we're all disablist too? YAWN https://t.co/YR1VhLlD0J
… and to racism/anti-Semitism within the CLP (Tom Watson – who should know that it has a large Jewish contingent and is chaired by a Jewish person; Wes Streeting (again) – who accused the people of Liverpool of being anti-Semitic en masse in yet another ill-advised tweet;
How about MPs who were perfectly happy to vote no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn in 2016 stop whinging when one of their own faces a similar vote.
How about MPs threatening to leave the party stop using antisemitism to tarnish Labour's reputation before they finally bugger off. https://t.co/165VMI6hVH
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush (@WarmongerHodges) February 8, 2019
The attempted bullying by the members named above incensed party members across the UK – many of whom are now threatening to burn their membership cards in protest at what they see as clearly prejudicial behaviour – in favour of MPs who are spreading lies, and against members who are the victims of those lies.
Mr Watson’s comments in particular – as a non-Jew potentially implying the “wrong kind of Jew” argument against Jewish party members – disgraced the Labour Party. Wavertree CLP’s executive has released a statement to “strongly reject the media inaccuracies and the accusations of political bullying, for simply adhering to Party rules and doing our jobs” and asserting that “the suggestion that the CLP Executive is in any way a party to bullying and antisemitism is a false and slanderous accusation”.
Kate Hoey. Not Jewish. Chris Leslie. Not Jewish. Joan Ryan. Not Jewish.
It's disgraceful of Tom Watson to intervene in CLP business. I think all the treacherous Blairites can feel the cold wind of deselection coming so expect some more desperate measures as they try to bring back Toryism to @UKLabour Party.#iStandWithWavertree#JC4PM2019#Brexit
"Tom Watson" has some nerve referring to "bringing the party into disrepute".
Remember Project Anaconda which was devised by Tom Watson which he openly boasted about?
“Project Anaconda” – the plan to isolate Corbyn and regain control of the Party through a war of attrition
— ☼ Dallo #BDS 🇵🇸 Ex LP Member – BLM ☼ (@dallo100) February 8, 2019
And Mr Streeting’s tweet – following Ms Formby’s call for no more “trial by Twitter”, this indicates he believes she was lecturing rank-and-file members, not him – will undoubtedly have led to more calls for his Labour membership to be suspended and an investigation into his behaviour held. See this article for further details.
Ordinary Labour Party members took offence at the glib way so-called leaders of the party tried to pretend that the “no confidence” motion was an attack on Ms Berger as a person, rather than as a representative of the party. Ms Formby came in for particularly strong criticism. See:
I agree with abuse & antisemitism being abhorrent but that’s not what the motions were about, it was on basis that she would do everything in her power to stop a Labour govt from delivering its manifesto. Which is why this disappoints me, but I’m glad you didn’t suspend CLP tho.
Donahue Rogers tweeted: “Gen Sec should not be voicing an opinion about this – especially as you’re asking members to show solidarity with someone who refuses to show support for a Labour government and also refuses to dismiss rumours that she is about to join another party #iStandWithWavertree”
Here’s the ever-controversial George Galloway – with an opinion that, for once, wasn’t:
It was an error of judgement, especially as it allowed party members to compare support for an MP who consistently undermines her party with the lack of it for the MP who has endured more abuse than all the others put together. As “Audrey” put it: “I didn’t see that many ppl falling over each other publicly to defend Diane when she is abused permanently even by tv journos. Guess some ppl are just not worth standing in solidarity with…Planning to do something about Watson or aren’t the members worthy of solidarity either?”
Albert Trigg also took issue with Ms Formby’s claim that party members should stand in solidarity with Ms Berger: “‘Solidarity’? The same kind of solidarity she shows Corbyn and the membership? She could not even bring herself to say she wanted a Corbyn Government. Abuse is wrong but it works both ways. False accusations of racism from Labour MPs is not on.”
Consider these:
It was withdrawn. Rightly or wrongly that’s the decision of the CLP. However, to suggest this is AS is crazy. She was Jewish when she was voted into office by her CLP who has a large Jewish representation. If Wavertree pushes a VONC then it would go ahead.
Totally agree, she not shown solidarity towards the party or @jeremycorbyn or the members. I give up. Np point in standing by them, when at first opportunity they won't stand up for us, in fact they attack us. Disgusting, thats not socialism.
— Qualified to think for myself. (@darrenmark69) February 9, 2019
Carla Marx added: “More disappointing responses from our leaders. This isn’t enough from Jennie. The online abuse has nothing to with Wavertree activists – they have a perfect right to hold their MP to account for her signal lack of respect to them and the Party she’s meant to represent.”
Some suggested that the Labour leadership had lost focus and needed to concentrate on the real troublemakers in the party:
I agree when good grassroots socialists are being labelled as AS with no evidence it's time to move and get rid of those MPs and others who use anything to further their own advantage They must be removed from the party so we can move on @JennieGenSec #IStandWithWavertree
Ms Berger has already called for a “no confidence” vote in the Wavertree CLP executive in what can clearly be recognised as a piece of “tit-for-tat” vindictiveness:
Luciana Berger: New calls for no confidence in team leading local Labour branch https://t.co/4yICtkYB9S
Labour’s national leadership has already confirmed that there will be no action taken against Wavertree.
Then came the threats to quit:
I am definintely planning to quit my membership. If the Gen Sec is saying that Luciana Berger deserves solidarity, when she has shown none towards the party, the leader or the members, it's time I went. #Solidarity
— Qualified to think for myself. (@darrenmark69) February 9, 2019
Took the words out of my mouth 🇬🇧😡 between Watson and Berger I've just about had enough 😡😡 https://t.co/003M2vr94c
Fortunately other members took a more rounded view: “There is a greater need than us,” tweeted Teri_Card007. “The 14 million in poverty, 1.5 million in destitution, 330,000 homeless and the disabled who are dying every month because of Tory policy. We stand together, support each other. Labour is Socialist and there are many of us and they’re the few.”
Here are a few more such opinions:
All those good folk in despair over events of the last 24 hours, stay strong.
The Blatcherites want you to give up. The tories want you to give up.
Invoke the spirit of Liverpool and stay strong. Now, more than ever we need you to believe. #iStandWithWavertree
It may feel like the attacks on our party have mounted again in the face of what seems a defeat for socialism in recent days. You may feel deflated, beaten, angry. That's how they want you to feel, That's how they regain control of our movement if we let them. Not on my watch. pic.twitter.com/PSHiObGCVF
Perhaps the best reflection of the way Labour members feel came from a former 2017 general election candidate going under the handle @DisIdealist, who wrote: “Where members tend to draw the line, in my experience, is when a representative is seen as both politically unsympathetic and not helping to obtain a Labour government. If an MP ever crosses a line to be seen as actively helping to prevent a Labour government, then members will almost always move against them. If one looks at those Labour MPs who have faced motions of no confidence – and it is a relatively small number – one finds that it is inevitably the case that they not only have serious political differences with the leadership, but they are seen by members as making a Labour government less likely through their public provision of ammunition to the hostile media and the Tories.”
That is the real spirit of Labour. Not the fake-Tory divide-and-rule we’re seeing from the likes of Berger, Harman, Watson, Streeting, Umunna (always the same names, aren’t they?) and (I’m sorry to say) Formby.
But those are just six voices – loud voices, maybe, but not many – among more than half a million. They want to deceive the rest into thinking that their few voices matter more than those of the rest of us – and they hope that their lies will convince people of good conscience to quit the party, so they can have their cosy little club back; never challenging the Tories enough to make a difference, just making sure they take their ministerial salaries home.
To the mass of Labour members: Don’t let them win. Force the issue. Make them defend themselves – and prove that they can’t.
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Jennie Formby: Rather than taking a confrontational attitude to rank-and-file Labour members, she should consider the words behind her in this image.
Labour Party general secretary Jennie Formby took to Twitter to appeal for members not to use the social media forum to attack MPs…
… and had her posterior handed to her by scores of people, representing just a fraction of the Party membership that has had enough of a system that favours privileged members of Parliament over the hard-working campaigners who put them there.
She tweeted her appeal after This Site’s article about Wes Streeting’s disgraceful attempt to smear a party member as an anti-Semite by using a doctored image and releasing personal details of the person involved without her permission (doxxing).
That person responded sharply to Ms Formby’s intervention, which has been taken as an attempt to take the heat off Mr Streeting, rather than any commitment to justice:
I'm being tried by twitter, Mr Streeting, FB & BBC. I'm tired, scared & worried for my safety since he put my private details in public. Suported JC & Lab leadership, but I won't support Labour MPs who bully Diane & loyal members & no one does a thing about it.
— NOT MEMBER of STARMERs Tory Tribute Band !!! (@xpressanny) February 6, 2019
Asked how she was coping by another Twitter user, she responded: “The attackers are still at it. Someone is keeping a great deal of information on all of us to bring up to accuse us all. Nothing I can do. Wes Streeting is a police matter.”
The “Diane” mentioned above is Diane Abbott, Shadow Home Secretary. @xpressanny believes her to have been bullied by Mr Streeting.
She stated she would put in a request to Labour under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to see who has accessed her data: “No stone will be left unturned. But I am exhausted, stressed & very anxious for my safety and that of my husband. It seems MPs can dump on members & get away with it whilst members can be expelled, rubbished & lied about.”
I can say from my own experience that Labour is unlikely to honour any such request. I put in a Subject Access Request for all information held on me by the Labour Party last year, while I was facing false claims of anti-Semitism (as @xpressanny is now). It was neither acknowledged nor actioned and I am still waiting for the information. The Information Commissioner’s Office stated that I would have to take Labour to court myself if I wanted the information.
Other Twitter users tweeted their support for @xpressanny…
I'm so exhausted. I am going to go through legal channels & see what happens first.
— NOT MEMBER of STARMERs Tory Tribute Band !!! (@xpressanny) February 6, 2019
… and their disgust that the Labour Party’s general secretary seems so keen to ignore the issue.
This is not the first time @wesstreeting has stepped over the line. Labour won't do anything about this???
Others – and there were many more than I can list here – pointed out to Ms Formby that they have no faith in Labour’s complaints system (it’s called the Compliance Unit), pointing out that they know it favours elected representatives over subscription-paying members because members had been suspended for offences including enjoying the music of the Foo Fighters, while here we have an elected member who has exposed a 70-year-old woman (@xpressanny is a pensioner) to the threat of harm by faking an accusation of anti-Semitism and releasing personal details that make it possible to track her down.
I tweeted on this myself: “The complaints system is not fit for purpose as it favours MPs over members. The current Streeting issue makes that clear.”
Here‘s Ruth Morgan “Polluting Wes’s Bullshit Mentions”: “Sorry but when we have mp’s like Streeting making scurrilous attacks on paying members then that’s the tipping point. Rather than attacking the government, he and his ilk are more engaged in falsifying smears against people who are actually doing his job without pay. Remove him!”
Sullycorbynista: “If you did something about it when members complain there would be no need for ‘Trial by Twitter’. Yet when an MP complains it’s dealt with ASAP – one rule for them and another for us members. Pull your socks up and start dealing with these rebellious MP’s attacking members.”
And @milkysue, who tweets under the presumably-satirical handle Turning Point UK Spalding, stated: “We will not stop. As long as u r silent over the despicable behaviour of a labour MP’s treatment to a 70 yr old member, resulting in her being in tears and getting 24/7 insults. Live up to the slogan ‘for the many not the few’.”
Masmit hit the nail on the head: “All I will say is one rule for members then, and one rule for MPs. It’s time MPs were treated the Same way as members, when they use social media, as a tool to lie and smear, then attack members. Obviously rules are inadequate, because they are out of control.”
This theme was expanded by “brenda105”, who stated: “For the past 3 years we have been called every name under the sun by the so-called centrist, and nothing is ever done to these MPs. we have had enough and its about time they were booted out of the LP.”
Mary S Wheeler made what might seem an obvious point: “You can not change human reaction. If we are attacked by the Wes Streetings and Gapes of the world we will defend ourselves. You’re asking the wrong people.”
She’s right. Mr Streeting had taken to Twitter to make his accusation but it was rank and file Labour members who were being criticised by Ms Formby it seemed. Here are a couple of tweets that put the issue in a nutshell:
Paid representatives attack our members and do nothing other than run down the leader of the party How can this continue, something must be done Only tweets or interviews from the usual suspects, #chuka etc I ever see are calling corbyn out not tories Very damaging
“m00 cow”, who published a template complaint letter online, only to have fellow members complain that the Compliance Unit had rejected their concerns out-of-hand, tweeted her frustration:
Socialist Sam’s point came a little late, in fact, as @xpressanny is understood to have contacted the police already.
One positive aspect of this is that Ms Formby has at last found an issue that concerns party members more than the fabricated claims of rampant anti-Semitism. Her problem is that people are angry that she has done absolutely nothing to halt the flow of falsehoods or penalise those who broadcast them.
The sheer volume of tweets on the subject made it abundantly clear that Labour Party members who expressed an opinion have no confidence in the Compliance Unit or Ms Formby’s words:
That would be fine if anyone had any confidence that complaints would be dealt with.
Vanessa Frank was even more blunt: “I did. You said I wasn’t allowed to complain – literally.”
Here‘s Dallo: “Jenny, if you start to discipline the Blairites, Bitterites, Centrists (whatever you want to call them), maybe members will complain more to LP HQ, but sorry people are sick of tired of the you doing sweet FA about them constantly bringing the party into disrepute.”
“terry6120” pointed out the glaring omissions in Ms Formby’s tweet that suggest a lack of sincerity on her part: “You missed a few important words eg ‘we’ll investigate, take action, expel if necessary’ between ‘send it to us’ and ‘then let’s all…'”
Others made clear what they thought the Compliance Unit would do with any complaints about MPs like Mr Streeting. Here‘s Julian Rowlands: “‘send it to us and we’ll force you to sign a NDA before sweeping it under the carpet'”
And here‘s Ian Musgrave: “f you have a complaint send it to us and we’ll ignore it.”
Jay: “The problem is that ‘sending complaints’ to you is akin to attempting to heat a vacuum.”
Here‘s [email protected]: “What frustrates many of us is that those who are Corbyn / Left Labour seem to get summary judgements made against them, yet certain Labour MP’s can say and do as they like. It would help if when a Complaint was made that it was acknowledged.”
Ms G Richards expanded on this: “Maybe if you started dealing with MPs like Wes Streeting who is happy to doxx party members on twitter, people might start having a bit of confidence that you will act fairly. Just sayin’.”
“Rho” pointed out that loyalty goes both ways and that Ms Formby and the Labour leadership are being disloyal to members by allowing MPs to get away with behaviour that may be illegal:
On another note, you may wish to look into the legalities of why mp's are being allowed to attack members in particular a 70 year old who was panic stricken by the mp publicly releasing her full name. I am truthfully considering giving my membership up over this. You need to act.
— Rho. Socialist and ex Labour member. (@greekalphabet) February 6, 2019
Challenged over her threat to quit the party, she pointed out that it is hard-working members and campaigners who are being attacked, with no evidence, by liars who seem to be immune to censure because they happen to have a Parliamentary seat:
Maybe its because I have flu but fed up with the attacks on members. We give 100% to the party yet we get called antisemites, a cult etc when it's unmerited. Last straw for me was what was done to a 70 year old lady. I just want Corbyn et al to protect the members from MP attacks
— Rho. Socialist and ex Labour member. (@greekalphabet) February 6, 2019
“I Daniel Blake” expanded on the realities of Mr Streeting’s behaviour: “Doxxing is illegal & harrassment, & something has to be done when an MP not only does it, but uses a photo-shopped tweet as his reason.”
That’s right – when “Karen” stood up for @xpressanny, someone took it on themselves to report her for bullying. That report is presumably with the Compliance Unit. Will it be thrown out or will “Karen” be penalised?
What do you think?
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Wes Streeting appears to have dumped himself in a lot of trouble.
The Labour MP, whose antipathy towards Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters is well-documented, appears to have gone too far with an attempt to “out” a Twitter user as an anti-Semite with a faked image while publishing her full, real name.
Others involved in the exchange said they reported the incident to Twitter – and may also have reported Mr Streeting to the police.
Here’s the tweet that started it all:
And here’s the tweet to which he was referring:
Oh please go away. Luciana Berger has done everything she possibly can to smear Mr Corbyn & over 500k members. #EnoughisEnough of the cost hatred being perpetuated by you and others towards innocent people who have never in their lives been antisemitic.
— NOT MEMBER of STARMERs Tory Tribute Band !!! (@xpressanny) February 4, 2019
Notice that the tweet does not dismiss anti-Semitism “as a smear”, as Mr Streeting suggested, but says that Luciana Berger has smeared Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the more-than-500,000 members of the Labour Party with claims of widespread anti-Semitism among them.
Interesting subject, the Rothschilds: A hugely wealthy and influential business/banking organisation that is apparently immune from investigation under any circumstances because those questioning its actions may always be accused of anti-Semitism. Does anybody – apart from a witch-hunter – think that is reasonable? We can see that Mr Streeting does, but then, he stands with the witch-hunters.
He concluded: “People like @xpressanny deny the problem, even when it stares them in the face. People like Ann Wetherly-Barton aren’t just bystanders to antisemitism, they’re enablers. To understand the problem, she doesn’t need a dossier – just a mirror. Now leave Luciana and Emily alone.”
He had gone too far, as “Wolfie” pointed out, with support from “Valleyboy” – both pseudonyms, possibly for good reasons as outlined here:
Wes Streeting gave it out this morning. Now it seems it's been mentioned on BBC News tonight. I feel sick.
— NOT MEMBER of STARMERs Tory Tribute Band !!! (@xpressanny) February 5, 2019
The practice is known as “doxxing” – searching for and publishing private or identifying information about (a particular individual) on the Internet, typically with malicious intent. Can anyone deny that this is what Mr Streeting has done?
The matter of the image is complicated. The quotation is not from Voltaire, but it is likely that many people have supported it and spread it in the belief that it is. In fact, it was said by an American white nationalist, neo-Nazi, Holocaust denier and white separatist called Kevin Alfred Strom. It seems that anti-Semitism witch-hunters have taken to using it to spread false accusations against innocent people – guilt through association.
But the assertion in the words is entirely reasonable, isn’t it? In a nation that is said to value free speech, any demand that one cannot criticise others – for whatever reason – is an assertion of power.
It is possible that some of those who have been netted by this trick associated the quote with the words of Tony Benn – most definitely not an anti-Semite – in his “essential five questions of democracy”. Those questions ask: What power have you got? Where did you get it? In whose interests do you use it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?
Obviously if someone in power is not accountable, this means we are not allowed to criticise them. You see the similarity?
Next: The image used by Mr Sweeting has been doctored. The original – and most popular – does not feature the Star of David on the sleeve of the arm that is crushing the people. But the space has been used to accommodate several symbols or phrases, as a Google image search (other search engines are available) will reveal.
As a widely-used and popular meme that most commonly appears without the anti-Semitic addition of the Star of David on the sleeve, and that features a sentiment with which most people would approve (although they may not support the person who coined it), it seems possible that the person Mr Streeting had targeted had voiced her support for it without noting its sinister undertones.
I was nearly caught out in a similar way on Twitter a couple of weeks ago. A witch-hunter tweeted an image of former Israeli Knesset member Shulamit Aloni, who said the government of that country often accuses its critics of anti-Semitism in order to avoid dealing with the issues presented to it. On that basis, I pressed the “like” button – and was then accused of supporting anti-Semitism because the image included text of an anti-Semitic nature. Unfortunately for my own critics, the image had been cropped automatically by Twitter so the text was not visible when I saw it on my timeline.
Twitter users have made Mr Streeting aware that the ploy used to entrap his victim has been spotted:
However, it seems Labour’s corrupt complaints system – which automatically suspends any ordinary member at the slightest whiff of an anti-Semitism accusation – is geared to shrug off criticism of Parliamentarians.
It certainly seems there may be a reckless endangerment case here. It has been alleged that Mr Streeting’s victim has been dogpiled on Twitter by his supporters and those of the fake anti-Semitism witch-hunt.
There is another matter as well, regarding Mr Streeting. I will not quote the details here but you can find it if you look up comments on this issue by @eddiegraham39 on Twitter. It is possible that Mr Streeting should be facing much, much stronger court action.
If it happens, he will have brought it on himself. He is not above the law and should be reminded of that fact.
POSTSCRIPT: Mr Streeting seems to enjoy throwing his weight around with allegations of anti-Semitism. After The Sunday Times published its now-disproved article about This Writer, he tweeted the following:
He was accusing me of anti-Semitism; he was wrong. Where’s my apology?
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Jeremy Corbyn: Can he talk his way out of this tight corner?
Labour made a huge mistake on Friday.
After 40 white people escorted another white person to the hearing in what looked like a lynch mob, a panel composed entirely of white people found an innocent anti-racism campaigner – who happened to be black – guilty of a form of racism.
Just on the face of it, that makes Labour look like the racist party.
We are told the verdict on the allegations of anti-Semitism facing Marc Wadsworth went against the evidence.
According to Grassroots Black Left, “The panel … ruled the case against Wadsworth could be proven based on solely on the perception by some people that what he said at the launch of the Charkrabarti report on June 30, 2016 was anti-semitism.”
That would certainly run against the meaning of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism to which Labour has subscribed. That document states that anti-Semitism “may be expressed as hatred towards Jews”; it is not behaviour that may be inferred as offensive by Jews.
In other words, according to the definition which Labour supports, a person’s behaviour should not be deemed anti-Semitic because someone else took offence at it; it would have to be informed by, and motivated by, hatred towards Jews.
And criticism of an individual Jewish person, or a group of them, should not raise accusations of anti-Semitism unless it is informed by hatred towards all Jews. Such criticism may be entirely reasonable, depending on the evidence supporting it.
So the decision against Marc Wadsworth is doubly wrong. And it could jeopardise Labour’s ambitions in the local elections taking place on May 3.
Black and minority ethnic people are infuriated, and you can see why.
As one commenter to This Site put it: “To see Marc Wadsworth shouted down for daring to express an opinion, “How dare you, how absolutely dare you,” like [a] servant being berated by the white mistress of the house, makes me shudder. Do they ever think how much courage it takes for a black person to stand up and speak honestly in a room full of powerful white people?”
And then the Labour Party expects black people to come out and vote it into power in councils across London.
It has been suggested that New Labour expected black and minority ethnic people to vote for the party because they had nowhere else to go. That assumption was wrong; they just stopped voting.
The arrival of Jeremy Corbyn gave them a reason to start voting again – and for Labour.
But the Wadsworth decision suggests that Labour will not support the BAME community; that Labour does not support justice.
In that case, why should the BAME community support Labour?
The party has painted itself into a corner in an attempt to appease liars.
I do not know if there is a mechanism in place that can reverse the damage before Thursday.
If not, I hesitate to speculate on how much harm the NCC panel, Ruth Smeeth, Wes Streeting and the posse of MPs and Lords who supported her at the hearing have done to the people of the United Kingdom.
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This ReTweet by Labour MP Wes Streeting shows him supporting a view taken by a member of another political party, in direct contradiction of current Labour membership rules.
Thousands of rank-and-file Labour members were “purged” from the party – their memberships either suspended or revoked – in the run-up to last year’s leadership election, on the basis of claims that they supported the views of other parties (mostly the Green Party, which often promotes ideas that are attractive to – or the same as – Labour’s.
Mr Streeting has chosen to support a Conservative – a member of Labour’s natural political enemy. While the sentiment expressed is one with which we can all agree (right?), it is unacceptable that Mr Streeting has chosen to support a Conservative MP’s comments. Such an action is banned under current Labour Party rules.
So when will Mr Streeting receive his email from Labour General Secretary Iain McNicol?
Today? Tomorrow?
Or does Mr McNicol take the view that right-wing Labour MPs are somehow exempt from the rules that govern the rest of the party?
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