Judge Rinder: Rise of antisemitism is 'deeply frightening'

24 January 2021, 16:01 | Updated: 24 January 2021, 16:17

Judge Rinder: Rise of antisemitism 'deeply frightening'
Judge Rinder: Rise of antisemitism 'deeply frightening'. Picture: PA

By Seán Hickey

The TV judge tells LBC he feels a 'profound existential sadness' over the Labour party's management of antisemitism within the party.

"The encouraging of antisemitic tropes, of all the conspiracy theories that are of course writ large across the world and are so easy to find," said Robert Rinder, host of the hit TV show Judge Rinder.

He shared his concerns over the rise of antisemitism in the UK with Ruth Davidson, describing it as 'the underlying fuel that feeds the flame' of hatred.

The barrister suggested that the Labour party's management of anti-semitism fuelled such hatred, hinting that former leader Jeremy Corbyn is responsible in part for the rise.

"For a leader of a political party accidentally or otherwise to like one of those tropes was a moment of not just reflection, of deep, profound existential sadness."

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Mr Rinder went on to point out how the struggle of Holocaust survivors is severely undermined by antisemitic tropes, adding that people like his grandfather have had their experience tarnished.

"For someone to besmirch the love and compassion that this Jewish community - a tiny community - have for our nation, to make them not just afraid but to support the type of tropes that lead only in one frightening direction was not saddening as I say, it was deeply frightening."