Leftists exploit anti-Semitism / philo-Islamism to lift Labour (and Democrats) to power

Why British Jews Are Worried by Jeremy Corbyn

Has denying the reality of anti-Semitism become a left-wing loyalty test? By Helen Lewis in The Atlantic December 11, '19

It is an astonishing statistic: Some 87 percent of British Jews believe that Jeremy Corbyn—one of two men who could be prime minister in a few days’ time—is anti-Semitic.

How did we get here? Corbyn’s party, Labour, has strong connections with the Jewish community, dating back to its earliest days. Yet a deep distrust has developed between the two since he became Labour leader in 2015, and the issue has dogged Corbyn throughout this election campaign.
 . . .
At the same time, the other plausible candidate to be the next prime minister—the Conservative leader, Boris Johnson—has faced his own questions over his use of racial epithets and his attitudes toward minorities. Racism directed at faith communities in Britain has therefore become a deeply partisan left/right issue: Any mention of “Labour anti-Semitism” is met with cries of “Tory Islamophobia.”
. . . 
Yet the question of anti-Semitism is also divisive within the left. Jewish voters I spoke with over the past several weeks told me of feeling as though the entire community had been “gaslit”—that the reality of anti-Semitism was being minimized by the party leadership—and that denying this reality had become a way to demonstrate loyalty to Corbyn and his radical anti-austerity agenda. This feeling is aggravated by persistent suggestions from the hard left that anti-Semitism is merely the pretext for a “smear campaign” against Corbyn and the left in general.

Britain’s Jewish community is small, about 284,000 people, or about 0.5 percent of the population, and heavily concentrated in a few areas of North London. That means many incidents that are widely noted by British Jews—such as Corbyn’s over-pronunciation of Jeffrey Epstein’s name as “Ep-schtein” in a televised debate—go unnoticed by the wider population. A Survation poll found that 39 percent of Britons overall believe Corbyn is anti-Semitic. While that is still a remarkably high number, it is far short of the consensus that has formed among Jews. 

The gulf has exacerbated the sense that their concerns are not being treated seriously by the rest of the population. As Britain’s chief rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, wrote in The Times: “Just a few weeks before we go to the polls, the overwhelming majority of British Jews are gripped by anxiety. The question I am now most frequently asked is: What will become of Jews and Judaism in Britain if the Labour Party forms the next government?”

British orthodox Rabbi Lionel Rosenfeld of The Western/Marble Arch Synagogue, returned for the AIPAC Policy Conference in D.C. this spring with a dire warning to North Americans regarding the Socialist/Islamist influence in the Labour and Democratic Parties in the UK and the US.

 

Question: We have had a year of the Labour Party getting closer to office and - what's the condition of Zionism and Zionists in the political zeitgeist in Britain today, in the UK today?

Answer: Well I don't know if you heard the Labour MP Joan Ryan on Sunday evening Labour Friends of Israel. She's not even Jewish  - she was almost crying because what's happened to the Labour Party is really is what's happened to Zionism in the country. It's just tragic. We're on a downhill slope from last year when I spoke to you. 

We have a Conservative government that is sleepwalking towards Brexit with no real discernible leadership. Everyone agrees on that and we, on the other hand, we have a Labour possible government who haven't really increased in the polls. Normally with them they would be miles ahead - but they're not because of this man, Corbyn. Because of his refusal to eject antisemites from his party, and because of the general fear of so many Jews in Britain that anti--semitism is taking a real hold on what was a great supporter of the State of Israel, the Labour Party. 

Question: Hasn't the Jewish community in the UK traditionally been a liberal-minded politically?

Answer:  Very much so. Very much like the Jews of United States of America, great Democratic supporters - so have - I mean I happen to know that many of great rabbis have been quietly Labour supporters but not anymore. How can they be? Labour does not have any of the values that we espouse.

Question: Particularly with regard to the Middle East and the growth of the spread of anti-semitism in Europe?

Answer: Particularly with that. And also because they condemn the United States and Israel as two colonialist powers and that's how they see the world. It's becoming a left Marxist that no one wants to touch with a bargepole, as you would say. (Watch continuation on video embed).

As socialists inject anti-Zionism to dominate progressive parties, how many Democrats will follow British Jews rightward towards Republican candidates?

Dems’ AIPAC boycott is another sign of their turn to extremism -N.Y. Post March 22, 2019

... This year, however, at least eight Democratic hopefuls deliberately snub the AIPAC conference, with its 18,000 delegates, heeding a demand from MoveOn.org that they boycott the event.

That includes Bernie Sanders, who in 2016 said he “would very much have enjoyed speaking at the AIPAC conference” but now accuses the group of providing “a platform” for “leaders who have expressed bigotry.”

Make no mistake: This is yet another deeply troubling sign of the rapidly shifting winds within the Democratic Party when it comes to supporting Israel.

True, the party’s top members of Congress — Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer — will all speak. Mayor Bill de Blasio, to his credit, will also show.

But the fact that major Democratic contenders for the nation’s highest office — including Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and Kirsten Gillibrand as well as ex-Rep. Beto O’Rourke — are now pointedly turning their backs means that the hard lefties, not Schumer and Co., are the ones calling the shots.

And don’t the bad guys know it. Radical activist (and Louis Farrakhan ally) Linda Sarsour gloated on Twitter that “the tide is turning” on Israel and “the status quo is no more.” Worse, it’s further vindication of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s anti-Semitic attacks on AIPAC and all supporters of Israel.

Now, Democrats aren’t just refusing to hold Omar accountable for her vicious bigotry — they’ve adopted her talking points.

"UK Labour's predictable descent into anti-Semitism" in The Commentator, 5/1/16

The British Labour Party's descent into totalitarian, anti-Semitic bigotry has been driven by the false belief that hatred of the Jewish state of Israel -- itself a vile form of bigotry -- can truly be divorced from hatred of the great mass of Jews.

"Now, Labour has a leader who is essentially anti-Western, and that manifests itself in a multiplicity of ways from opposition to domestic free market economics to a systematic rationalization of the anti-freedom agendas of groups such as Hamas and international leaders such as Vladimir Putin."  . . .

As the center-Left(ish) columnist Nick Cohen put it in an article in the Guardian on Saturday:

"When Jeremy Corbyn defended the Islamist likes of Raed Salah, who say that Jews dine on the blood of Christian children, he was continuing a tradition of communist accommodation with antisemitism that goes back to Stalin’s purges of Soviet Jews in the late 1940s.

"It is astonishing that you have to, but you must learn the worst of leftwing history now. For Labour is not just led by dirty men but by dirty old men, with roots in the contaminated soil of Marxist totalitarianism."

And so it is. But it is also important to underline the very specific reasons why, among all the other possible outcrops of totalitarianism, it is anti-Semitism that has taken center stage.

At the top layer, the reason is an obsessive hatred of the Jewish state of Israel that has been building for decades, but which went into overdrive after the second Palestinian intifada and the failure (due to Palestinian rejectionism) of the Clinton-brokered peace talks of 2000.

A generation of Labour youth has now reached political maturity believing that Israel represents some kind of demonic evil. Quite ordinary party members therefore think nothing (indeed they are proud) of turning up on anti-Israel demonstrations alongside supporters of murderous anti-Semitic terror groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

It is often argued that anti-Zionist fanaticism started out in anti-colonialist, rather than traditionally anti-Semitic, Leftist traditions positing the Palestinians as a kind of pet, Third World liberation movement. But by now, what's the difference? Traditionally anti-Semitic and modern anti-Zionist tropes are largely interchangeable.

In both incarnations, real-world Jews are (and were) targeted for delegitimization, boycotts, and, ultimately, destruction. 
(Read more)

Rabbi Lionel Rosenfeld, Senior Rabbi and Cantor of the Western Marble Arch Synagogue in Central London offered his perspectives on the situation during his fourth visit to the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington D.C. in this exclusive video interview during the last day of the Conference at the end of March.



Question: We've had a year of the Labour Party getting closer to office and what's the condition of Zionism and Zionists in the political zeitgeist in Britain today in the UK today?

Answer: Well, I don't know if you heard the Labour MP Joan Ryan on Sunday evening - Labour Friends of Israel. She's not even Jewish she was almost crying because what's happened to the Labour Party is really is what's happened to Zionism in the country. It's just tragic. We're on a downhill slope from last year when I spoke to you we have a Conservative government that is sleep-walking towards Brexit with no real discernible leadership. Everyone agrees on that and we, on the other hand, we have a Labour possible government who haven't really increased in the polls normally with them they would be miles ahead but they're not because of this man Corbyn. Because his refusal to eject anti-Semites on his party and because of the general fear by so many Jews in Britain that anti-semitism is taking a real hold on what was a great supporter of the State of Israel, the Labour Party.

Question: Hasn't the the Jewish community in the UK traditionally been a liberal-minded politically?

Answer: Very much so - very much like the Jews of United States of America great Democratic supporters so who I mean I happen to know that many of our great rabbis have been quietly Labour supporters but not anymore. How can they be? Labour does not have any of the values that we espouse - particularly with regard to the Middle East and the growth of the spread of anti-Semitism in Europe particularly with that and also because they condemn the United States and Israel as two colonialist powers and that's how they see the world. It's becoming a Left/Marxist party that no one wants to touch with a bargepole!

Question: When you say Marxist - meaning that the beginnings of socialism leading to communism?

Answer: The people who are now running the Labour Party want to reject all previous Labour members of parliament who had an idea that Tony Blair was the correct leader. The New Labour- as it used to be which was so successful in popular they want them all out they want to start again.

Question: What was the the the psychological adjustment that it took for liberal British Jews to say that this this party which I've voted reflexively for so long- to be able to say are you going to vote against them now?

Answer: Because of the way they treated first of all the Jewish MPs who are in the Labour party. They and of all the tweets and the terrible anti-semitic slurs against them that they and they realized now that we are in a very toxic atmosphere politically and they don't know what to do. No one really wants to leave and go on aliyah. They have no intention of leaving Britain this idea that Jews are going to be leaving Britain I don't think it's going to happen we just have to fight to make sure that the Conservative Party comes to its senses and can win the next general election or

Question: The Jewish population of Britain are they supporting the Conservatives now against Labour?

Answer: I would think there's very few Jews that I know that would vote Labour in the next general election. How can they when they are controlled by a small clique of left-wing previous Marxists and Communists?

British Parliamentarian, Joan Ryan's remarks to AIPAC Policy Conference 24 March '19:  

British Parliamentarian Joan Ryan addressing AIPAC in D.C. 24 March

"As a member of the British Parliament, I am proud to be with you all today. I am proud to be a Zionist, I'm proud to be a staunch supporter of the world's only Jewish state and I am proud to be chair of Labour Friends of Israel, a group in the Parliament that promotes support for a strong relationship between Israel and Britain. 

Over the past four years, Britain's Labour Party, of which I've been a member for 40 years, has been transformed. Once, a close friend to Israel and an unwavering ally of British Jews, it has been taken over by the far left. It is now, despite the best efforts of some decent members, riddled with anti-Semitism. It now seeks to demonize and delegitimize Israel. It is now led by a man who proudly declares Hamas and Hezbollah to be his friends. I would never have believed just three years ago, that the party which backed a Jewish homeland even before the Balfour Declaration, would have sunk so low so fast. 

And so along with eight other members of Parliament, we made a choice. We decided that words were simply not enough. We walked away from the Labour Party.

Why did I, a non-Jewish friend of Israel, travel to your conference to tell you this? I did so to remind you that things can change quickly; to remind you that we must stay on our guard and to remind you that we must stand our ground. We must condemn anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism unequivocally wherever we find it, whenever we find it. We must always call out politicians from whatever side of the aisle who question Israel's right to exist and engage in vile anti-Semitic tropes about the loyalties of British or American Jews to their countries. 

I served as a minister under Tony Blair and I saw that sticking to your convictions is not always popular. But it is always right. When I announced my decision to leave the Labour Party, I received an unprecedented torrent of abuse and hate mail. So too have many of my Jewish friends and colleagues. But those threats only strengthen my resolve. Threats will not stop me doing my job. Threats will not stop me standing by British Jews against the far left and the far right. 

Liberal at Labour rally: "Jeremy Corbyn made me a Tory"
(photo: AFP via The Financial Times 7/16/18 )

And let me tell you, threats will not stop me standing up for Israel. Why? Because I never forget that Israel is not just a Jewish state but a democratic state, in a neighborhood where democracies are few and far between. Because it is a state with the rule of law in a region not blessed with an abundance of independent courts. And because it is a country where Christians, Muslims and Jews are free to practice their faith in an area where many nations still practice religious intolerance. 

We should support Israel not just because it is Jewish but because the values which underpin it are worthy of our support. I'm a former teacher. I always told my students never give in to a bully. And I can tell you, I never will. 

That is why I made the stand, spoke out and I took action. And that's what I'm going to keep doing. 

So to you, the members of AIPAC who serve on the front lines to ensure that Israel remains our cherished friend and ally, I deliver this message from your friends in Britain. 

Thank you for your support for Israel. Let us stand together, proud of each other and proud of Israel in the battles that lie ahead. Thank you. " 

Obama's State Department-funded group bankrolling campaign to defeat Netanyahu with joint, Isaac Herzog/ Tzipi Livni ticket

Legislators looking into State Department’s past funding of peace advocacy group that is supporting Israeli ‘V15′ campaign, Fox News reports'- Times of Israel March 14, 2015

Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni of Zionist Camp intend to alternate Premiership

An investigatory bi-partisan panel has been convened in order to probe allegations that the US State Department gave a political group that opposes Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu taxpayer-funded grants, a source with knowledge of the proceedings told Fox News on Saturday.

The news broke a day after Netanyahu told The Times of Israel that it didn’t require “a tremendous leap of imagination” to believe that the Obama Administration wants to see him gone as prime minister.

Labor's Isaac Herzog at Kibbutzim College in Tel Aviv (Photo Ofer Vaknin)

Watch DemoCast original video interview with Israeli opposition candidate, Isaac Herzog, filmed at AIPAC last year.



The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has agreed to look into charges that the State Department helped fund OneVoice and thus indirectly funded its affiliate V15 — created by Israeli activists ahead of Tuesday’s election as a concentrated, grassroots effort to unseat Netanyahu.

Read more: Senate said probing US ties to anti-Netanyahu group | The Times of Israel 

Meet Obama organizer working to boot Bibi

Mentored by disciple of notorious radical Saul Alinsky by Aaron Klein in World Net Daily  March 2, 2015

270 Strategies' Jeremy Bird brings Alinsky to Israel

Jeremy Bird, the national field director for President Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign, specializes in the revolutionary tactics infamously pioneered by radical community organizer Saul Alinsky.

Jeremy Bird is largely known for his 2012 campaign role, where he was central to building what he described as “the strongest grassroots organization in the history of American presidential politics.”

He explained Obama’s 2012 re-election infrastructure, aptly titled Organizing for America, had 631 offices in swing states alone, compared to challenger Mitt Romney’s 282.

According to Politico, Obama’s grassroots network — led by 270 Strategies’ Bird and Mitch Stewart — encompassed “10,000 neighborhood team leaders, 30,000 core team members and 2 million volunteers.”

Bird’s re-election team reportedly utilized publicly available information on voters, collecting as many as “500 data points on a single voter, from his reading habits to his opinions on the economy,” according to a 2013 Bloomberg profile.