ADVERTISEMENT

U.K. Chief Rabbi Says Corbyn’s Labour Is Poisoned Against Jews

Mirvis wrote in the Times newspaper that British Jews are increasingly concerned about the prospect of a Labour government.

U.K. Chief Rabbi Says Corbyn’s Labour Is Poisoned Against Jews
Bloomberg Best of the Year 2019: Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the U.K. opposition Labour party, sits in car at the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) stand on day two of the annual Labour party conference in Brighton, U.K. (Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg)  

(Bloomberg) -- The U.K.’s chief rabbi has suggested Jeremy Corbyn is unfit to be prime minister in a coruscating attack on the Labour leader’s handling of antisemitism within his party, just two weeks before the general election.

Ephraim Mirvis said “a new poison -- sanctioned from the very top -- has taken root” in Britain’s main opposition party, which is campaigning to become the government in the Dec. 12 vote. “It can no longer claim to be the party of equality and anti-racism.”

It is a highly unusual intervention in an election campaign from such a senior faith leader, who would normally remain neutral in the sensitive period leading up to a vote. The timing could hardly be worse for Labour, which is due to publish its race and faith manifesto on Tuesday. The party rejected the chief rabbi’s criticism.

Under Corbyn, the party has been hit by a series of antisemitism scandals, and the leader himself has come under scrutiny for his history of sharing speaking platforms with supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah. The controversy has prompted a formal probe by the U.K.’s Equality and Human Rights Commission to determine if Labour has unlawfully discriminated against Jews. The watchdog has not yet reported its findings.

While Mirvis didn’t explicitly tell British citizens not to vote for Labour, he said: “I simply pose the question: What will the result of this election say about the moral compass of our country? When December 12 arrives, I ask every person to vote with their conscience. Be in no doubt, the very soul of our nation is at stake.”

Labour issued a statement saying Corbyn is a “lifelong campaigner against antisemitism and has made absolutely clear it has no place in our party and society.” But this isn’t the kind of headline the party needs as it lags in the polls going into the final two weeks of the election.

Luciana Berger, who quit Labour in February over the party’s alleged antisemitic prejudice, said on Twitter: “During the the last meeting I had with Jeremy Corbyn at the end of 2017 I told him about the many public and private Facebook groups that were littered with antisemitic posts which used the Labour leader’s name/and photo in their group name. Nothing was done about it following our meeting.”

U.K. Chief Rabbi Says Corbyn’s Labour Is Poisoned Against Jews

“It’s an unprecedented intervention in a general election,” Conservative Cabinet minister Michael Gove told Talk Radio on Tuesday. “Jeremy Corbyn has been warned about antisemitism at the heart of his party for years now and the chief rabbi has confirmed that Jeremy Corbyn just hasn’t taken the action required.”

Labour’s faith envoy Stephen Timms told Talk Radio “there has been a problem of antisemitism in the Labour Party, there’s no doubt about that and steps have been taken to deal with it.”

“There have been problems of antisemitism in the Tory Party as well, as well as a very big problem of Islamophobia which the Tory party has largely ignored,” said Timms, a Labour member of Parliament.

The most senior clergyman in the Church of England, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby said the country must take Mirvis’s words seriously.

To contact the reporters on this story: Kitty Donaldson in London at kdonaldson1@bloomberg.net;Alex Morales in London at amorales2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Stuart Biggs

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.