Speaker Pelosi Shames Jeremy Corbyn on anti-Semitism

t is rare for a senior US politician to speak out against the Leader of Britain's Opposition. In fact, it is unprecedented but that was before Jeremy Corbyn and his laissez-faire attitude to anti-Semitism.

by Patrick Sullivan, Political Editor on 17 April 2019 09:17

Following on from her whirlwind trip to London on Monday, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi sat down for an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour yesterday.

Speaker Pelosi was interviewed in Dublin, Ireland where she is due to address Dáil Éireann, the principle chamber of the Irish legislature, to celebrate the passing of 100 years since the formation of the first Dáil.

As Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, she is the third highest ranking public official in the United States. She is also the nation’s most powerful Democrat and until they nominate a Presidential candidate the de facto leader of the Democratic Party.

In 2007, she was sworn in as Speaker of the House of Representatives for the first time. That the first woman Speaker in American history was Nancy Pelosi is hardly surprising once you discover that she was practically born into politics.

Her father Thomas D’Alesandro Jr. had served as Congressman for Maryland’s 3rd Congressional District and Mayor of Baltimore. He was also a man of great moral courage, breaking with the immensely popular President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whilst a Democratic Congressman, to support the Bergson Group.

The Bergson Group sought to raise awareness of the Holocaust and was deeply critical of the lack of action from the administration to save the Jews of Europe, condemning thousands to death. The Roosevelt administration’s policy on Jewish refugees was so inhumane that in 1939, the U.S. government turned away a ship carrying over 900 refuges, many of them Jewish, escaping from Nazi Germany.

With that proud history it is no surprise that Speaker Pelosi responded forcefully to the suggestion that the Democratic Party was beginning to have a problem with anti-Semitism, following some offensive and unwise comments by freshman Congresswoman IIhan Omar

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Speaker Pelosi emphasised that not only did the Democratic Party not have an anti-Semitism problem, she was committed to fighting anti-Semitism wherever it occurs.

It was then that she revelled just how direct she had been with Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn over his handling, or lack of handling, the problem of anti-Semitism within his Party saying:

“When we met the Leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, we said we have concerns about how the Labour Party is perceived, in terms of anti-Semitism.”

Not mentioned in the interview was that the Speaker, who will have had many demands on her time during her London visit, made a point of having a meeting with three backbench MPs. What made those backbench MPs significant was that they were three former Labour MPs who left the Party in February due to its failure to tackle the growing anti-Semitism from within. Mike Gapes MP and Chris Leslie MP became founding members of ChangeUK, whilst Ian Austin MP now sits as an independent MP.

That the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives would be so public in voicing her concerns over the Labour Party’s attitude towards anti-Semitism shows just how great the damage Jeremy Corbyn has been. The Speaker of the House would not seek to shame a potential Prime Minster like that but then that is not how Mr. Corbyn is seen internationally.

What is obvious is that concern over Mr. Corbyn’s attitude towards anti-Semitism is great amongst our closest ally and something they regard as a grave threat. We should all be grateful to Speaker Pelosi for disregarding political niceties and instead making it abundantly clear to Mr. Corbyn and his allies that the whole world is now watching their behaviour.

Patrick Sullivan is the Political Editor of The Commentator @PatJSullivan

http://www.thecommentator.com/article/7347/speaker_pelosi_shames_jeremy_corbyn_on_anti_semitism

British Jews’ Corbyn problem

There’s no evidence Labour leader’s anti-Semitic view will turn voters off.

8/31/18, 8:04 AM 

Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn | Leon Neal/Getty Images

LONDON — Today, Jewish life in Britain is under greater threat than at any time since World War II, and it is because of one man — Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn — and the fetid politics that surround him.

It’s now almost impossible for any British Jew to plausibly defend him. Only outliers remain.

Over the past few weeks, a barrage of reports in the British press have shed light on the Labour leader’s anti-Semitic worldview. Among the relentless slew of revelations: a video of Corbyn promoting the propaganda site of terror group Hamas in 2013, in which he took aim at his favorite subject, the perfidy of “Zionists.”

“[British Zionists] clearly have two problems,” he said. “One is they don't want to study history, and secondly, having lived in this country for a very long time, probably all their lives, they don't understand English irony either.”

“For me, Corbyn’s patronizing, racialized put-down of British ‘Zionists’ and our sense of history and English irony was no surprise” — David Krikler, Jewish communications consultant

It’s the latest link in a chain of scandals that have engulfed the Labour Party over anti-Semitism this summer. And it is serious.

Existential threat

“For a community with a history like ours, you can’t underestimate the need for Jews to feel like they belong, like they are accepted, like they are safe,” said Claudia Mendoza, head of policy at the U.K.’s Jewish Leadership Council, speaking more in sorrow than anger.

At the end of July, Britain’s three largest Jewish publications took the unprecedented step of carrying matching front pages calling Corbyn an “existential threat” to Jewish life in the U.K.

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It is important to understand the gravity of what was done: The Jewish community has not felt compelled to do anything so drastic since Oliver Cromwell readmitted the Jews to this island in the mid 1600s.

Many in the community thought the papers were being hysterical. They were quickly disabused. Footage emerged of Corbyn taking part in a wreath-laying ceremony at a cemetery in Tunisia in 2014. The wreath was laid at the graves of Black September terrorists who masterminded the murder of 11 Jewish athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn | Chris J. Ratcliffe/AFP via Getty Images

The photos went viral. Corbyn’s critics rushed to damn him for yet another anti-Semitism scandal, while his defenders rushed to protect him from the disgraceful smears of  “Blairites” and “Zionists.” He was actually paying his respects to those killed by Israeli security service Mossad and not the Munich killers, went one line. When that defense fell apart, Corbynistas claimed he had not actually laid a wreath. Or perhaps he had but had been unaware. At this point, no one actually knew what the party line was anymore. Of course many didn’t care. And, of course, many more thought he had done nothing wrong.

When a fringe far-left magazine featured Jewish Labour MP Margaret Hodge on its cover with the strapline “The Enemy Within” emblazoned across it — a classic anti-Semitic trope that was chosen through a vote of the magazine's readership — it was yet another sign of the pollution of Britain's far left. Hodge had recently called Corbyn a “racist anti-Semite” to his face and suffered a predictable deluge of abuse as a result.

The Jewish community absorbed the escalating backlash with great alarm. Jewish organizations even demonstrated against Corbyn earlier this year. Many were angry, bitter. Now things are of a different order entirely. Now people are seriously afraid.

“The Jewish newspapers were right,” said Mendoza. “Jews from across the political and religious spectrum — literally ranging from orthodox to completely secular — have said they will not want to stay in this country under a Corbyn premiership. Who knows what would actually happen. But if that’s the case — if Jews leave en masse — how is that not an existential threat?”

Politics as usual

My social media feed is full of Jewish acquaintances and public figures talking about their fear and anger over the Labour Party. Mandy Blumenthal, a descendant of the former mayor of Birmingham, recently said in a TV interview she was moving to Israel because Corbyn had let the anti-Semitic “genie out of the bottle.”

Others are just angry.

“For me, Corbyn’s patronizing, racialized put-down of British ‘Zionists’ and our sense of history and English irony was no surprise,” said David Krikler, a Jewish communications consultant in London. “His political career has been spent in the company of Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites and terrorist groups, so I don’t need to hear him sounding like an old-fashioned anti-Semite to know exactly what he stands for.”

“It’s been interesting to see some commentators say they can no longer defend him after seeing that,” he added. “I think it’s telling that they were prepared to defend his support for organizations that literally murder Jews, whether on Israeli buses, in Olympic villages or in Argentinian community centers, but they’re more concerned by a linguistic micro-aggression. Support for anti-Semitic terror groups is fine, as long as you don’t sound like an elderly racist who’s had one drink too many in the process.”

People hold up placards and Union flags as they gathered for a demonstration organized by the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism outside the head office of the British opposition Labour Party in central London back on April 8, 2018 | Tolga Akmen/AFP via Getty Images

Britain’s Jews now live in hope that the barrage of evidence that Labour is an institutionally anti-Semitic party, from its leadership to significant elements of its membership, will be off-putting to voters.

Unfortunately, for many like Krikler, that seems unlikely. The recent Corbyn revelations are not actually revelatory — his views were well-known before the issue flared up this summer. And yet they haven’t stopped him from winning two Labour leadership elections or over-performing in the 2017 general election.

Among the British Jews I’ve spoken to, the most common fear is that anti-Semitism is so niche and the scandals so abstruse that ordinary voters will find it hard to grasp what the problem is.

The unavoidable fact is that Labour is led by a politician with a lifetime history of anti-Semitic, anti-Zionist politics. Even the U.K.’s former chief rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, has called Corbyn “an anti-Semite” who has “given support to racists, terrorists and dealers of hate.” That someone of his stature should be so unequivocal in his language about the leader of Her Majesty’s official opposition is astonishing. And yet that is where we are.

“First you get the anti-Semitism, then, when you call it out, your honesty and integrity is called into question for doing so” — David Krikler, Jewish communications consultant

Corbyn and his acolytes respond as they always do. The Dear Leader has no problems with Jews, only those who support Israel. The implication being that those who label him an anti-Semite do so in the service of defending Israel.

“It is doubly isolating,” saids Krikler. “First you get the anti-Semitism, then, when you call it out, your honesty and integrity is called into question for doing so.”

Corbyn and the Jews. It’s a relationship that started out badly and now seems beyond repair, to the great distress of a people who have called Britain their home for centuries.

David Patrikarakos is a freelance journalist and author of several books, including "War in 140 Characters: How Social Media is Reshaping Conflict in the Twenty-First Century" (Basic Books, 2017). 

https://www.politico.eu/article/british-jews-labour-party-jeremy-corbyn-problem-anti-semitism/

Truth from France on anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism

French President Emmanuel Macron is establishing himself as a defender of truth and justice over France's past persecution of the Jews. He rightly acknowledges that anti-Zionism is a form of anti-Semitism, showing the way for all his counterparts in the West

Hitler and Petain in 1944

Michael Curtis

On 18 July 2017 05:03

"We cannot build pride upon a lie," was uttered by French President Emmanuel Macron at a ceremony on July 16, 2017, commemorating the 75th anniversary of one of the darkest days in French history under the wartime Vichy regime.

On that day, July 16, 1942, the French police conducted the Velodrome d'Hiver (Vel d'Hiv) round up, the arrest of 13,152 Jews, of whom 4,115 were children.

They were confined in the velodrome bicycle arena at the Quai de Grenelle. Those arrested were confined there for four days before being sent to Drancy and then to Auschwitz. Fewer than 100 survived.

French participation in the Holocaust has remained a sensitive and controversial issue in the country. Macron's forthrightness and his diplomatic skills are daily becoming increasingly impressive, purposeful, and sensible, and that was displayed by his remarks on July 16.

In the 2017 French presidential campaign Marine Le Pen, Macron's main rival, had said that today's France could not be held responsible for Vichy. The war time regime was to blame for the tragedy, not France or the French people.

Macron replied it was very convenient to regard the Vichy regime as a monster that sprang out of nowhere, but that is false. Macron admitted that Vichy was not all of France. Noble citizens, like those in Chambon-sur-Lignon had put themselves at risk to help the persecuted Jews.

But during World War II, Vichy was the government of France and the French establishment and administration. Vichy, not the German Nazis,  was responsible for deporting Jews to their death. Probably the most important single fact was that not a single German took part in organizing the Vel d'Hiv roundup.

Macron is not the first French leader to address and critize French war time official behavior. In 1995 President Jacques Chirac was the first official to admit France had assisted the Nazis by participation in the Holocust. His forthright statement was that France, the homeland of the Enlightenment and of the rights of man, had committed the irreparable on Vel d'Hiv.

Breaking its word, France had handed over those who were under its protection to their executioners.

However, Macron has gone further than Chirac and put the Vichy issue in a contemporary context. Aware of zealots who seek to destroy the State of Israel and the Jewish people, he condemned anti-Zionism as a new form of antisemitism:

"We will never surrender" Macron said , "to the message of hate, to anti-Zionism because it is a reinvention of antisemitism."

The Macron statement may finally lead to the recognition of reality by all sides in France. Official silence in France about its wartime activity persisted for decades until the appearance of Marcel Ophuls' documentary film, The Sorrow and the Pity, a study of the city of Clermond -Ferrand in war time which indicated that not all French people had resisted the Nazis.

A more judicious view has come with presentations such as the American film Sarah's Key and the French La Raffle.

It is also noticable that the anticipated commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the death of Celine, a gifted but notorious antisemitic writer, was not welcomed by many.

It is unlikely that the offences of the past can today be lightly dismissed or excused as they were previously. It is worth looking at the difference. One instance is the notorious case of  Paul Touvier, a ruthless thug who was Intelligence Chief of the Vichy militia in the Lyon area.

After the war, Touvier had been sentenced to death twice in abstensia but had been protected and hidden by Catholic Church officials.

The Court of Appeal in  Paris in April 1992, rather incredibly, ruled that Touvier, who, among other atrocities, had ordered the execution of seven Jewish hostages in Rillieux, near Lyon, on June 29, 1944 had not committed a "crime aginst humanity" because the Vichy regime was not  a concerted plan in the name of the state to eradicate civilian populations or to persecute for religious, racial, or political reasons.

Vichy, the court held, had not considered Jews as state enemies. It minimised Touvier's killings as a tragic accident of war. However, this argument was not accepted on appeal by the Cour de Cassation which held that a crime against humanity had been committed, though it limited the principle only to  the murder of these seven Jews.

Touvier was pardoned secretly by President Georges Pompidou in November 1971 probably as the result of clerical pressure by Catholic officials. The President remarked that the time has come to draw a veil over the past when Frenchmen disliked one another, attacked and even killed one another.

Yet truth, albeit inadvertent, came out of some of the most despiable individuals. In October 1978 the journal L'Express published an interview with Louis Darquier de Pellepoix, Vichy Commissioner for Jewish Affairs who disappeared from France and escaped punishment and was living in Spain.

He had played a significant role in the Vichy regime and was a colloborator with the Nazis. He informed us about things mere mortals did not know. The gas chambers at Auschwitz were used to kill lice, not people. He "knew" that the figure of 6 million Jews killed was an invention, an invention of the Jews. He pictured himself as a "protector" of French Jews.

But Darquier also gave the game away. He accused Rene Bousquet, chief of Vichy police, as the real organizer of atrocities, especially the "great lottery" of July 1942, the above mentioned Vel d'Hiv.

Bousquet and "his dirty police" organized everying, escaped punishment, and he even became a director of the Bank of Indochina.

That was before his assassination on June 7, 1993 for non-political reasons by a frustrated stranger. In his inadvertent self-indictment of himself and the Vichy regime, Darquier explained: "By putting on a show of following them, (the Nazis) of coming to meet their desires, I was keeping in my own hands, French hands, the reins of the anti-Jewish struggle."

That struggle was waged by many others, such as important figures like Bousquet, who indeed was an efficient administrator responsible for mass deportations of Jews to their death, and Maurice Papon, who escaped any, or serious, punishment for their deeds.

Macron 's remarks and his criticism of those who neglect or minimize France's role in the Holocaust are hopeful signs for sanity, not only in France but in the world, on political and historical truths, as well as for future cooperation between France and the State of Israel. 

Michael Curtis is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in political science at Rutgers University. Curtis is the author of 30 books, and in 2014 was awarded the French Legion d'Honneur