Claims of anti-Semitism and misogyny in the Labour party are “only a problem because the right wing media try to make it a problem,” according to the UK’s top trade union leader.
Len McCluskey of Unite was recorded delivering a speech at a Resolution Foundation event saying allegations of misogyny and anti-Semitism were simply intended to portray Labour as “a toxic party.”
The Daily Telegraph reports the key ally of Jeremy Corbyn said:
Let’s not kind of highlight too much division as though it’s a problem. It’s a problem because the right wing media try to make it a problem.
That’s why we’ve had all the stuff flowing around about misogyny and anti-Semitism in the Labour party to try and create an image that the Labour party is somehow a toxic party.
Following the event, Mr McCluskey later tweeted: “The media try to create more of a division than there is in our movement. @UKLabour the biggest party in Europe. Of course, there will be a range of views. But we deal with each other in a respectful manner and accept the majority view #newpolitics @resfoundation”
A Unite spokesman said Mr. McCluskey comments were a result of him responding to a question about division.
“He then went on to stress the need for people to treat one another in a respectful manner,” he said. “Len McCluskey and Unite have always been clear that anti-semitism is an evil which must be combatted wherever it emerges, including within the Labour Party.”
Accusations of anti-Semism against the Labour party are nothing new and go back to the most recent Labour party conference and before that.
As Breitbart Jerusalem reported, last December Israel’s public security minister, Gilad Erdan, expressed the concerns he shares with his country’s government about the views of senior Labour figures while speaking at a conference in Brussels. He said:
We recognise and we see that there are antisemitic views in many of the leadership of the current Labour party. We hope it will be changed.
That they will come to the right decisions about people in their party who don’t understand that Hamas is a recognised terror organisation, that you cannot have a regular relationship with a terror organisation.
Just weeks before that expression of concern, far-left Nasreen Khan, a shortlisted Labour Party candidate for a Bradford council seat, posted anti-Semitic comments on Facebook and accused teachers of “brainwashing” children into thinking “the bad guy was Hitler”.
A former activist for anti-Israel George Galloway’s Respect Party, Ms. Khan was responding to a video on Facebook in 2012 called, “The Palestine You Need to Know”.
Using the name Naz Kahn, she posted: “It’s such a shame that the history teachers in our school never taught us this but they are the first to start brainwashing us and our children into thinking the bad guy was Hitler.
“What have the Jews done good in this world??”
Follow Simon Kent on Twitter: Follow @SunSimonKent or e-mail to: skent@breitbart.com
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