This Argument Over Anti-Semitism In The Labour Party Got VERY Heated
26 March 2018, 10:37 | Updated: 26 March 2018, 10:45
This journalist tore into a Labour campaigner for saying the story of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party is a campaign by Jewish organisations to influence the local elections.
Jeremy Corbyn was forced to apologise for his backing of an artist who had painted an anti-Semitic mural and admit that Labour does have a problem
Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi from the Free Speech on Israel campaign group said this story is just Jewish organisations trying to take down the Labour leader.
"Are you seriously expecting your listeners to believe this wave of hysteria implying that in the Labour Party there are significant numbers of people who hate Jews, who set out to distress Jews, who ferment incitement against Jews?
"That is not true. It's a lie. It's always been a lie right from the beginning."
Nick suggested that it would imply a split in the party, as Yvette Cooper had criticised the leader, but Ms Wimborne-Idrissi insisted: "Yvette Cooper is one of Jeremy's leading enemies. She's been stabbing him in the back since the very beginning.
"This is not a coincidence. If anything is likely to ferment hostility and ill-feeling towards Jews, it's Jewish organisations playing politics blatantly in the run-up to very important local elections by playing into the hands of people who have been out to get Jeremy Corbyn."
But Jonathan Sacerdoti, a Jewish journalist hit back: "What a sorry state of affairs listening to that woman. Her allegation seems to be that Jews are getting together en masse to complain about racism against them, purely because of some local elections.
"The two leading Jewish organisations representing Jews in this country are doing this just because they don't much like Jeremy Corbyn.
"If Jews don't much like Jeremy Corbyn, it's because he's defended this grotesque caricature of Jews on a huge wall in London.
"Or because he defended Stephen Sizer, who linked Jews and Israel to 9/11.
"Or because he supported Paul Eisen's Deir Yassin group, when Eisen is a self-confessed Holocaust denier.
"Or because he calls Hamas and Hezbollah, both of them terrorist, genocidal organisations who want to kill Jews, his friends and invited them into parliament.
"Or because the blood-libelling Sheikh Raed Salah was invited to tea on the terrace in parliament by him.
"Or because he went to a wreath-laying ceremony for the grave of a Palestinian terrorist involved in the Munich massacres.
"Or because he was found to be in two Facebook groups pushing anti-Semitism.
"You can give someone the benefit of the doubt a couple of times. But if it quacks like a duck, if it looks like a duck, if it tastes like a duck when you roast it and serve it with apple sauce, the chances are it's a duck."
Things got even more heated after that. Watch the video at the top of the page.
