Jewish leaders reject Corbyn’s attempt to build bridges
Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘kinder politics’
JEREMY CORBYN’S attempt to build bridges with Jewish community leaders received another setback after they accused him of failing to take action to tackle anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.
After more than two hours of talks with the Labour leader at Westminster, the Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council (JLC) said their meeting was a “disappointing missed opportunity”.
In a joint statement, they said Mr Corbyn had failed to adopt any of the measures they had proposed following last month’s demonstration outside Parliament against anti-Semitism in Labour.
“Our sole objective from this meeting was to build trust with Mr Corbyn, but this will not be possible until and unless he and the party turn their many strong words against anti-Semitism into equally strong actions in order to bring about a deep cultural change in his supporters’ attitude to Jews,” they said.
In response, Mr Corbyn said he was “absolutely committed” to rooting out anti-Semitism.
He said he had instructed new Labour General Secretary Jennie Formby to overhaul its disciplinary procedures to ensure complaints were dealt with “swiftly and fairly”.
“We will lay out the further steps we are taking in the coming weeks. We will continue to engage and work with Jewish community organisations to deal with this issue. Our party will not fail our Jewish brothers and sisters,” Mr Corbyn said.
Ahead of the meeting, Mr Corbyn used an article for London’s Evening Standard to again apologise for the pain caused by the problem.
“We have not done enough fully to get to grips with the problem, and for that the Jewish community and our own Jewish members deserve an apology,” he said.
Despite the harsh criticism, he insisted that it had been a “positive and constructive” meeting and he rejected complaints by some on the left that accusations of antiSemitism were simply “smears” to undermine his leadership.
“I DO not believe in personal abuse of any sort. Treat people with respect. Treat people as you wish to be treated yourself.”
Who said this? None other than Jeremy Corbyn in his first conference speech as Labour leader when he set out his desire for a “kinder politics”.
Yet, more than two and a half years later, Mr Corbyn’s words – spoken with great sincerity at the time – sound very hollow.
His party has, under his leadership, failed to address the toxic anti-Semitism that exists within its ranks – and Mr Corbyn’s meeting with Jewish faith leaders last night was a belated attempt to draw a line under this controversy.
Mr Corbyn might have spoken of his “absolute determination” to tackle this disgraceful abuse, but his record now suggests otherwise. He should have been acting when Jewish MPs, and others, revealed the anguish and distress caused to them.
And then there’s the Momentum-backed activists who are being selected as Parliamentary candidates. They range from Pudsey’s Jane Aitchison who has used foul-mouthed language on social media to denigrate everyone from Prince Charles to Waitrose shoppers, to Worcester’s Mandy Richards who has cast doubt on the murder of Batley & Spen MP Jo Cox.
If there’s to be a ‘kinder politics’, Mr Corbyn’s actions need to speak louder than his words – and that means taking a firm stance against those whose vile views bring Labour, and public life, into disrepute.