Corbyn meets with far-left Jewish group
Leader accused of showing disregard towards tackling anti-semitism in Labour by attending far-left event
Jeremy Corbyn was last night accused by his own MPS of acting “irresponsibly” by attending an event hosted by a far-left Jewish group which has called for the destruction of Israel and dismissed the anti-semitism row engulfing Labour as “faux-outrage”. He was pictured at an event hosted by Jewdas, a group which is highly critical of mainstream Jewish organisations. MPS said his decision to attend was a “blatant dismissal” of concerns about anti-semitism in the party.
JEREMY CORBYN was last night accused of being “irresponsible” towards tackling anti-semitism in the Labour Party after attending an event hosted by a far-left group that called for the destruction of Israel.
Mr Corbyn was photographed at a Passover Seder hosted by the group called Jewdas, which has reportedly dismissed the anti-semitism scandal in the party as a “bout of faux-outrage”.
The group is not anti-semitic but describes itself as “radical” and openly “opposes capitalism”. However, it is highly critical of mainstream Jewish groups, and last week it attacked the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council’s response to the Labour anti-semitism scandal as “playing a dangerous game with people’s lives”.
It also reportedly described the row as “the work of cynical manipulations by people whose express loyalty is to the Conservative Party and the Right wing of the Labour Party”.
Jewdas has previously said that “Israel is… a steaming pile of sewage which needs to be properly disposed of ”.
It comes at a time when Labour yesterday dropped a council candidate and suspended him from the party after he posted a series of anti-semitic messages online, including some that denied the Holocaust.
Mr Corbyn has been under increasing pressure to grasp the issue of antisemitism head on, and deleted his personal Facebook page over the weekend after it emerged he was a member of several groups in which supporters posted anti-semitic messages.
The Guido Fawkes website published leaked audio recordings from the Jewdas event yesterday evening, claiming that Mr Corbyn stayed for several hours and took a beetroot from his allotment as a gift. Guests are heard booing Jonathan Arkush’s name, the President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, and shouting “---- capitalism”.
Labour MPS John Woodcock and Angela Smith both tweeted their frustration at Mr Corbyn’s decision to attend last night. Mr Woodcock, who it was claimed last week was on the brink of resigning as a Labour MP, tweeted: “This is deliberately baiting the mainstream Jewish community days after they pleaded with him to tackle anti-semitism. And he must know that meeting them now will give his members the message that the group’s extreme views are OK. Irresponsible and dangerous.”
Ms Smith added: “Corbyn’s attend- ance at the Jewdas seder reads as a blatant dismissal of the case made for tackling anti-semitism in Labour.”
Danny Stone, director of the Antisemitism policy trust, said last night: “Jewdas have long claimed to be a group that satirises the Jewish community. Satire only works if the people seeing it understand it to be just that.
“At this time of heightened sensivity, I would expect Jeremy Corbyn to be very careful not to give the impression he endorses, or is conferring legitimacy upon, anyone seeking to mock or cast aspersions on mainstream Jewish communal and others’ concerns about antisemitism. “
A spokesman for Mr Corbyn said: “Jeremy was invited to a Passover Seder with Jewish members of his local community. He wrote to the Board of Deputies and Jewish Leadership Council last week to ask for an urgent formal meeting to discuss tackling anti-semitism.”
In a difficult day for Labour, Roy Smart, a council candidate, was barred from standing for the party in Tunbridge Wells after posting images on Facebook, including one called the “Holocaust deprogramming course”. It said: “Free yourself from a lifetime of Holo-brainwashing about ‘six million’ Jews ‘gassed’ in ‘gas chambers’ disguised as shower rooms”, the Jewish News reported. Mr Smart said he was questioning the Holocaust, not denying it.
Further pressure was also put on the party to sack a second council candidate after it emerged that Jonny Morris is standing for re-election despite being suspended last year for giving a Nazi salute during a council meeting.
Mr Morris, a current Labour councillor, was allowed to rejoin the party after undergoing an equalities training session following his suspension.
Momentum, the grassroots organisation supporting Mr Corbyn, also warned yesterday that reports of abuse and antisemitism in the party were worse than previously thought and could not be ignored.
Unconscious anti-jewish bias was “more widespread than many of us understood even a few months ago”, it said.
When asked whether he thought it was appropriate for him to stand again, Mr Morris told The Daily Telegraph:
“Yes I do, it has nothing to do with antisemitism and the issue has been dealt with by the Labour Party and is now closed.”
In a statement, Momentum said the anti-semitism row had been used to some extent to undermine Mr Corbyn.
But in its strongest condemnation of the way the problem has been handled, it added that it was disappointed in the “failure to date to deal with [accusations of anti-semitism] in a sufficiently decisive, swift and transparent manner”.
‘Corbyn’s attendance reads as a blatant dismissal of the case for tackling antisemitism in Labour’