FEARS GROW ABOUT ABUSE OF PUBLIC FIGURES
THE apology for the online attack comes as concern grows in Westminster and beyond about the impact of abuse on public figures.
Hansard recorded a harrowing account of a Commons debate this week on anti-Semitism which laid bare the toxicity of attacks directed at MPs.
Labour’s Luciana Berger said: “They have said that I am Tel Aviv’s servant and called me a paid-up Israeli operative. Essentially, this is anti-semitism of the worst kind, suggesting that I am a traitor to our country.
“They have called me Judas, a Zionazi and an absolute parasite and they have told me to get out of Byron Davies this country and go back to Israel.”
Veteran Labour MP Margaret Hodge stated: “I have never felt as nervous and frightened at being a Jew as I feel today. It feels as if my party has given permission for anti-Semitism to go unchallenged.
“Anti-Semitism is making me an outsider in my Labour Party. To that I simply say enough is enough.”
Conservative MP Robert Halfon accused popular social networks of acting “as a septic tank in which a disgusting and non-stop stream of anti-Semitic sewage collects”.
Cardiff South and Penarth Labour MP Stephen Doughty said he had seen an online claim “suggesting that those of us who have spoken out about anti-Semitism have taken a bounty of £1m from Israel to undermine the leader of the Labour Party”.
Later, he said: “There is no place for anti-Semitism in the Labour Party or any organisation that claims to support it. Enough is enough.
“Anyone listening to the heartrending speeches of MPs in Parliament [or] the experiences of far too many Jewish people should be examining their consciences and asking what they can do to stop it – not seeking to make excuses, diversions or worse still, endorsing, turning a blind eye, or circulating wild conspiracy theories.”