Sir Keir Starmer's response to the latest Jeremy Corbyn statement, who many on the left saw as a genuine apology, has seen his allies calling for the former Labour leader to have the whip reinstated. For the benefit of readers, when the whip is removed the MP affected can continue to sit in the House of Commons, but only as an independent.
Senior trade union leaders have also hit out at the Labour leadership with the leader of the Communication Workers Union, Dave Ward, tweeting “The most shocking thing about Starmer’s refusal to reinstate the whip to Jeremy Corbyn is that it yet again deflects from the serious issues of the day. Millions face redundancy, hundreds are dying every day and the government gets away with it. But Starmer wants a civil war. Len McCluskey leader of one of the largest trade unions Unite also stood firmly behind Jeremy Corbyn with a stinging response to Starmer by tweeting “The continued persecution of Jeremy Corbyn, a politician who inspired millions, by a leadership capitulating to external pressure on Party procedures risks destroying the unity and integrity of the Party. I urge Keir Starmer in the strongest terms to pull back from the brink.”
MP’s traditionally close to Mr. Corbyn have also rallied around him with 32 signing a Socialist Campaign Group declaration calling for the Whip to be reinstated immediately. All forms of racism and Anti-Semitism must be challenged and in Mr Corbyn, there is not an MP in the House of Commons with a record more demonstrable than the Islington MP when it comes to challenging all forms of hate. Whilst there are issues of Anti-Semitism in the Labour Party, I believe Mr. Corbyn made genuine efforts to combat these. Under Corbyn’s leadership the Palestinian issue was made a genuine priority and had the party been successful in either of the two previous general election bids there would have been a swift and full recognition of Palestine and this was a point of great sensitivity for the Israeli lobby, which is, as we know, the most powerful and far-reaching lobby in the world.
When it comes to the media and Jeremy Corbyn, particularly on the issue of Anti-Semitism, it tends not to look beyond those prominent groups such as the Board of Deputies and this is not without merit. However, in order for the public to have a more balanced view on the matter, it is important to highlight that there are Jewish groups that offer huge support to Jeremy Corbyn – one such group within the Labour Party is ‘Jewish Voice for Labour’ which recently announced “We strongly urge the (Labour) Party to apologise to Jeremy Corbyn for the highhanded and public nature of his suspension and the consequent distress he has inevitably suffered as a result of media intrusion and the ongoing attacks that have continued following his reinstatement.” It is interesting that the likes of the BBC and other major media platforms have tended not to report on this, so we thought we would try to bring a little bit of balance to this debate.