Day: 28 May 2016

With barely a month to go to put forward motions to this year’s Labour Party conference, supporters of Free Speech on Israel are fighting back against the smear campaign which has branded anti-racist activists antisemitic because of their support for justice for Palestine. One of the most high-profile victims, Jackie Walker, had her suspension from the party revoked on Friday after taking an uncompromising stand.

Labour Party members have until June 24 to take decisions in their constituencies on resolutions, rule changes, constitutional amendments and delegates to represent them at the annual conference in Liverpool on September 24-28. The same deadline applies to nominations for places on the National Executive Committee (NEC).

The Zionist Jewish Labour Movement, backed by the right-wing “Progress” faction, is pushing relentlessly for a change to membership rules that would allow proponents of one particular ideology to intimidate and exclude people who oppose them. It is being deliberately rushed through in order to pre-empt the findings of the Shami Chakrabarti inquiry which is due to report after the June 24 conference deadline.

The rule change the JLM and Progress are proposing seeks to insert the following new paragraph E (at Clause I, section 4 (‘Exclusions’) in the party’s membership rules:

Where a member is responsible for a hate incident, being defined as something where the victim or anyone else think it was motivated by hostility or prejudice based on disability, race, religion, transgender identity, or sexual orientation, the NEC may have the right to impose the appropriate disciplinary options ….(our emphasis)

This is a deliberate misreading of the Macpherson report recommendation that a victim’s perception must be taken into account in a case of hate crime. Macpherson did NOT intend to empower an alleged “victim or anyone else” to determine when a hate crime was being committed without reference to any other criteria. If passed, Zionists will use their new rule to claim that someone attacking their political beliefs is attacking their race or religion, making them an antisemite and therefore guilty of a hate crime.

The rule change is being presented as if it is needed to protect Labour Party members from racism and has received the backing of some on the NEC. But if a hate crime is committed there are laws that can – and should – be brought into play. The motivation of JLM and Progress – neither of which has any record of support for anti-racist struggles in British society at large – is to make it impossible to question the ideology which gave rise to the creation of a racially exclusive Israeli state on land stolen from the Palestinians.

This pernicious rule change motion needs to be opposed, and it is being opposed. There is a fine example here of the incredulity of its supporters when they were thwarted in Hampstead and Kilburn Labour Party last Thursday.

There are also a growing number of examples of positive resolutions being passed after thoughtful debate in labour movement organisations around the country. Below are just a few that we have heard about. Please let us know if you are aware of others.

You can download this leaflet about the JLM to hand out at labour movement meetings.

BELOW ARE SEVERAL RESOLUTIONS PASSED IN LABOUR MOVEMENT ORGANISATIONS IN SUPPORT OF FREE SPEECH ON ISRAEL Continue reading “Free Speech on Israel campaigners fight back against smears and intimidation in UK Labour”

You can download this leaflet here to hand out at CLP, TU, etc, meetings

Baroness Royall’s inquiry into charges of antisemitism against Oxford University Labour Club has concluded that there was no institutional antisemitism. But the inquiry recommends that all Labour student clubs receive training in antisemitism from the Jewish Labour Movement. This idea was first put forward in April by the Progress think tank: there is a strong overlap between Progress and the lobby group Labour Friends of Israel. Progress called for all Labour’s National Executive Committee members to be “properly trained on modern antisemitism by the Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) or its nominee.”

We deplore the proposal to task Jewish Labour Movement with training Labour Party branches and organisations. JLM is an affiliate both of the Israeli Labour Party which in office has promoted the building of settlements in the occupied Palestinian Territories and the World Zionist Organization, which has channelled funds to the illegal settlements.

JLM has proposed a change to the Labour Party Membership rules that gives “due regard to the Macpherson definition of a racist incident which places particular value upon the perception of the victim/victim group.” This deliberately distorts the Macpherson report recommendation that a victim’s perception had to be taken into account in a case of hate crime; it was not intended to empower an alleged victim to determine when a hate crime was being committed without reference to any other criteria. It allows pro-Palestinian, pro-boycott or anti-Israel statements to be labelled antisemitic, thus shutting down debate on Israel.

Some Labour Party members are being persuaded to join the JLM in the mistaken belief that this is a way of showing solidarity with “the Jewish community.”

The Free Speech on Israel network strongly objects to the Labour Party’s cooperation with the Jewish Labour Movement on combatting racism, given the latter’s record:

• The Jewish Labour Movement, founded in 2004, is the successor organisation to Poale Zion. Earlier this year, the Israeli Labour Party to which it is affiliated, unanimously supported a plan that Israeli professor Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion University said “would have been applauded by Apartheid South Africa.”

• Israeli Labour Party leader Isaac Herzog has stated that “we wish to separate from as many Palestinians as possible, as quickly as possible….we’ll erect a big wall between us. That is the kind of co-existence that is possible right now.” In  April, Herzog said the Labour Party shouldn’t give the impression of being “Arab lovers.”

• Since Poale Zion officially affiliated to the British Labour party in 1920, it has been able to retain an influence at the highest levels of the Labour Party, despite growing evidence of the existence, resistance and suffering of Palestinians, and the increasingly nationalist and colonialist character of the militarised Israeli state.

• Over the decades many Labour figures have remained supportive of Israel despite the devastating consequences of Israel’s occupation for the Palestinians, and the role of the Israeli Labour Party in segregationist and illegal policies.

Continue reading “Leaflet: Why the JLM does not represent Labour’s Jewish members”