Eretz Israel is our unforgettable historic homeland...The Jews who will it shall achieve their State...And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind. (Theodor Herzl, DerJudenstaat, 1896)

We offer peace and amity to all the neighbouring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all. The State of Israel is ready to contribute its full share to the peaceful progress and development of the Middle East.
(From Proclamation of the State of Israel, 5 Iyar 5708; 14 May 1948)

With a liberal democratic political system operating under the rule of law, a flourishing market economy producing technological innovation to the benefit of the wider world, and a population as educated and cultured as anywhere in Europe or North America, Israel is a normal Western country with a right to be treated as such in the community of nations.... For the global jihad, Israel may be the first objective. But it will not be the last. (Friends of Israel Initiative)

Saturday 8 February 2020

Like Hain the Pain, Corbyn Wanted to Abolish the State of Israel

Poale Zion, since 2004 known as the Jewish Labour Movement, affiliated to the British Labour Party (founded 1900) in February 1920.

Until the Left's increasing anti-Israel stance following the June 1967 War, it represented the  reflected the consensual pro-Zionist view within the British Labour Party.

In April 1983, amid a burgeoning sentiment on the party's Left that the party should sever its connection with Poale Zion, female members of Poale Zion were prevented from attending an International Women's Day seminar at the Greater London Council (GLC)'s County Hall. (Ken Livingstone was, of course, at that time leader of the GLC)

Then, in May 1985, a band of leftist Israel-haters in the party, who had been pressing for Poale Zion to be disaffiliated from the party, submitted a formal motion to that end.

Among the sponsors of that putrid proposal was Islington MP Jeremy Corbyn and several Islington (as well as Brent) councillors, the Bennite activist Tariq Ali and the gay activist Peter Tatchell as well as a number of rabid class warriors on the benches of the House of Commons, and MEP Richard Balfe, now retired and a life peer, who joined the Conservative Party in 2002.

The first name on the list of sponsors was Tony Banks, an MP who became a life peer twenty years later but did not long live to enjoy it.

Then came, in this order:
Ron Brown MP
Harry Cohen MP
Jeremy Corbyn MP
Stuart Holland MP
Joan Maynard MP
Bob Clay MP
Dafydd Elis Thomas MP (Plaid Cymru; now a life peer)

The resolutions passed with ease.

Here's a screenshot, taken from the Twitter page of British international relations academic Dr James Vaughan (#Equus on the Buses).



But as Dr Vaughan has also reminded us, J.L. (Larry) Whitty, also a future life peer, who was general secretary of the Labour Party, assured Reginald Freeson MP, who was a co-chair of Poale Zion (and a moderate leftist who opposed the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon): 
"On the 'totally unconstitutional ' nature of moves in some CLPs [Constituency Labour Parties] to disaffiliate Poale Zion. you can also rest assured of my own personal concern that legitimate critiques of the policies ofthe Israeli government and their supporters should not be translated into racist and anti-semitic attacks in this country or elsewhere within a socialist and internationalist Party."
Note, especially, the resolution supporting
"the Palestinian people in their struggle for a democratic, secular state in the whole of Palestine"
For the record: there is, then, no doubt what the man who, but for Boris Johnson, may at the 2019 General Election have become Britain's prime minister, harboured in his heart for the little Jewish State.

No less than former Young Liberal firebrand, Peter (now Lord) Hain, who not so long ago also entertained hopes of leading the Labour Party and the British nation, he sought its eradication.

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