Jewish alarm on Corbyn
JEREMY Corbyn would pose a ‘clear and present danger’ to the Jewish community if he is elected Prime Minister, the faith’s three main newspapers have warned.
The Jewish News, Jewish Chronicle and Jewish Telegraph took the unprecedented step of publishing a joint front page outlining the threat they believe Mr Corbyn poses to British Jews.
In an excoriating editorial, they said the Labour leader had let the ‘stain and shame of anti-Semitism’ flourish in the party and condemned him for having a ‘default blindness’ to the fears of the Jewish community.
They singled out Labour’s ‘sinister’ failure to adopt the internationally accepted definition of anti-Semitism in its new code of conduct.
THE Jewish community would face an ‘existential threat’ if Jeremy Corbyn became prime minister, the country’s three main Jewish newspapers warn today.
In an unprecedented step, the Jewish News, Jewish Chronicle and Jewish Telegraph published a joint front page editorial voicing fears that power could be handed to a man who has ‘contempt for Jews and Israel’.
It highlighted how the ‘stain and shame of anti-Semitism’ had flourished in the Labour Party since Mr Corbyn became leader in 2015.
And they singled out Labour’s ‘sinister’ failure to adopt the internationally accepted definition of anti-Semitism in its new code of conduct.
The decision has fuelled concerns that the watered-down definition means activists could avoid being punished for making slurs such as comparing the actions of Israel to those of the Nazis.
Underneath the headline United We Stand, the papers condemned Mr Corbyn for having a ‘default blindness’ to the fears of the Jewish community. They said they had teamed up because of the ‘existential threat to Jewish life in this country that would be posed by a Jeremy Corbyn-led government’.
The article was written over a photograph of placard-waving campaigners against Labour anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial in March. It said there had been ‘many alarming lows’ of antiSemitism in Labour. These included human rights campaigner Shami Chakrabarti being handed a peerage weeks after publishing a report that allegedly whitewashed antiSemitism in the party.
The article also condemned Labour for reinstating Ken Livingstone after he had been suspended for claiming Hitler had once supported Zionism.
But it said the ‘stubborn refusal’ to accept the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism – which saw Labour MP Dame Margaret Hodge, who lost family in the Holocaust, to brand Mr Corbyn a ‘racist’ – as the ‘most sinister yet’. The definition is recognised internationally and has been accepted by the Government and 130 councils. But Labour left out four key examples of anti-Semitism relating to Israel. This was a cynical attempt to avoid the need to expel ‘hundreds, if not thousands’ of Labour and Momentum members, said the newspapers.
The article added that if Labour failed to implement the definition in full it would be seen ‘by all decent people as an institutionally racist party’.
Labour has been engulfed in claims of anti-Semitism under Mr Corbyn’s leadership following a spate of attacks on Jewish people and supporters, including Labour MPs. At last year’s party conference a fringe event speaker said people should be able to question whether the Holocaust took place.
Prior to her confrontation with Mr Corbyn last week, in March Dame Margaret branded him ‘the poster boy of anti-Semites everywhere’.
Last night, Gideon Falter, chairman of the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, said: ‘We hear from members of our community constantly that were Jeremy Corbyn to become prime minister, they would take the drastic step of leaving the country. Jeremy Corbyn has displayed utter contempt for the Jewish community...the Labour Party is now so institutionally anti-Semitic under Jeremy Corbyn that the Jewish community considers it to be a threat to our very future in this country.’
In January, the Community Security Trust, a charity that monitors anti-Semitic abuse, said it recorded 1,382 hate crimes last year – 3 per cent more than in 2016. It was the highest figure since records began 34 years ago. It said the increase followed ‘unprecedented publicity’ about controversies involving Labour.
Last night Labour MP Wes Streeting said of the editorial: ‘This is a shameful episode in the history of the Labour Party and we need to put it right.’
The Labour Party said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party are fully committed to the support, defence and celebration of the Jewish community and its organisations. The next Labour government poses no threat of any kind whatsoever to Jewish people. The security and wellbeing of Jewish people is a priority for our party.
‘We understand the strong concerns raised in the Jewish community and are seeking to engage with communal organisations to build trust and confidence in our party.’
‘He has displayed utter contempt’