Yesterday, the Labor leadership released a report on its formal inquiry into anti-Semitism in its ranks. In his accompanying speech, the party’s head, Jeremy Corbyn, tellingly told his constituents that “our Jewish friends are no more responsible for the actions of Israel or the Netanyahu government than our Muslim friends are for those of various self-styled Islamic states or organizations.” James Sorene, director of the Britain-Israel Communications & Research Center, responds to the report with an official statement (free registration required):
We regret that the inquiry has failed to recognize the dangerous, systematic demonization of Israel by those Labor-party members who cross the line into anti-Semitism and attempt to disguise it as anti-Zionism. There are sadly no recommendations [in the report] for new measures to allow them to be removed as members, and the inquiry effectively offers an amnesty, which it calls a “moratorium,” to those who have used anti-Semitic language in the past.
The report is vague and indecisive on action against members who indulge in anti-Semitic anti-Zionism, and dismisses a culture of systematic demonization of Israel as a “series of unhappy incidents.”
If you portray the existence of Israel as a crime and indulge dangerous fantasies about the country no longer existing, that is anti-Semitic and deeply offensive. There is a constructive debate in the UK about how to reach a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, . . . of which we are part, and this is not it.
Read more on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BICOM.Britain.Israel.Communications.Research/posts/10154217396300505