‘My regret at calling Hamas my friends’
JEREMY Corbyn said for the first time yesterday that he ‘regrets’ calling supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah his ‘friends’.
Mr Corbyn has repeatedly declined to apologise for calling the militant groups his friends in 2009. But he told the Commons home affairs select committee: ‘I regret using those words.’
Asked about Ken Livingstone, who was suspended from Labour over allegedly antiSemitic remarks, Mr Corbyn said his comments had been ‘unacceptable’, but added: ‘He has been my friend for a very long time.’ He went on to say he was ‘content’ that Jackie Walker, who was suspended for saying Jews were ‘chief financiers of the slave trade’, has been reinstated as a Labour member.
Mr Corbyn, who came under fire last week for appearing to compare the Israeli government with Islamic State, insisted Labour’s Keith Vaz was ‘wrong’ for suggesting people fear he is ‘fostering a period in the Party where anti-Semitism exists’. And he claimed he was ‘unaware’ that his communications director Seumas Milne had ‘praised Hamas for their spirit of resistance’ at a rally.