LFI chair hits out at Corbyn
LABOUR FRIENDS of Israel chair Joan Ryan has used to her speech at the group’s annual dinner to attack Jeremy Corbyn for attending a wreath-laying ceremony in honour of the Black September Palestinian terrorists.
In a hard-hitting speech, the Enfield North MP told Tuesday’s gathering at Westminster Central Hall that it was neither “morally right nor at all acceptable to lay a wreath at the grave of those who order the torture and murder of people simply because they are Israelis.
“It is neither principled nor brave to campaign for the right of people to call Israel a ‘racist endeavour’ or to spin absurd conspiracy theories blaming Israel for terror attacks.
“And, no, it does not advance the cause of peace to snub our party’s comrades in Israel while calling Hamas terrorists friends and brothers.”
The outspoken
Joan Ryan parliamentarian made her remarks after a year in which she was targeted for deselection by hard-left activists in her local party and narrowly lost a noconfidence vote in September.
But Ms Ryan insisted: “In this fight against antisemitism, I will never cower in the face of hatred and abuse. However long it takes, whatever the personal cost.”
Earlier, LFI Director Jennifer Gerber welcomed guests and supporters, including Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, Israel’s ambassador to the UK Mark Regev, Sir David Gerrard, Issac Kaye and new Jewish Agency chair Isaac Herzog. More than 300 people attended, including 70 MPs and 30 peers. Long-standing parliamentary supporters also attended, including deputy Labour leader Tom Watson, MPs Ruth Smeeth, Ian Austin, Dame Margaret Hodge and Luciana Berger, alongside LFI Lords chair Baroness Ramsay. There was sustained applause for Dame Louise Ellman who was handed the LFI Lifetime Achievement award for her support for the group by Mr Regev.
PRO-JEREMY CORBYN group Momentum has been attacked by its own supporters for publishing a video calling out how conspiracy theorist David Icke promotes antisemitism.
In a video published on its social media pages on Saturday, titled “Stop Using Lizards as a Cover for Antisemitism”, Momentum described how Mr Icke “calls the global conspiracy ‘Rothschild-Zionism, a secret society putting its agents in places of power’ — and then lists Jews allegedly part of the plot.”
“Icke claims he isn’t an antisemite ‘because the Jews are really reptiles’,” the video says. “But this is clearly the same antisemitic conspiracy theory about Jews controlling the world promoted by the Russian Tsars, Adolf Hitler and the far right today.”
It is the second video Momentum has produced in recent weeks on antisemitism, in what some have seen as attempts by the group to reach out to the Jewish community alienated by the rise of anti-Israel, far-left politics within Labour under Mr Corbyn.
It came after Momentum members picketed Mr Icke’s talk in Watford on Friday, alongside members of the Jewish Labour Movement. Mr Icke himself tweeted on Sunday: “Zionist Lansman’s Corbyn-owning ‘Momentum’ wants to silence David Icke – yet another enemy of free speech.”
Meanwhile, at a meeting of the Liverpool Momentum group on Tuesday evening, the vicar who stood down as a Labour candidate over allegations of antisemitism sparked chaos after he arrived clutching stones and invited attendees to throw them at him in an apparent image of a biblical stoning of Jesus.
In bizarre scenes, Liam Moore arrived unexpectedly for the Liverpool Momentum committee meeting and stood in front of audience to attack what he said was a “serious smear campaign against me”. But Mr Moore — who had previously accused pro-Israel MPs of “infiltrating” Labour and “selling out for 30 pieces of silver” in reference to Judas — received loud disapproval as tried to argue his case.
Stephen Marks, a member of the fringe, pro-Corbyn Jewish Voice for Labour group, was one of six candidates on a left-wing slate, agreed by Momentum and Campaign for Labour Party Democracy (CLPD), to have won places on Labour’s national constitutional committee (NCC). The NCC rules on disciplinary cases involving Labour members, including ones relating to allegations of Jew-hate.
Momentum had confirmed it would support Mr Marks as a candidate – despite earlier claims that its founder Jon Lansman would block the endorsement of the JVL activist.
According to minutes of a meeting of Momentum’s Oxford branch, Mr Marks, who once accused the Board of Deputies of being behind “imagined” claims of antisemitism in Labour, wrote a letter in support of suspended Labour activist Jackie Walker.