Britain’s main left-wing political force, the Labour Party, has suffered a split, with members of a splinter group identifying Brexit and rising anti-Semitism in the party as key reasons for rejecting the old-left politics of leader Jeremy Corbyn.
The Labour Party has faced a steady torrent of anti-Semitism scandals in recent years, with critics pointing to a new atmosphere of hate within the party since veteran campaigner Jeremy Corbyn took the leadership in 2015.
Speaking about her decision to leave Labour at a press conference Monday morning, Jewish MP Luciana Berger said she was “embarrassed and ashamed” of the party. She has frequently spoken out about the abuse she has received from fellow Labour members in recent years, challenged Corbyn on his alleged anti-Semitism problem, and even had a bodyguard at last year’s Labour conference.
Following the schism, Dr Moshe Kantor, the President of the European Jewish Congress, spoke out to further highlight Labour’s anti-Semitism problem, calling on Corbyn himself to act to stamp out the hate within his party.
In a statement seen by Breitbart London, Dr Kantor said:
The time is now long overdue for Jeremy Corbyn to act once and for all to stamp out the scourge of antisemitism from his party. We call on him to put his words into action and show that there is no place for antisemitism in modern Britain.
Political leaders have an essential role to fulfil in fighting antisemitism and hatred. Much more needs to be done by the Party leadership to rebuild Labour’s credibility as an anti-racist party and to reassure British Jews that the Party makes no exceptions for antisemitism in any form. The necessary first step will be for Mr Corbyn to apologise for his past comments and affiliations with Jew-haters and to expedite urgently the disciplinary process against all Labour Party members accused of antisemitism.
It’s regrettable that Labour’s leadership has not taken a stronger line on antisemitism, which has undoubtedly led to many Jews thinking that they may not have a future in Britain. However, it is also true that the British government is hugely supportive of our community and Britain remains a safe and welcoming place to be Jewish.
Breitbart London reported in December at the end of a bruising year of anti-Semitism scandals for Labour that Jeremy Corbyn had made the Simon Wiesenthal Center list of ‘top-10’ worst anti-Semitism incidents worldwide for 2018. The centre’s report stated that the prospect for a Corbyn-led British government was an “existential threat to Jews” and that the rising tide of anti-Semitic incidents in Labour was “injecting the world’s oldest hatred into the mainstream of society.”
The Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human rights organisation that researches the Holocaust and contemporary anti-Semitism, said of the rise of such incidents within Labour: “Party leader Jeremy Corbyn stands directly responsible.”
Oliver JJ Lane is the editor of Breitbart London — Follow him on Twitter and Facebook
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.