‘Racist’ and ‘misogynist’ columns attacked
VJEWISH GROUPS have rounded on commentator Rod Liddle after two recent articles were widely condemned as antisemitic and Islamophobic.
In a piece published by the on Friday, Mr Liddle floated the idea that the upcoming general election should be held on a day when “Muslims are forbidden to do anything on pain of hell, or something”.
He added: “There must be at least one day like that in the Muslim calendar, surely? That would deliver at least 40 seats to the Tories, I reckon.”
Mr Liddle also appeared to mock Labour MP Rosie Duffield, a victim of domestic abuse, calling her “sobbing and oppressed Rosie ‘#MeToo’ Duffield”.
It followed an article in the published the day before, in which he appeared to accuse Jews of religious hypocrisy, writing that on a recent trip to Israel he noticed that Jewish Israelis were not permitted to use cigarette lighters or coffee machines over the chag, but “were allowed to push the buttons on their cash registers”.
Mike Katz, the national chairman of the Jewish Labour Movement, accused the columnist of promoting “rancid views and racism”, calling on the and the to dismiss him.
He said: “We need to stand up to all racism — Islamophobia on the right and antisemitism from the left. Liddle’s
article is truly vile, casual in its deployment but no less hateful and hurtful. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Liddle doubled down with his deeply misogynist mocking of Rosie Duffield’s powerful speech on domestic abuse.
She deserves so much better, given her unflinching support for JLM and Jewish Labour members.”
Jonathan Goldstein, chair of the JLC, said that the writer had “perfectly illustrated the overlap between misogyny and racism in one fell swoop”.
Marie van der Zyl, President of the Board of Deputies, added: “This is not just hate speech, it is an affront to democracy. Not content with calling for Muslims to be disenfranchised, Rod Liddle has sunk into antisemitic stereotype territory with his snarky comment about Jews and cash registers. He should apologise.”
The CST condemned the article, but said of the piece that “people often hold more than one view at once.They can be positive in some
Rod Liddle regards, whilst also having attitudes that some (or perhaps many) Jews would consider antisemitic in one way or another. This seems to fall squarely into that category.”
Liberal Judaism’s Rabbi Charley Baginsky, of the South Bucks Jewish community, said: “We stand in solidarity with those targeted in Rod Liddle’s latest column.”
VA HOLOCAUST denier has failed in her bid to have her conviction for broadcasting “grossly offensive” songs about Jews overturned.
Alison Chabloz, of Charlesworth, Derbyshire, applied for a judicial review of her landmark conviction on the basis of technicalities of what constitutes the act of sending offensive material online.
Her barrister, Adrian Davies, argued at the Royal Courts of Justice that uploading footage to YouTube did not qualify since the site is an “inanimate object”.
Two of the counts she was convicted of related to her embedding a link on her personal blog to a YouTube video of one of her songs, which was uploaded to the video website by someone else. Mr Davies argued this was equivalent to notifying the public of its existence but fell short of endorsing it.
But the appellant could not dispute Westminster Magistrates’ ruling that her songs were grossly offensive.