CONSTITUENCY SNAPSHOT

V LEEDS IS home to the third largest Jewish community in the UK, made up of around 10,000 people, with most living in the Leeds North East constituency.

Recently, the Jewish community living in the suburbs of LS17 — which includes Alwoodley and Moortown — has enjoyed a period of rejuvenation.

Despite that, Jewish voters in the constituency were keen to air their concerns.

The Conservative party’s candidate for the seat, Amjad Bashir, this week issued an apology to the Conservative Friends of Israel and offered to meet the Board of Deputies over his comments about British Jews who return from Israel being “brainwashed extremists”.

Mr Bashir was suspended by the party after his comments were revealed by the JC — although election rules mean he will remain the Tory candidate.

The former Ukip MEP’s efforts to make amends did not convince many voters in the Leeds constituency.

Malcom Berwin, 92, has lived in the constituency all his life and until this week was confident about how he was going to vote.

He said he was no fan of the previous MP of 22 years and current Labour candidate Fabian Hamilton, who is close to Jeremy Corbyn and “has anti-Israel views. He has been totally unrepresentative of the Jewish community here or of our concerns over antisemitism in the Labour party.

“He acts like it is a load of rubbish and does anything to defend Jeremy Corbyn and his handling of the problem.”

Mr Berwin said he would normally “vote Conservative”, adding: “As a former businessman I think their policies are more sensible. I think Labour’s idea of a 32-hour week is ridiculous.”

But since the news about Mr Bashir