by Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld
Nowadays conspiracy theories targeting Jews, Israel, and others are being heard once again in Labour circles.
Jeremy Corbyn speaking at a leadership election rally to his supporters in August 2016,
photo via Wikipedia
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 990, October 29, 2018
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Conspiracy
theories can usually be found in anti-Semitic environments. Labour
leader Jeremy Corbyn is a terrorist sympathizer, supporter of Holocaust
distorters, anti-Israel inciter, and part-time anti-Semite. He has also
promoted conspiracy theories about Israel. Years ago, senior Labourites
were heard to promote anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Nowadays
conspiracy theories targeting Jews, Israel, and others are being heard
once again in Labour circles.
Conspiracy theories can usually be found in
environments where anti-Semitism is substantially present. The classic,
most extreme case – a lie originating in Tsarist Russia – is the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Many extreme anti-Semitic conspiracy theories flourish in the Arab world.
In publications about the anti-Semitism scandal in
the British Labour party, a slew of conspiracy theories by elected
party members have come to the fore.
Jeremy Corbyn, who has been Labour leader since
2015, is a terrorist sympathizer, supporter of Holocaust distorters,
anti-Israel inciter, and part-time anti-Semite. He has also promoted
conspiracy theories about Israel. In 2010, Corbyn spoke at a meeting of
the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign in London at which he mentioned the
shooting of Turkish activists by Israeli commandos on a ship of the Gaza
flotilla. He remarked that British MPs had made speeches in Parliament
on this issue with a pre-prepared script that he was sure had been
written by then Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor. “They all came with same
key words,” Corbyn said. “It was rather like reading a European document
looking for buzz-words. And the buzz-words were: Israel’s ‘need for
security, the extremism of the people on one ship and the existence of
Turkish militants on the vessel.’” The Daily Mail checked the
transcript of the Commons debate in question and was unable to find any
evidence that these buzzwords were used by any MPs.
Two years later, Corbyn gave an interview to the Iranian propaganda outlet PressTV
in which he commented on a terrorist attack at an Egyptian army base in
the Sinai Peninsula that killed 16 Egyptian soldiers. He suggested that
Israel had been behind the attack because it had an interest in
increased violence in Sinai and a destabilization of the Muslim
Brotherhood regime. He said, “In whose interests is it to kill Egyptians
other than Israel, concerned about the growing closeness of
relationships between Palestine and the new Egyptian government? … I
suspect the hand of Israel in this whole process of destabilization.”
There are several classic conspiracy theories
about Jews currently circulating within Labour. One was articulated by
former Mayor of London Ken Livingstone, who resigned from the party
earlier this year after having been suspended for some time. Livingstone
claims that charges of anti-Semitism leveled against individual
Labourites and the party in general are used to smear the left and
silence criticism of Israel, an assertion that British sociologist David
Hirsh defines as the “Livingstone formulation.”
In 2003, veteran Labour MP Tom Dallyel said that
then-Prime Minister Tony Blair was unduly influenced in his policy on
the Middle East in favor of Israel by a cabal of Jewish advisers. He
specifically mentioned Peter Mandelson, Lord Levy, and Jack Straw. The
last of these, who was Foreign Secretary at the time, is an evangelical
Christian with one Jewish grandfather.
The same year, Labour peer Lord Ahmed claimed that
Jewish lawyers and media were responsible for the length of the prison
sentence he received after causing a fatal car crash. He resigned after
the party suspended him.
In recent years, some Labour officials have
claimed that Israel was behind ISIS. One was Blackburn councilor and
former mayor Salim Mulla. He too was suspended by the party.
Muhammad Pappu, a local councilor in the London
borough of Tower Hamlets, was praised by Corbyn for his help in creating
a “fair, just and decent society.” This is the same Pappu who shared
messages on Facebook in which he accused Britain of attacking Syria “to
install a Rothschild bank.” He has also shared posts on social media
claiming that Israel staged 9/11 and was responsible for the London
terrorist bombings and the Paris terrorist attacks.
While Corbyn has never apologized for his
conspiracy claims, some lesser Labour officials have expressed regret
for having promoted conspiracy theories alleging Jewish world control
and responsibility for terrorism. In December 2015, Labour councilor
Irfan Muhammad, of the London borough of Lambeth, posted on his Facebook
page: “Jews working in the World Trade Center received a text message
before the incident, ‘Do not come to work on September 11th.’” When this
was exposed he resigned his post as councilor and apologized. Andy
Slack, a Labour city councilor in Chesterfield, shared: “The modern
State of Israel was created by the Rothschilds, not God, and what they
are doing to the Palestinian people now is exactly what they intend for
the whole world.” He too later apologized.
On the other hand, John Clarke, a city councilor
and prospective Labour parliamentary candidate, shared this tweet in
2017 by a neo-Nazi: “The Rothschilds have used usury alongside modern
Israel as an imperial instrument to take over the world and all of its
resources, including you and I.” Rather than apologize for the retweet,
Clarke commented that it contained a great deal of truth.
The trade union leader Mark Serwotka, head of the
Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS), is an avid supporter of
Jeremy Corbyn. Referring to the anti-Semitism row within Labour, he told
a conference that it was possible “that Israel could have created a
story that doesn’t ‘exist’ in order to distract attention from
atrocities.” Serwotka had been expelled from Labour in the 1990s as an
extreme leftist but was allowed to rejoin after Corbyn became its
leader.
Ian Hilpus, a former BBC producer and Corbyn
supporter, wrote about the Labour leader that the Zionists are “part of a
conspiracy to undermine the most honest man in politics today.” He
posted this on a Facebook group called We Support Jeremy Corbyn that has
70,000 members.
While conspiracy theories proliferate about Jews
and Israel, they are not the only targets for attack. Andrew Murray,
policy advisor to Corbyn, suggested in an article that the British
security services were undermining Corbyn. Mendy Richards, selected as
the prospective Labour parliamentary candidate for the constituency seat
of Worcester, was banned from bringing claims to the court without the
judge’s permission after she made nonsensical accusations against the
security services, the Metropolitan Police, the army, the postal
service, her water company, her gas, electricity, and broadband
providers, and more.
An earlier version of this article, co-written with Irene Kuruc, was published on October 17, 2018 by Algemeiner.
BESA Center Perspectives Papers are published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family
Source: https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/uk-labour-party-antisemitism/
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