More flak for Corbyn

– Having spent months fending off accusations of anti-Semitism, Britain’s main opposition Labour Party is once again being forced to confront the toxic issue at its annual conference.

“Like everybody in this room, I am fed up of talking about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party,” said MP Ruth Smeeth at party-affiliated Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) rally on Sunday in Liverpool, northwest England, yards from the party’s main conference.

The issue has dogged party leader Jeremy Corbyn, a staunch supporter of the Palestinian cause and critic of Israel, ever since his 2015 election victory.

Several party members have been suspended, expelled or forced to resign for making anti-Semitic statements, but Corbyn is accused of not doing enough to clamp down on it. He defended himself again on Sunday, telling the BBC he “will die fighting racism in any form”.

But for his critics, Corbyn’s words are not enough. Tim Bale, professor at Queen Mary University in London, said: “AntiSemitism seems to be almost within the DNA of some people on the hard-left, and many would say that Jeremy Corbyn should be included in that category.”

Corbyn’s supporters maintain his accusers are conflating his pro-Palestinian activism and criticism of Israel with racism. Jon Lansman, the Jewish founder of far-left pro-Corbyn group Momentum, said there was “no contradiction between fighting anti-Semitism and supporting Palestinian rights”.

Corbyn told Jewish News in March he was “not an anti-Semite in any way” after Jewish leaders wrote an open letter accusing him of siding with anti-Semites. –

Liverpool