Jeremy Corbyn tells Labour anti-Semites: You do not do it in my name
3 min read
Jeremy Corbyn has told anti-Semites in the Labour party they are not acting in his name and he will kick them out.
In a bid to end the controversy which has ripped through the party in recent weeks, the Labour leader rejected suggestions that a government he led would pose "an existential threat" to the Jewish community.
But he stopped short of accepting the demand by Jewish groups and the majority of Labour MPs that the party accept the full International Holocaust Rememberance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism, alongside all of its illustrative examples.
Instead, Mr Corbyn expressed his confidence that their differences could be settled through more dialogue.
Writing in The Guardian, Mr Corbyn admitted there was a “continuing problem” with anti-Semitism in his party and said that Labour staff had seen “examples of Holocaust denial, crude stereotypes of Jewish bankers, conspiracy theories blaming 9/11 on Israel, and even one individual who appeared to believe that Hitler had been misunderstood".
He said: "People holding those views have no place in the Labour party. They may be few: the number of cases over the past three years represents less than 0.1 per cent of Labour’s membership of more than half a million. But one is too many.
"Our party must never be a home for such people, and never will be. People who dish out antisemitic poison need to understand: you do not do it in my name. You are not my supporters and have no place in our movement."
Britain's three main Jewish newspapers recently took the unprecedented step of printing the same front page condemning Mr Corbyn and claiming a Labour government led by him would pose "an existential threat" to their community.
But the Labour leader said: "I do not for one moment accept that a Labour government would represent any kind of threat, let alone an ‘existential threat’, to Jewish life in Britain, as three Jewish newspapers recently claimed.
"That is the kind of overheated rhetoric that can surface during emotional political debates. But I do acknowledge there is a real problem that Labour is working to overcome."
Mr Corbyn also admitted that the party’s failure to fully adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism had caused “strong concern” among the Jewish community but said that he believed an ongoing consultation would resolve the issue.
"The community should have been consulted more extensively at an earlier stage – which is why our executive decided last month to reopen the development of the code in consultation with Jewish community organisations and others to address their concerns," he wrote.
"But I feel confident that this outstanding issue can be resolved through dialogue with community organisations, including the Jewish Labour Movement."
However, a spokesman for the Jewish Labour Movement rejected Mr Corbyn's comments.
He said: "In the last two weeks, the Labour party has pursued diciplinary action against MPs for calling out the anti-Semitism now live within the party. This followed a decision by the NEC to adopt a code of conduct which rejected the full IHRA definition of anti-Semitism, after no consultation.
"At that meeting we subsequently learned that a member of the party’s governing body angrily accused 68 rabbis of fabricating social media posts and dismissed the Jewish community as Trump fanatic - all in the presence of the leader of the Labour party who sat silently. That individual faces no further action.
"Today, other than another article bemoaning a situation of the party’s own making, nothing has changed. There is no trust left. We find ourselves asking once again for action, not words."
Some critics also pointed out that some sections of Mr Corbyn's article were identical to another article he wrote for the Evening Standard at the height of Labour's last anti-Semitism crisis in April.
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