Bristol South Passes Motion of Solidarity with Jeremy Corbyn

As Mike has reported in his piece about Jeremy Corbyn calling in m’learned friends, Bristol South has passed a motion of solidarity with the former Labour leader. This was one of four motions, one of which commented on the EHRC report on anti-Semitism in the party.

Bristol South is my local Constituency Labour Party, and I was at the meeting. Due to the lockdown, it was held on Zoom and was packed. It was a long meeting, partly because of problems some members had accessing the meeting and the polling system with their machines.

The current secretary, David Evans, has issued a diktat stating that it was ‘not competent business’ for local Labour parties to repudiate the EHRC report or comment on the disciplinary proceedings against members. Hence the meeting was very rigidly controlled in order to prevent people unfortunately breaking those rules. The four motions were present to the members, who were called on to suggest amendments. However, because of the danger of transgressing Evans’ decrees, people were not allowed to discuss them. This was naturally resented by many members, but the local party leadership made it clear that they were not going to change their rules for the evening.

One of the motions was, I think, passed unanimously or almost so. This was presented by the CLP’s LGBTQ+ officer. It noted that there was rising levels of prejudice and abuse against other minority groups, such as Blacks, Asians and ethnic minorities, gay and transfolk, and the disabled as well as Jews. It called for the party to treat hate and discrimination against them as seriously as anti-Semitism, for officers dealing with cases to receive special training.

The first motion commented on the EHRC and there was some bitter opposition to it and to the motion of solidarity with Corbyn from those members, who I assume are members of the party’s right-wing or have been taken in by the lies of the establishment smear merchants. These members wished the motions to be altered to omit a number of clauses. One of these was a condemnation of the political interference now being done by the leadership, because it was bringing the party into disrepute, just like the political interference in the anti-Semitism cases condemned by the EHRC in their report. Others stated that it was a pity that the EHRC had not waited until the party’s own reports into the handling of anti-Semitism cases had been published before publishing theirs. The motion also contained a clause requesting the party issue clear guidance on how anti-Semitism cases should be handled. Despite very strong opposition, the proposed amendments to remove them failed and the clauses remained in the motion.

A young man tried to amend the motion of solidarity with Corbyn so that it removed all reference to him and became instead a pledge of unity that the party would go forward to combat racism, Fascism and anti-Semitism. This chap clearly believed that Corbyn was a terrible anti-Semite, but his motion was also defeated. It’s noxious for a number of reasons. The most important of these is obviously that Jeremy Corbyn is not and never has been an anti-Semite, despite the screaming lies by the right-wing British establishment. Secondly, the reason why Corbyn and his supporters have all been grossly libelled as anti-Semites is because Corbyn is an opponent of Israel’s barbarous treatment of the Palestinians. The supporters of the current Israeli government have tried to defend the indefensible by decrying the country’s critics as anti-Semites. They’ve been doing that since the 1980s, which is why one Jewish critic of Israeli racism, Norman Finkelstein, has called the Israel lobby a machine for manufacturing anti-Semites. Thirdly, you cannot pick and choose which racism you oppose if you are serious about combating racism. You cannot, say, denounce and fight anti-Black racism or Islamophobia while ignoring anti-Semitism. At the same time, you can’t oppose institutional racism against Blacks while defending the Israeli apartheid system which viciously discriminates against the Palestinians. This is why Jackie Walker, a Jewish Black woman, came to become an opponent of Israeli apartheid. She had been a member of the movement against South African apartheid in the 1970s, and somebody asked her how she could oppose that, but not Israeli discrimination against their indigenous population. She couldn’t, and so became an opponent of Israeli racism along with the other noxious varieties. This is why the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism and the Jewish Labour Movement took it upon themselves to smear her as an anti-Semite, as they have done so many Jewish critics of Israel, despite her Jewish heritage, marriage and faith.

I am very glad that these motions have been passed, and fully appreciate the reasons for the very tight restrictions the local party leadership placed on their debate. As the secretaries made clear, these are very emotive issues, quite apart from the fact that it has been made clear that any breach of Evans’ rules would result in disciplinary action.

I hope the current leadership will take these motions on board and reinstate Jeremy Corbyn fully, restore the whip to him and adopt the recommendations of the other motions in order to make the party more just and fair in dealing with cases of prejudice and discrimination.

Video Compilation of Sargon Defending Nazis

Sargon of Akkad, real name Carl Benjamin, is a right-wing internet pundit, who puts up videos on YouTube attacking what he describes as ‘Social Justice Warriors’ – feminists, anti-racists, gay and trans-rights activists, as well as the liberal and socialist left. Benjamin defines himself as a ‘classical liberal’, which means that he’s all for the unfettered Manchester school capitalism of the early 19th century. For some reason, however, he considers himself ‘centre left’, despite holding what most people would consider to be right-wing, if not extremely right-wing, views. He’s also a nationalist, but of the civic kind. Which means that in contrast to the ethnonationalists of the Alt Right, who believe that only Whites should have citizenship in the majority White West, he believes that everyone born in a country should be equal citizens, regardless of their race or ethnicity. The Sage of Swindon has frequently debated this issue with the Alt Right. However, critics like Kevin Logan have pointed out that while he might disagree with them on this issue, he nevertheless seems to agree with them very much on others.

Kevin Logan, male feminist and anti-Fascist, put up this video on YouTube. It’s a mirror from another anti-racist YouTuber, Rational Disconnect, and it shows various examples of Sargon defending and supporting the real Nazis of the Alt Right and related movements.

It begins with a clip of Sargon telling a panel of other YouTubers on the Trainwreck TV channel that he stands up for people being bullied, including Nazis. This then fades into another clip of him talking to the Scots racist, Millennial Woes, in which they both agree that Heather Hayer, the young woman mown down and killed by one of the Nazi fanatics at the Charlottesville march really died of a heart attack. They then claim, contrary to the facts, that the Alt Right is being unfairly blamed for her death. There then follows a tweet from Sargon in which he tells a gay rights group that the election of the Fascist Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil is somehow their fault for forcing the issue of trans rights, or something. In another, he states that Bolsonaro is quite right to call out the left’s ‘Marxist baggage’. In another tweet about Bolsonaro, he declares that the left are going to get helicopter memes as Bolsonaro murders them. This is a reference to memes and jokes by Fascists and Nazis about General Pinochet’s favourite method of killing political prisoners: throwing them out of helicopters. Sargon goes on to say that he’s not going to shed a tear, because leftists are liars, scoundrels and cowards.

There’s then an audio rant from Sargon blaming feminists for the mass-murder, mainly of women, by Elliot Rodger, an Alt Right misogynist. Sargon rants that murders on this scale didn’t happen before the rise of feminism, because it has disenfranchised a large section of poor young men, who feel they have no options left. Yes, he actually says it’s the fault of a ‘feminist system’. In another audio clip, he states that the success of the Alt Right is less of a threat to him and his family than the success of the SJWs, and that the Alt Right should take this gambit. ‘Even if it means the end of liberal democracy’.

Sargon has a very large audience on YouTube for his extreme right-wing nonsense, which is bad enough, though not a threat to democracy. I doubt many people beyond his circle really know who he is. However, Sargon has also joined UKIP, along with other figures from the internet right. Like Mark Meechan, aka Count Dankula, who trained his girlfriend’s pug to make the Nazi salute when he yelled ‘gas the Jews’, and Paul Joseph Watson, formerly Alex Jones’ sidekick at the conspiracy internet site, Infowars. The organisation that, amongst other lies, has told its viewers that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are literally demons, or cyborgs, or satanic witches, and that Obama wanted to get rid of every American’s right to own guns and force people into FEMA concentration camps for the New World Order. And then there’s Batten’s own adviser on Islam and prisons, because he’s spent a lot of time in them, Tommy Robinson, the notorious islamophobe and former head of the EDL and Pegida UK. These characters have brought several thousands more members into UKIP and dragged the party further towards the genuine Fascist right that Nigel Farage was so keen to distance it from. But while Benjamin shares many of their views, defends them and their murder of women, leftists, feminists and queer activists, Sargon’s not a Nazi. 

He may not personally be a Fascist, but he is defending and supporting them, especially as UKIP look set to select him as one of their candidates for the European elections. His views are vile, and are a real danger to democracy and the safety of this country’s citizens. 

Raheem Kassam’s Anti-Semitic Claim that Jews Funding Cadwalladr’s Investigation of ‘Leave’ Campaign

After the anti-Semitism lies and smears against the Labour party and decent, anti-racist people like Mike, Tony Greenstein, Jackie Walker, Martin Odoni and so many, many others, here’s what looks very much like the real thing. Yesterday Mike put up a piece about a smear made on Patreon by Raheem Kassam against the journalist Carole Cadwalladr. Kassam’s a staunch supporter of Brexit, but many of the ‘Leave’ organisations are now being investigated for breaches of electoral law and funding irregularities. Much of this is the result of Cadwalladr’s investigations into these bodies. Kassam couldn’t tolerate this, and so issued a Tweet claiming that because Cadwalladr’s investigations were published on the Open Democracy website, which is partly funded by George Soros and his Open Society Foundation, she’s being backed by ‘Globalist shills’. Mike explains that this is apparently an anti-Semitic dog-whistle.

Kassam stated

“Cadwalladr has attempted to cover such tracks by issuing a series of tweets alleging that any critique of the billionaire, fund manager Soros is ‘racist’ against Jews. This is despite Soros’s rejection of his Jewish identity, and in spite of the fact that he has openly admitted to assisting in the confiscation of Jewish property during the Holocaust”.

The Liberal Jewish organization, Zelo Street, responded by issuing a firm refutation of Kassam’s claims.

“George Soros did not assist in confiscation of Jewish property” – and this certainly seems unlikely as he would have been only 15 at the end of World War II. “And whether he “rejects his Jewish identity” is irrelevant. Calling “Soros” is code for “the Jews”. Like gratuitously pitching terms like “globalists”, “global bankers”, and “Goldman Sachs”.”

Mike in his article wonders if the Leave response to these breaches of electoral law is simply anti-Semitism, and asks if many Leave supporters will disassociate from Kassam, or whether they will simply double down and renew their calls for Remainers to get over it.

See https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2018/11/07/anti-semite-claims-the-jews-are-funding-carole-cadwalladrs-brexit-investigations/

I really don’t think there can be much doubt that Kassam’s tweet was full of coded anti-Semitic terms. The American Right, and particularly Fundamentalist Evangelical Christians, have been afraid of the creation of a ‘One World’ dictatorial state for a very long time. In modern Millennialist Christian theology, this will be the beginnings of the End Times, with the Anti-Christ as the dictator of this new global state. Which will, of course, begin the persecution of Christians. See the ‘Left Behind’ series of Christian novels by Tim LaHaye. I don’t doubt that most of the people, who hold these views aren’t anti-Semites. But it can shade into the real anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about the Jews secretly running the world, manipulating capitalism and Communism to enslave gentiles and destroy the White race through immigration and racial intermixing. The literature for this conspiracy theory sees the United Nations as the seed from which the One World dictatorship will develop, as well as the Trilateral Commission in the US and the Bilderberg group. The last is a regular meeting of major political and business figures from around the world, and is the centre of much conspiracist speculation.

The literature also discusses the major roles of the Jewish financiers in the creation of these bodies, through the Rothschild banking family and Bernard Baruch. Some of this literature will try to distance itself from overt anti-Semitism by drawing a distinction between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Jews. The good Jews are the millions of ordinary Jewish peeps not involved in the conspiracy, and who may themselves be the victims of it. The material taking this line will point out that Rothschilds continuing giving credit and financing the Nazi regime even when it began openly persecuting the Jews. The bad Jews are, of course, Rothschilds and the other immensely wealth Jewish banking families. These last are described as ‘Zionists’, but the term isn’t used according to its normal meaning. When the people promoting this conspiracy talk about ‘Zionists’, they really mean the Jewish global banking conspiracy. They definitely don’t mean in its proper sense of supporters of the state of Israel. Hence the Nazis and anti-Semites in America refer to their government as ZOG, or Zionist Occupation Government.

George Soros has now entered the demonology of paranoid anti-Semites because he is an immensely wealthy Jewish financier, who funds a variety of groups promoting human rights, democracy and liberal society, as well as being on opponent of Brexit. Thus, he’s been bitterly attacked and vilified by Viktor Orban and his far-right Fidesz party, which now forms the Hungarian government. At the same time, the real Zionists and Netanyahu’s government in Israel despise him because Soros is an anti-Zionist. He’s despised the Zionist movement because of the way they made deals, under the leadership of Kasztner, with the Nazis to allow the deportation of many Jewish Hungarians on the condition that a certain number should be allowed to emigrate to Israel.

Tony Greenstein has today put up a piece about how George Soros thus provides a unifying connection between modern Nazis and anti-Semites, and Netanyahu and the Israel lobby. He also reproduces with his own article a couple of pieces from other journalists, which support his point. One is by Dove Kent of Jewish Currents, and Adele M. Stan of the American Prospect. These articles are also worth reading, as they show very clearly how Trump is using dog-whistle anti-Semitic codewords to weaken the Left. The women protesting against Judge Kavanaugh, who has been accused of sexual assault but is nevertheless trying to become a member of the Supreme Court, are accused of being funded by Soros. As is the Black Lives Matter movement and Trans Rights campaigners. Anti-Semitic tropes were also used to attack the Left during McCarthyism, and were particularly effective because Jews were over-represented in Communist and Left-wing groups. Greenstein in his piece also describes how Netanyahu and the Israeli lobby have also deployed anti-Semitic stereotypes and rhetoric to demonise Soros.

Greenstein also describes how right-wing broadcaster and polemicist, Glenn Beck has also attacked Soros using the rhetoric and ideology of anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. He described Soros as a ‘puppetmaster’, a Jewish financier with no ties to any country – which conforms to the anti-Semitic stereotype of Jews as ‘rootless cosmopolitan’ in Nazi ideology – who wanted to create a ‘one world government’. He also claimed that Soros came from an anti-Semitic family, and participated in the Holocaust against the Jews when he was 14. Beck isn’t a peripheral figure. He’s been a fixture of the American right-wing broadcasting scene for decades. But he is bonkers. Many of his broadcasts and talks are simply rants in which he predicts that America will suffer some kind of totalitarian Nazi-Communist-Socialist-Atheist dictatorship, and that ‘They’ will come for him. And his performance, already bizarre, often ends with him in tears. The online humour magazine, Cracked, a few years ago, covered one of his talks in California, which hilariously described how nonsensical and mad it all was. Apparently it feature someone in pseudo-Nazi costume representing tyranny, while a woman dressed as the Statue of Liberty represented freedom. Oh yes, and I think there was someone who was supposed to represent anarchy as well.

See: http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2018/11/george-soros-unifying-figure-for-trump.html

This is the paranoid, anti-Semitic worldview that is deliberately evoked by the attacks on Soros, although I don’t doubt that many of those, who are taken in by it probably aren’t anti-Semites and don’t realise the very definite anti-Semitic background behind it.

As for Raheem Kassam, if I recall correctly he’s another member of Breitbart, who also promotes Islamophobia. I also seem to remember that a few years ago he was also connected to UKIP and perhaps some other extreme right-wing parties in Britain.

Which also shows what a number of anti-racist campaigners have pointed out: the racism may start out by attacking other groups, like Muslims and Blacks, but ultimately it returns to the Jews.

The Racism of the Tory Party and its Supporters

Yesterday Mike put up a piece commenting on the sheer amount of racism in the Tory party. Evolve Politics had published a piece about the 18 Conservative councillors and council candidates that have been suspended just that month for alleged racism. They gave the name of the councillors and candidates, the towns and areas in which they were standing, and the reasons for their suspension. And it’s a long, ugly list. Most of them were suspended for alleged islamophobia, though there was also accusations of anti-Semitism, general racism, sexism, misogyny, homophobia and abuse of transsexuals. One candidate, Darren Harrison of Watford, had been suspended for allegedly having links to Neo-Nazis and the EDL. The Tory Mayor of Wokingham was also suspended for alleged links to the EDL. Two other Tories were suspended for supposedly abusing and assaulting their fellow activists. Another had allegedly been falsely claiming to have served in the army. And Geoff Driver of Sunderland was suspended on charges of corruption and witness intimidation.

Evolve Politics also reported that the largest Islamic organisation in the UK has called for an inquiry, but this has been ignored, as the media ignored the racism in the Tory party.

See: https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2018/05/11/have-we-already-forgotten-the-huge-number-of-tories-who-were-suspended-amid-allegations-of-racism-and-abuse/

A few days earlier, Mike also posted a very relevant piece from the Turning the Tide blog. The blogger there had been a member of a number of Corbyn-supporting groups on Facebook. He had never once encountered a threatening, racist or anti-Semitic remark on them. But the media are fixated on attacking Corbyn with supposed left-wing racism. This is not questioned, because it is shared by so many of the mainstream media. They have also turned a blind eye to the much more prevalent racism in the Tory party. The blogger therefore compiled a selection of on-line hate, garnered from Twitter and Conservative-affiliated webpages. The blogger then gave an example from the Guido Fawkes site. This contained some very nasty comments about Muslims.

Mike then reminded his readers that the Guido Fawkes site has been the source for many of the anti-Semitism stories used by the Blairites and the right-wing media.

He concludes this article with the words

And nothing from the MSM on this issue, even though it is right in front of them.

Are our news reporters now so poor at their jobs that they can’t do even the slightest investigation? Or is their political bias now so great that they refuse to discuss anything that could harm Conservative political chances, no matter who is harmed as a result?

Let’s have an answer, mainstream journalists. You are avoiding this story because of either ignorance or incompetence.

Which is it?

https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2018/05/08/blogger-looks-for-right-wing-hate-online-and-finds-it-easily-wheres-the-media-outrage/

We shouldn’t be surprised at this racism and bias in the Tory party. This is the party, after all, which ran posters advising people to vote Labour if they wanted a Coloured neighbour in the 1960s. I also remember the scandals in the 1980s when the Union of Conservative Students adopted racial nationalism – the official ideology of the National Front and BNP – as its own. As for Guido Fawkes, he was a member of Freedom Association, a Libertarian organisation, when it was inviting the leaders of South American death squads to its annual dinners as guests of honour.

So it’s no surprise that the media are keen for the racism in Tory ranks to remain unreported. There have been academic studies of the role and power of the media, that show how important the media is for shaping which issues or considered suitable for discussion and debate. Those issues that aren’t reported, or which they sneer at, generally are held to be outside the circle of proper debate. And this is another case of the mainstream media trying to do this by not reporting the Tories’ racism.

.