Antisemitism and contemporary politics

[Nefertiti2]

Got something else fort you MsD

this is a cracker

https://twitter.com/davidgraeber/status/1201950245804027904?s=20[/https://twitter.com/davidgraeber/status/1201950245804027904?s=20

[MsD]

Again, thanks a million.

[Nefertiti2]

[URL]https://twitter.com/moonbootica/status/1201962815885631488?s=21[/URL]

[Satchmo Distel]

Gus John is a true great.

[Nefertiti2]

Isn't he. Sneaky headline from the Guadian. he doesn't quit because of the Cheif Rabbis' report. he quits because of the Archbishop of Canterbury's response to it.

[Nefertiti2]

.If you thought any of this had to do with actual concerns about actual antisemitism

[URL]https://twitter.com/rob_k_abrams/status/1201876699006275585?s=21[/URL]


As someone once wrote if Jeremy Corbyn wrote a foreword to one of Boris Johnson’ books Corbyn would be attacked for not mentioning Johnson’s antisemitism

[San Bernardhinault]

I know I should be focusing on the anti-semitism, which is the important issue here, but I can't get past how incredibly awful the writing is.

[Nefertiti2]

Yes it's dire. He can manage half a sentence but anything longer collapses. And he's bee working as a professional writer for 30 odd years,

meanwhile onthe antisemitism thing

https://twittehttps://twitter.com/DanielKatz6/status/1202298612086165508?s=20r.[c[om/DanielKatz6/status/1202298612086165508?s=20

[Nefertiti2]

The “Jewish Labour “ Movement clearly wants a Johnson victory

[URL]https://twitter.com/flying_rodent/status/1202541300857356288?s=21[/URL]

[Nefertiti2]

[URL]https://twitter.com/davidgraeber/status/1202549271750479873?s=21[/URL]

[wingco]

Thanks for all your posts, Nef. This election campaign is threatening to have a serious effect on my mental health and coming to this site is like taking a break in a spa of sanity.

[Satchmo Distel]

We have to try somehow to insulate our mental health from the election shitshow so we can keep fighting during 2020 and beyond. Easier said than done though because the failure of the BBC and others to hold power to account has become so grim that the UK is now only a semi-democracy at best.

[Nefertiti2]

I’m seriously upset. Along with at least 40 percent of the population I’m being gaslit by the BBc and the media. As the son of a Holocaust Survivor I find this extremely upsetting, particularly as it’s clear to me that Johnson with his record of racism and antisemitism, his far right links. And his readiness to ignore or evade all democratic norms is far more of a threat to Jews in Britain than Jeremy Corbyn.

thanks wingco . Praise from you is particularly valuable

some background.


tweet]https://twitter.com/donahuerogers/st...339647489?s=21[/tweet]

these “new” allegations are exactly the same ones that have been repeated for the past theee years

[MsD]

I just made an absolute tit of myself when I went to the shop. There were two Orthodox chaps there, and I felt the need to tell that I'm a Labour member and not to believe all the nonsense, we're their friends. The younger one turned his back on me and the older one looked appalled.

(They often turn away from women, especially blonde shiksas like me, it's not a new thing since Corbyn. Stupidly, I thought they appreciate a friendly gesture. At least it's not the Sabbath.)

Just blushing again.

[Nefertiti2]

Shared by a friend of a friend on Facebook

As a Jewish Labour member I think I've reached the point where I give up. After an amazing canvass on Tuesday in Putney where, in my group of nine, four of us were Jews all out canvassing for Labour; today the Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) have released their dossier of evidence. Frankly this time, I'm too tired and it's all too upsetting to push back or to fight beyond this final mini-essay on the subject I'm gonna write.

This will also be my last public post on this subject that I am happy to have shared; as last time I was called a Kapo via private message from a fellow Jew. Look it up. A Kapo. The people that led their fellow Jews to the Gas Chambers. Yep. That's what he said.

I read the entire JLM dossier. Yes. All of it. It's a lot. I'm not going to get into the mudslinging around whether or not the leadership are too involved or not involved enough in the investigations. Both of which are suggested. And I - and many others - have stated that the party were initially too slow to act on complaints. Let's just take that as read.

However: the dossier contains stuff that I know not to be true because I've done my research and found credible sources refuting points raised; it contains examples of claims against JEWISH members where they leave out the fact that the person being claimed against is Jewish; stuff that I frankly consider smears against Corbyn himself; lots of stuff that could frankly be argued either way based around the IHRA definition of antisemitism; and numerically it does list about the same amount of complaints of antisemitism that Labour itself says it has received (which JLM dispute for some reason).

All of which isn't to say that it doesn't a) contain some horrific and hard things to read and b) show that there are some vile fucking people in the Labour Party. And there is no place for the things said or those anti-semites in our movement. None.

But I'm Jewish. And let me tell you: I've been to the internet. (Who hasn't? It's where the best cat memes live.) I've been to football matches - I'm a Spurs fan and I've heard away fans singing the most antisemitic stuff imaginable. I've had well-meaning friends make seemingly harmless "jokes" about stinginess, running the world, bankers etc and I even went on a date once with someone (who was half Jewish!) who spouted a load of Illuminati, conspiracy bollocks about Soros. I'm not surprised by any of this. Antisemitism is everywhere and has been steadily increasing, in line with other racism, fed by social media and the wider internet. A brief visit to the darkside of youtube comments, 4chan or twitter will tell you as much.

The fundamental truth is that, by my counting up of all the incidents listed in the JLM dossier, these incidents (as Labour say) do actually make up less than <1% of the membership. Despite the cries that that simply cannot be true from the people actually making the claims. After reading the full extent of the claims: I firmly don't believe Jeremy Corbyn is an antisemite. Nor do I believe the Labour Party is institutionally antisemitic.

I have never once been the victim of antisemitism from a member. But let's be honest: this battle of words has been lost. And lost in a way that demeans anti-racism through the actions of both sides - JLM in the dishonest way they have assembled these accusations and Labour itself in the speed it has dealt with things.

So frankly: by all means don't vote Labour if you are concerned about antisemitism. But know you are not doing so for me, my family - all of whom vote Labour - or the hundreds of Jewish Labour members who have been out in all weathers campaigning for a party that they feel at home in. And please know that if you are voting Labour and are feeling guilty (as the narrative says you should) then I stand with you and you should not feel ashamed to say that you are a proud Labour voter.

Unless you are one of the <1% of members who have said antisemitic things in which case you can get in the bin. And you can take Boris with you.

[MsD]

Please, can s/he not give up. I have several Jewish Labour members still fighting the good fight against the lies.

[Nefertiti2]

I don’t think they’re giving up campaigning. They’re giving up posting about “antisemitism in the Labour Party “

[Lang Spoon]

The SNP candidate for my hometown retweeted some bullshit Soros meme from those Sputnik cunts, was suspended from the Nats (too late to be removed from the ballot), now the Times and fuckin Wings Over Scotland are claiming it's a witch hunt from "woke" party members cos he's on the Joanna Cherry Transphobe Salmondite populist arsewipe wing of the party.

Im actually hoping Lesley fucking Laird keeps her seat. Even my Dad is going to vote Green rather than this Hanvey cunt. Though the brazen prick is crowdfunding as an Independent and seems to have plenty on the ground support from the Proto Gammons of the more "mature" end Essentialist Nats of the Kdy Indy massive. A depressing mess.

[Flynnie]

I read some of the dossier last night too and was appalled they brought up a fringe event where someone suggested it was OK to deny the Holocaust, without acknowledging Miko Peled is Israeli (of impeccable Zionist stock at that — his grandfather signed the Declaration of Independence in 1948) and Jewish, and that his quote was a thought exercise about free speech and the need to debate views in the open. He was completely misrepresented. He is not Gilad Atzmon*.

there was also an utterly nonsensical claim that holding meetings on Fridays and Saturdays is antisemitic, as if the interests of religiously observant Jews should be weighed above, say, people with kids.

Finally, they clearly detest JVL because it’s an obvious riposte to their claims Labour are Nazis. So they pretty much mischaracterise them every chance they get too.

* speaking of, I’m no Tony Greenstein fan (I’m sure he’s in the dossier too) but kudos for leading the charge to get Atzmon out of the UK Palestinian freedom movement as much as humanly possible.

[Nefertiti2]

I read some of the dossier last night too and was appalled they brought up a fringe event where someone suggested it was OK to deny the Holocaust, without acknowledging Miko Peled is Israeli (of impeccable Zionist stock at that — his grandfather signed the Declaration of Independence in 1948) and Jewish, and that his quote was a thought exercise about free speech and the need to debate views in the open. He was completely misrepresented. He is not Gilad Atzmon*.

there was also an utterly nonsensical claim that holding meetings on Fridays and Saturdays is antisemitic, as if the interests of religiously observant Jews should be weighed above, say, people with kids.

Finally, they clearly detest JVL because it’s an obvious riposte to their claims Labour are Nazis. So they pretty much mischaracterise them every chance they get too.

* speaking of, I’m no Tony Greenstein fan (I’m sure he’s in the dossier too) but kudos for leading the charge to get Atzmon out of the UK Palestinian freedom movement as much as humanly possible.

The trouble is that there are so many bad faith actors. Indeed the Jewish Labour Movement is only interested in Corbyn and Israel. I’m not aware of them ever campaigning on anything else.

[Nefertiti2]

[URL]https://twitter.com/gordonmaloney/status/1203332591266467841?s=21[/URL]

[Nefertiti2]

Good if very painful piece by Eleanor Penny

[URL]https://twitter.com/rivkahbrown/status/1203446191100497929?s=21[/URL]

[Nefertiti2]

lhttps://twitter.com/MikeSegalov/status/1203710952035753985?s=20

[Patrick Thistle]

https://twitter.com/labourblackrose/status/1204182439398129664?s=19

[Levin]

That's not what the letter says. The headline that is.

It's not an endorsement of Crbyn. It seems to say that Jews shouldn't be critical of any political leaders and that they should just keep their heads down. Now I may very well be wrong but that appears to fit in with what little I know about Orthodox Judaism in the UK.