Any leftist in the UK following the situation within the Labour Party at the moment will be aware of the fact that there has been a lot of discussion recently regarding an alleged anti-Semitism crisis on the part of Labour members. Not being either Jewish nor a Labour member, it is certainly not within my capacity to comment on the accuracy of this, and I shall not do so. Suffice to say that as a believer in justice, I believe that all complaints of racism must be taken seriously and investigated to the full extent of the law (or at least, to the full extent of whichever anti-discrimination procedures are relevant at the time).
There has also been an awful lot of discussion on the suspension of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and seeing as I missed the chance to write about this at the time, at this stage I don't think anything that I write will add to the discussion in any productive way. I'm here to talk about something quite different, which is the suspension of Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, a senior official in the organisation Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL), a network for Jews within the Labour Party.
I have quite a lot of respect for JVL; it was formed in 2017, its motto is 'Always with the oppressed, never with the oppressor' and its aims include promoting freedom of expression and democracy, acknowledging Jewish involvement in the socialist and trade union movements and opposing racism across the world, standing up against anti-Semitism and against wrongs committed against Palestinians. I'm in support of all of these things, but above all it's tremendously important to have strong Jewish voices speaking out in support of Palestine. In 2014 I worked on the Palestine demonstrations, went on some marches in Bristol and London and learned a great deal about the situation in this part of the world. In particular, this powerful speech by the activist Barnaby Raine has stayed with me for the past six years, because he talked so passionately about how much his Jewish ancestry has caused him to stand against oppression, whomever is causing it. This is the sort of voice that we don't hear enough in the media, especially not from Jews - not because not many Jews hold these views (I have met many who do in my own life) but because it doesn't fit the right media narrative. More on that in a moment.
Today, the Jewish Chronicle reported that Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi has been suspended from the Labour Party for her conduct in a CLP meeting. The article goes on to discuss that her 'crime' was to express dismay at the weaponisation of Jewish opinions. You should read the article and her comments yourself rather than just taking my word for it, but to paraphrase, quite a bit of her commentary was to do with the fact that Jews are now being seen as a group for whom it is impossible to discuss things openly without offending them - a notion that is deeply anti-Semitic in itself.
This is Naomi talking about the experiences of anti-Semitism she has faced for being a Jew with left-wing opinions (link redirects to Twitter). Have a look at what she has to say, then come back.
Finished? Okay then.
Naomi says a lot in that video, far more eloquently than I could. But I think what she's getting at is an idea that left-wing politics by itself has started to be considered anti-Semitic. There are numerous examples of this, and nearly all of them are examples of anti-Semitism themselves. In 2019, John McTernan wrote in the Financial Times (there's a paywall) that "Rhetoric about the 1 per cent and economic inequality has the same underlying theme [as anti-Semitic tropes] — a small group of very rich people who cleverly manipulate others to defend their interests. So anti-capitalism masks and normalises anti-Semitism". As Tom Clark at Another Angry Voice points out, this line of argument relies on the notion that Jews are greedy and that the left criticise greed, therefore a leftist anti-capitalist is inherently anti-Semitic. I think anyone with a degree of common logic can see that this line of thinking contains a pretty negative and untrue stereotype about Jews by itself. Another instance is this clip of Lisa Nandy on Radio 4, claiming that 'anti-Semitism is a very particular form of racism. It's the sort of racism that punches up, not down'. Again, she makes an assumption that the victims of anti-Semitism are going to be more privileged than those perpetrating it - a tired trope about Jews that she should know better than to be spreading.
But very few people expressing these sorts of views in the Labour Party seem to find themselves subject to any kind of disciplinary action at all. Those who face disciplinary action are people like Naomi, a proud Jewish activist, when they point out that it's pretty disrespectful to extend opinions held by certain Jewish lobbyist groups to be inherent to the entirety of Judaism. It's got to a point where they aren't even trying to make it plausible anymore - general secretary David Evans (who isn't Jewish) has claimed that any motions of no-confidence against himself pose a threat to Jews, without any clarity as to precisely why him keeping his job is so vital in the fight against racism!
In the fight against racism, discussion is vital. By shutting down discussion, we are unable to come together to work out an effective solution. My concern is that however well-intentioned the initial concerns about fighting anti-Semitism may have been, it has now been hijacked by those with a vested interest in maintaining Labour's top-down, anti-democracy, anti-grassroots status quo - most of them probably not even Jewish. We can tell this because since the EHRC report came out in October, the party's most prominent discussions haven't even been about its Jewish members. It has been nearly all in relation to Jeremy Corbyn, whether or not what he said in response to that report was acceptable and whether people should be allowed to discuss it. This report was meant to be the start of making the party a safer place - and any desire to do that was immediately abandoned in favour of waging another tiresome war between the left and the right. This will not achieve any additional safety for Labour's Jewish members - all it will do is a) make anti-Semitism harder to define, therefore making it harder to deal with; and b) make Labour far less likely to win the next election.
We on the left, quite rightly, abhor racism. It is right to stand against it, in all its forms. Unfortunately, the far-right (which incidentally, is exceptionally racist) has realised this, and is using it to divide us. We must not allow this narrative to win. At every accusation, we must look at exactly what is being accused and ask ourselves - is this a fair accusation? Has the person's words/actions been misinterpreted, or do they actually pose a tangible threat? How reliable is the person making the accusation? Are people with the opposite political viewpoint receiving the same due process? It is essential that we do this, because otherwise the right's go-to strategy to shut down any attempt to improve our world will be to accuse anyone it deems a political threat of racism, however spurious an allegation this might be.
Sadly for the Jewish community, it has been weaponised against its will, and if we continue down this path of hindering rational debate, any concerns Jewish Labour members have about the anti-Semitism crisis continuing are likely to come true.
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