Mick Hartley

From the JC.

A staff writer for The Canary website who previously shared antisemitic conspiracy theories on social media has been contributing to a news site that has been removed from Facebook and Twitter over claims it is a Russian-influenced network actively targeting the UK.

The Canary is a hard-left website that was one of Corbyn's main cheerleaders back in the day.

Steve Topple – who previously said that Jews should be held responsible for the “growing Zionist cancer” – has confirmed on his own social media profile page that he was working as a “columnist” for PeaceData.

A recent article by Mr Topple for PeaceData on Belarus and its exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya saw him brand her as “little more than a Western regime change puppet.”

But in a statement by Facebook on networks that the platform had removed in August, it was confirmed that PeaceData was among 13 accounts excised over links to the Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA).

It added that their “activity focused primarily on the US, UK, Algeria and Egypt.”

Facebook confirmed that it had decided to act after receiving a tip-off from the FBI about Peace Data’s “off-platform activity.”

They added their “internal investigation revealed the full scope of this network on Facebook.”

In a statement on September 1, Twitter also confirmed: “We suspended five Twitter accounts for platform manipulation that we can reliably attribute to Russian state actors. As standard, they will be included in updates to our database of information operations in the coming weeks to empower academic research.

“The accounts purported to be associated with a website called PeaceData, which publishes a range of content about global political issues. At least some of the content published on the website was created by real people who appear to have contributed to PeaceData as freelancers.”  […]

In recent articles for The Canary, Mr Topple has attempted to attack Sir Keir Starmer over the new Labour leader’s clampdown on antisemitism and left-wingers associated with Jeremy Corbyn.

He has also previously appeared on Russia Today UK and Al Jazeera and been heard on Sputnik International Radio and Talk Radio Europe.

Someone else who swims around in these murky waters is Pink Floyd man Roger Waters (previously, and again). Here he is on Al-Jazeera last week, in a MEMRI TV clip:

"The conspiracy… The plan to spread the antisemitic story about people like me and about the Labour Party, in England, abroad – it probably centered and came out of the Ministry of Strategic Affairs in Tel Aviv. This was completely orchestrated and very well done, and [it] succeeded totally in destroying Jeremy Corbyn's chances of becoming the next Prime Minister of the UK….

"Thank you for giving me this platform to say what I think, because I love to have a platform where I can say what I think, right or wrong, openly and honestly. And still, thank goodness, Al-Jazeera is one of the places I can do it. I can do it on Al-Jazeera, I can do it on RT [Russia Today]. I can't do it anywhere in the United States, because…"

No surprise that he enjoys speaking on Russia Today. He starts the interview by expressing his support for the Russian annexation of the Crimea from the "illegal government of the Ukraine". Clearly a Putin fan.