Mick Hartley

In the Daily Mail, an extract from Deborah Lipstadt's new book Antisemitism: Here and Now, in which she discusses the charge of antisemitism aimed at Jeremy Corbyn:

As horrific as the Holocaust was, it is in the past. Contemporary anti-Semitism is not. It is about the present. It is what many people are doing, saying and facing now. Today, anti-Semitism is 'back'.

Jeremy Corbyn's record in politics is deeply rooted in firmly held ideological beliefs. Fundamental to his political philosophy is an automatic — critics might call it knee-jerk — sympathy for anyone who is or appears to be oppressed or an underdog.

Those who fight with rocks are always preferred to those who use tanks. Coupled with that is a class and race-based view of the world.

Let's call it the Corbyn Syndrome — a syndrome in which Jews, for the most part white, privileged members of the elite, cannot possibly be considered victims. 

Indeed, anyone white, wealthy or associated with a group that seems to be privileged cannot be a victim. Whereas anyone who is, or claims to be, victimised by those who are white, wealthy and/or privileged deserves unequivocal support.

It is doubtful that Corbyn deliberately seeks out anti-Semites to associate with and to support. But it seems that when he encounters them, their Jew-hatred is irrelevant as long as their other positions — on class, race, capitalism, the role of the state, and Israel/Palestine — are to his liking.  […]

The difficulty he and his associates have in acknowledging anti-Semitism on the Left seems to be rooted in their foundational claim that because being a progressive means being opposed to any form of racism, oppression or group hate — including anti-Semitism — by definition, a true progressive cannot be an anti-Semite.

Their claim runs into trouble when they are confronted by progressive compatriots who include blanket statements about Jews in their excoriation of capitalists who oppress and exploit the poor, who imply that Jews exert undue influence on the media, who deny that Jews can be the victims of race-based hatred in the same way that people of colour are, and who include hate-filled Jewish stereotyping in their criticism of Israeli government policies regarding Palestine.

So, in answer to the question: Is Jeremy Corbyn an anti-Semite? My response would be that that's the wrong question.

The right questions to ask are: Has he facilitated and amplified expressions of anti-Semitism? Has he been consistently reluctant to acknowledge expressions of anti-Semitism unless they come from white supremacists and neo-Nazis? Will his actions facilitate the institutionalisation of anti-Semitism among other progressives?

Sadly, my answer to all of these is an unequivocal yes.