We are Jews who do not live in the UK and have no direct experience with the Labour Party, but we can read and we are alarmed that some are trying to use false charges of anti-Semitism as a way to stop criticism of Israel, its treatment of Palestinians and its brutal violence against Palestinians and others.
We see nothing in the Labour Manifesto that threatens Jews
We have heard of no campaigns that Labour has taken or is considering that would be a threat to Jews
Labour has a whole section in its Manifesto about its plans to fight racism and religious discrimination
It has a procedure for taking complaints about racism and anti-Semitism and it investigates accusations and has expelled people from membership for anti-Semitism allegations.
A celebrated attack on Corbyn by Chief Rabbi Mirvis was devoid of facts and instead complained of the Labour Party “culture”. Its one detailed charge, that there are 130 outstanding complaints of anti-Semitism against Labour Party members comes from a Labour Party group affiliated with the World Zionist Organization, hardly an objective news source.
A detailed examination of all the anti-Semitism accusations against Labour done by a group of UK Jews supporting Labour found the charges were “smoke without fire”.
As for what Jeremy Corbyn has done (as opposed to words taken out of context) his record is sterling, going back to the time he organized the defense of Jewish-populated Wood Green from a National Front rally.
John Bercow, the Jewish former Conservative MP and Speaker of the House of Commons, testifies that, having known Corbyn over two decades, he has ‘never detected a whiff of antisemitism’ about him.
This is a political fight, not a matter of a racist attack on religion or ethnicity.
Right-wing Jews who hate Corbyn for his support for Palestinian rights and Right-wing non-Jews who hate Corbyn for his proposed social reforms are united in spreading the “Labour anti-Semitism” slander.
If false charges of anti-Semitism are used by the Right in successfully destroying a candidacy in the UK, they’ll do it again and again worldwide.
We feel obligated to make this known.
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If you’d like to sign on to this statement send your full name and line of identification to: Stanley.Heller@att.net by 10 p.m. this Friday 12/6
We’ll have a disclaimer that organizations mentioned are only for identification purposes
This letter created by a number of individuals not for any organization.
Marcia Almey
Shelly Altman
Chair of Jewish Voice for Peace New Haven
Jan Bauman
San Rafael, California
Medea Benjamin
CODEPINK Co-founder
Edgar Blaustein
Economist
France
Elizabeth Block
Toronto, Canada
Member of Independent Jewish Voices
Prof. Daniel Boyarin
Taubman Professor of Talmudic Cultue, UC Berkeley
Mark Cramer
Clichy, France
author of Old Man on a Green Bike: Chronicles of a Self-Serving Environmentalist
James Cohen
Institute of the English-Speaking World, University of Paris 3 (Sorbonne Nouvelle)
Molly Crabapple
artist, author
Samuel Farber
author, professor Brooklyn college (emeritus)
Dorothy Field
Independent Jewish Voices
David Finkel,
managing editor, Against the Current magazine (USA)
Arie Finkelstein
Paris
Jesse Franzblau
Jewish American
Immigrant Rights Activists
Joseph Gerson (PhD)
President, Campaign for Peace, Disarmament and Common Security
Z. Havkin
Gyvatayim, Israel
Stanley Heller
TV news magazine host, author
for the'Jewish Socialist Bund'
abraham Weizfeld PhD
Montréal, Nablus
Leonard J Lapon
Retired High School Teacher
Leslie Lomas
Boulder, CO, USA
Savvas( Sabetai) Michael-Matsas
writer and secretary of the Workers Revolutionary Party (EEK) of Greece
Alan Myerson
Film and Television Director
Laura Myerson
Jewish Voice for Peace
Michael Myerson
Cortlandt Manor, NY
Rob Prince - University of Denver Korbel School of International Studies - Retired
Robert Reuel Naiman,
co-founder, Just Foreign Policy
Eleanor Roffman, Ed.D.
Professor Emerita
Lesley University
Martha Roth
Indpendent Jewish Voices-Canada
Erik Sperling
Executive Director
JUST FOREIGN POLICY
Julie WORNAN
42 rue Voltaire
92800 Puteaux
FRANCE