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Showing posts from September, 2018

Freedom of expression caveat, criticised by pressure groups and some Labour MP's.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-jeremy-corbyn-antisemitism-ihra-jewish-israel-palestine-statement-latest-updates-a8522806.html Labour adopts IHRA antisemitism definition in full. The National Executive Committee of the Labour Party have now adopted the complete IHRA definition of antisemitism and its examples.The NEC has also added its own caveat stating that, “this does not in any way undermine the freedom of expression on Israel and the rights of Palestinians”. All very right proper. However, as I have recently stated, no matter what concessions are made, in this case accepting the full IHRA definition, the baying hordes will always come back for more. True to form within minutes of the NEC meeting coming to a close, the pressure group Labour Against Antisemitism, closely followed by Labour Friends of Israel waded in describing the “freedom of expression” statement as “a get out of jail card”, and "the NEC has been told repeatedly that it

Jewish Labour Movement Conference attracts widespread media coverage.,

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/sep/02/gordon-brown-labour-ihra-antisemitism-definition-nec-vote Labour should adopt IHRA's definition of semitism says Gordon Brown. The Jewish Labour Movement held a 1 day conference on Sunday (2nd September). Conferences for this organisation are not usually reported in the media or on television, but yesterday's conference was an unique exception. From morning to evening there were blanket coverage reports on Sky News and BBC News, with numerous people giving interviews, and today's Front Pages carry long reports of speeches made by others during the day. You might wonder why a conference only usually reported in the Jewish Chronicle suddenly attracts the attention of all this country's media and television News programmes. A spokesperson from Progress, (the pressure group within the Labour Party), was the first to appear before the camera's giving his comments about how the Labour party was wro

Another former MP joins the witch hunt

Jeremy Corbyn must show he understands why British Jews fear his leadership Following on from my Blog of yesterday, Ed Balls today leaps in with his article in the Telegraph, saying "Jeremy Corbyn must show he understands why British Jews fear his leadership". You remember Ed Balls. He is Mr Yvette Cooper and is now more famous for his Strictly Come Dancing performance, his cookery "skills" in the Great Sport relief Bake off and his televised trip to the United States, Travels in Trumpland with Ed Balls, where, dressed in some sort of leotard he enga ged in a professional all in wrestling performance.  Balls is another one of those former MP's more closely associated with Blair and his "New Labour" experiment and has never shown any support for Jeremy Corbyn.It is therefore not surprising that he now joins the bandwagon of criticism from that part of the Labour party, using the "antisemitism" row as an excuse. Few people li

The "antisemitism" argument is just an excuse.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/sep/01/david-blunkett-calls-for-corbyn-project-rethink Labour needs 'seismic change' or party will fall into decline  Watching the newspaper previews on television last night, one of the reviewers made a comment which was certainly missed, probably by design, by his co previewer and the presenter and I should think by many of the viewers at home. The story under review was the Telegraph front page coverage of Baron Blunkett's intervention in the on going "anti semitism" row within the Labour party. The reviewer commented, as many of us have remarked on in the past, that all the criticism leveled at the party leadership on this issue, has originated from that section commonly described as the Blairite wing of the Labour party. Blunkett argues "Either Jeremy Corbyn can lead a party into gradual decline and irrelevance, or demonstrate that he can lead a party fit for Government", much i