Stop meeting anti-Semites, Jewish leader warns Corbyn
JEREMY CORBYN must stop ‘meeting with anti-Semites’ if he wants to win back Jewish voters, community leaders said yesterday.
Jonathan Arkush, the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said the Labour Party – traditionally supported by many Jewish people – was losing their trust.
Mr Corbyn has hit back at accusations of anti-Semitism, saying he had condemned all forms of prejudice many times and that his critics were ‘not listening’.
The Labour leader was asked about the issue after former Labour treasurer Lord Levy said he would give up his party membership if the leadership failed to condemn anti-Semitism.
Lord Levy said he had been ‘shocked and horrified’ by the views of those admitted into the party, and it had made him question remaining a member.
Vicki Kirby, vice-chairman of the party’s branch in Woking in Surrey, said Jews ‘slaughter the oppressed’ and suggested Adolf Hitler might be the ‘ Zionist God’. She was let back in to the party, but suspended earlier this month.
Hard Leftist Gerry Downing, who has spoken of the need to ‘address the Jewish question’, won an appeal against suspension, but was expelled after ‘new evidence’ came to light.
Mr Corbyn said yesterday: ‘ Lord Levy clearly hasn’t been listening to the seven times since I became leader that I’ve absolutely condemned anti-Semitism… I’m disappointed he has made the remarks. He knows full well what my views are.’
He told Sky News that racist allegations in the party were ‘properly and thoroughly investigated’.
But Mr Arkush said: ‘What we are seeing at the moment is widespread concerns being voiced by senior Labour Party figures, by no means limited to Jewish figures – in fact, the majority are not Jewish. There is an issue of trust in the minds of many in the Jewish community towards Labour.
‘I’m not saying that Labour have completely lost that trust, I’m saying that relations are under deep strain.’
Mr Corbyn has faced claims that he has tolerated anti-Semitism in those he associates with. He has described representatives of mili- tant groups Hamas and Hezbollah as his ‘friends’, attended events organised by Holocaust denier Paul Eisen and shared platforms with a pro-Palestinian campaigner who advocated suicide bombings.
Mr Arkush met Mr Corbyn last month. He said: ‘I had a very good conversation with Jeremy Corbyn, but one matter I highlighted was
‘There is an issue of trust’
meetings he’s had in the past with real dyed- in- the- wool antiSemites, including representatives of Hamas and Hezbollah who he called his friends.
‘It would make a real difference to members of the Jewish community but also senior figures in the Labour Party who are wanting to feel confident in the leader’s com- mitment to properly oppose antiSemitism, if he would say that “having thought about the issues, I will not be having any more meetings with anti-Semites, still less will I call them friends”.
‘This is not about criticism of Israel – every country can be subject to criticism. But there’s an ideological bigotry towards Israel prevalent on the far Left, that Israel can do no good. That whatever it does, it gets no recognition and nothing will ever earn a good word.’ Labour MP John Mann, who chairs an all-party group on antiSemitism, said: ‘There’s clearly a problem with anti-Semitism on the Left and some of that has inveigled its way into the Labour Party.
‘What we want to see is action. That means those who use antiSemitic abuse are thrown out. I also want to see an education programme in the Labour Party about anti-Semitism.’