Jewish leaders condemn Jeremy Corbyn over attempted ‘caveat’ to anti-Semitism definition
3 min read
Jeremy Corbyn has been condemned after being forced to abandon an attempt to give Labour members the right to call the foundation of Israel "racist".
Labour’s National Executive Committee finally agreed to accept the full International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism on Tuesday, including all of its illustrative examples.
It later emerged that Mr Corbyn had attempted to insert a lengthy "caveat" which he said was necessary to protect freedom of speech when it comes to criticising Israel.
He said: "It cannot be racist to treat Israel like any other state or assess its conduct against the standards of international law. Nor should it be regarded as anti-Semitic to describe Israel, its policies or the circumstances around its foundation as racist because of their discriminatory impact, or to support another settlement of the Israel-Palestine conflict."
But Mr Corbyn was forced to abandon the text after it became clear that it was not supported by most NEC members - including many of his own allies.
In a furious statement, Simon Johnson, chief executive of the Jewish Leadership Council, said: "It has now become absolutely clear that the leader of the Labour party attemoted shamefully to undermine the entire IHRA definition.
"The IHRA definition does not restrict free speech and it is astonishing that the Labour leader persisted in misrepresenting that it did."
Jennifer Gerber, director of Labour Friends of Israel, said: "It is contemptible but utterly unsurprising that Jeremy Corbyn prioritised and fought for the right of anti-Semites to describe the world’s only Jewish state as racist in a meeting supposedly about combatting anti-Semitism. It is now even more clear that Jeremy Corbyn is part of the problem not the solution."
Labour MP Ian Austin said that the move by Mr Corbyn to include the additional wording had showed why Labour “under his leadership had got itself into this terrible mess”.
He added: “You would have thought after the last few months that he would understand the hurt and distress that has been caused to the Jewish people of Britain.”
Labour’s shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti defended the additional statement, however, telling BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “There was no sullying. The words were not a caveat, not a dilution. The words are true.
“Accepting these examples, in my view, in no way negates reasonable free speech around these difficult issues around Israel and Palestine.”
Asked if she believed that it was acceptable to describe the foundation of the Israeli state as racist, she replied: “It depends how you do it. People have called Britain racist…
“I think there has to be a space for disagreement in a reasonable way otherwise we cannot move forward.”
Meanwhile, Jewish Labour peer Lord Dubs told BBC Newsnight that the decision by the NEC to accept the full definition had been the “right thing”, saying that he thought the party had “turned a corner.”
A senior Labour source said: "(Jeremy's) statement was welcomed by the NEC as an important contribution to the ongoing discussion and consultation on the code of conduct. This was not formally moved, and there were no votes on this agenda item - decisions were reached by consensus."
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