View source for Document:Keir Starmer's ‘antisemitism’ sacking is a signal that Israel is safe in his hands

{{Document
|title=Keir Starmer's ‘antisemitism’ sacking is a signal that Israel is safe in his hands
|publication_date=29 June 2020
|type=Article
|source_name=Middle East Eye
|source_URL=https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-labour-partys-antisemitism-sacking-meant-protect-israel-not-jews-starmer
|authors=Jonathan Cook
|image=Annexation.jpg
|image_width=300px
|image_caption=Pinching [[Palestine]] Property
|subjects=Keir Starmer, Rebecca Long-Bailey, Maxine Peake, West Bank, Israeli-Palestinian conflict
|description=Crackdown by [[Keir Starmer|UK Labour leader]] on [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|left-wing rival]] will subdue critics of [[Israel]] in [[Labour Party|his party]] ahead of [[Israeli-Palestinian conflict|Israel's annexation move]]
}}
The sacking of [[Rebecca Long-Bailey]] from the UK shadow cabinet – on the grounds that she retweeted an article containing a supposedly "[[antisemitic]]" conspiracy theory<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-labour-rebecca-long-bailey-fired-antisemitism-allegations "Labour leader Starmer accuses Long-Bailey of antisemitism over shared article"]''</ref> – managed to kill three birds with one stone for new [[Leader of the Labour Party|Labour leader]] [[Keir Starmer]].<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/labour-keir-starmer-chance-become-uk-prime-minister "Keir Starmer has every chance to become a future British prime minister"]''</ref> 

First, it offered a pretext for him to rid himself of the last of the Labour heavyweights associated with the party’s left and its former leader, [[Jeremy Corbyn]].<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/topics/jeremy-corbyn "The killing of Jeremy Corbyn"]''</ref> [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] was runner-up to [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] in the [[2020 Labour Party leadership contest|leadership elections earlier in the year]] and he had little choice but to include her on his front bench.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/labours-next-leader-has-already-betrayed-left "Labour's next leader has already betrayed the left"]''</ref>

[[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] will doubtless sigh with relief if the outpouring of threats on social media from left-wing members to quit over [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]]’s sacking actually materialises.<ref>''[https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/jun/26/keir-starmer-faces-backlash-from-leftwing-mps-over-rebecca-long-bailey-sacking "Starmer faces backlash from leftwing MPs over Long-Bailey sacking"]''</ref> 

Second, the move served as a signal from [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] that he is a safe pair of hands for the party’s right, which worked so hard to destroy [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] from within, as a recently leaked internal review revealed in excruciating detail.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/how-top-labour-officials-plotted-bring-down-corbyn "How top Labour officials plotted to bring down Jeremy Corbyn"]''</ref> Despite the report showing that the Labour right sabotaged the [[UK/2017 General Election]] campaign to prevent [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] from becoming prime minister, [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] appears to have buried its contents – as have the British media.<ref>''[https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2020/04/why-keir-starmers-response-leaked-party-report-anti-semitism-right-one "Why Keir Starmer's response to the leaked report is the right one"]''</ref>

He is keen to demonstrate that he will now steer Labour back to being a reliable party of government for the [[neoliberal]] [[establishment]]. He intends to demonstrate that he is the [[Labour Party]]’s [[Joe Biden]], not its [[Bernie Sanders]]. [[Starmerism]] is likely to look a lot like [[Blairism]].<ref>''[https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/06/labour-party-uk-keir-starmer-rebecca-long-bailey "Labour Leader Keir Starmer Sabotaged Rebecca Long-Bailey to Undermine the Left"]''</ref>

And third, [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]]’s sacking provided the perfect opportunity for [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] to publicly light a peace pipe with the [[Israel lobby]] after its long battle to tar [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]], his predecessor, as an [[antisemite]]. 

The offending article shared by [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] referred to [[Israel]]’s documented and controversial role in training and helping to militarise [[US]] police forces.<ref>''[https://www.amnestyusa.org/with-whom-are-many-u-s-police-departments-training-with-a-chronic-human-rights-violator-israel/ "WITH WHOM ARE MANY U.S. POLICE DEPARTMENTS TRAINING? WITH A CHRONIC HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATOR – ISRAEL"]''</ref> It did not mention [[Jews]]. By straining the meaning of [[antisemitism]] well past its breaking point, [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] showed that his promised "zero tolerance" for [[antisemitism]] actually means zero tolerance of anyone in [[Labour Party|Labour]] who might antagonise the [[Israel lobby]] – and by extension, of course, the [[Israeli]] government.<ref>''[https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/keir-starme-labour-antisemitism-a4408826.html "Keir Starmer: How I’ll rid Labour of anti-Semitism"]''</ref> 

By contrast, back in February [[Rachel Reeves]], an MP on the party’s right, celebrated [[Nancy Astor]],<ref>''[https://twitter.com/RachelReevesMP/status/1231886779982151680 "One hundred years ago, the first speech by a woman in the House of Commons was given by Nancy Astor"]''</ref> the first woman to sit in the UK parliament and a well-known [[Jew]] hater who supported the appeasement of [[Hitler]].<ref>''[https://www.counterfire.org/articles/opinion/20735-the-problem-with-nancy-astor "The problem with Nancy Astor"]''</ref> None of that appeared to bother the [[Israel lobby]], nor did it dissuade [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] from welcoming [[Rachel Reeves|Reeves]] into his shadow cabinet weeks later.<ref>''[https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/politics/leeds-mp-rachel-reeves-back-shadow-cabinet-sir-keir-starmer-picks-team-2529969 "Leeds MP Rachel Reeves back in shadow cabinet as Sir Keir Starmer picks team"]''</ref> 

==Feeble handwringing==
Doubtless, the move against [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] felt particularly pressing given that this week the door will open to the [[Israeli]] government of [[Benjamin Netanyahu]] annexing swaths of [[Palestinian]] territory in the [[West Bank]] in violation of international law, as sanctioned by [[Donald Trump]]’s “peace" plan.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/topics/done-deal "Done deal: How the peace process sold out the Palestinians"]''</ref>

[[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] joined more than 140 other MPs last month in sending a letter to the [[Boris Johnson|British prime minister]] urging “severe consequences including sanctions” on [[Israel]] should it carry out annexation.<ref>''[https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1260299764035465224 "I’ve joined 145 UK MPs and peers in demanding action over the Israeli government’s illegal plan to annexe large areas of occupied Palestinian territory"]''</ref> 

[[Keir Starmer|Starmer]], by contrast, has voiced only “concerns”. Sidelining the gross violation of international law annexation constitutes, or the effects on [[Palestinians]], he has weakly opined: “I don’t agree with annexation and I don’t think it’s good for security in the region."<ref>''[https://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/keir-starmer-opposes-annexation-but-refuses-to-be-drawn-on-sanctions/ "Keir Starmer opposes annexation, but refuses to be drawn on sanctions"]''</ref>

It looks like [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] has no intention of doing anything more than feeble handwringing – especially when he knows that the [[Israel lobby]], including advocacy groups inside his own party like the [[Jewish Labour Movement]], would move swiftly against him, as they did against [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]], should he do otherwise.

Sacking [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] has offered the [[Israel lobby]] a sacrificial victim. But it has also removed a potential loose cannon from his front bench on [[Israel]] and annexation-related matters. It has sent an exceptionally clear warning to other shadow cabinet ministers to watch and closely follow his lead. He has made it evident that no one will be allowed to step out of line.

==A smooth ride== 
All three audiences – [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]]’s own MPs and party officials, the billionaire-owned media, and the [[Israel lobby]] that claims to represent [[Britain]]’s [[Jewish]] community – can now be relied on to give him a smooth ride.

His only remaining challenge will be to keep the membership in check.

[[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] understands only too well the common policy priorities of the various audiences he is seeking to placate. In fact, the article [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] retweeted – and which led to her ousting – was highlighting the very interconnectedness of the problems these establishment groups hope to ringfence from examination.

The article published in the ''[[Independent]]'' was an interview with [[Maxine Peake]], a left-wing actor and [[Palestinian]] solidarity activist. As [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] shared the article, she called [[Maxine Peake|Peake]], one of her constituents, "an absolute diamond".<ref>''[https://twitter.com/RLong_Bailey/status/1276078311215677440 "Maxine Peake is an absolute diamond"]''</ref>

[[Maxine Peake|Peake]] had used the interview to warn: "We’re being ruled by capitalist, fascist dictators.” [[Establishment]] structures to protect [[capitalism]], "keeping poor people in their place”, were so entrenched, she wondered how we might ever "dig out" of them. 

Those who rejected [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] in the [[UK/2019 General Election]] because he was seen as too left-wing, she observed, had no place complaining now about an incompetent Conservative government there to serve the [[establishment]] rather than the public.

Her brief, offending comment about [[Israel]] – the one that has been widely mischaracterised as [[antisemitic]] – was immediately prefaced by [[Maxine Peake|Peake]]’s concern that [[racism]] and [[police brutality]] had become globalised industries, with states learning repressive techniques from each other.

She told the interviewer: “Systemic racism is a global issue. The tactics used by the police in [[America]], kneeling on [[George Floyd]]’s neck, that was learnt from seminars with [[Israeli]] secret services.”

==The Palestinian lab==
[[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] and the [[Israel lobby]] both wish to deflect attention away from the wider point [[Maxine Peake|Peake]] was making. She was referring to [[Israel]]’s well-known role in helping to train and militarise other countries’ police forces with so-called “counter-terrorism measures”. [[Israel]] has been doing so since the early 1990s.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-us-police-training-end-knee-neck-protests "US police departments under pressure to end training programmes with Israel"]''</ref>

As [[Israeli]] journalists and scholars have noted, [[Israel]] has effectively turned the occupied [[Palestinian]] territories into laboratories in which it can refine oppressive systems of control that other states desire for use against sections of their own populations.<ref>''[https://www.gumfilms.com/projects/lab "The Lab by Yotam Feldman"]''</ref> 
[[File:Israel_-_neck_kneeling.jpg|300px|right|thumb|Following [[George Floyd]]'s killing, pictures of neck kneeling by the [[IDF|Israeli army]] on [[Palestinians]] began to appear across [[social media]]<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-labour-partys-antisemitism-sacking-meant-protect-israel-not-jews-starmer "Keir Starmer's ‘antisemitism’ sacking is a signal that Israel is safe in his hands"]''</ref>]]
But [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] and the lobby chose to hoist [[Rebecca Long-Bailey]] – via [[Maxine Peake|Peake]]’s interview – onto the hook of a single unprovable assertion: that [[Israel]] specifically taught Minneapolis police the knee on the neck chokehold that one of their police officers, [[Derek Chauvin]], used for nine minutes on [[George Floyd]] last month, leading to his death.

[[Maxine Peake|Peake]] was right that [[Israeli]] security services regularly use that type of chokehold on [[Palestinians]], and also that [[Israeli]] experts had held a training session with Minneapolis police in 2012.<ref>''[https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/minnesota-cops-trained-israeli-forces-restraint-techniques "Minnesota cops 'trained by Israeli forces in restraint techniques'"]''</ref>

The specific claim that this particular chokehold was taught on that occasion, however, may be wrong – and we are unlikely ever to know, given the lack of transparency regarding [[Israel]]’s influence on other police forces’ strategies and methods.

Such opaqueness and a lack of accountability in police practices is the norm in [[Israel]], where the security services treat [[Palestinians]] as an enemy – both in the [[occupied territories]] and inside [[Israel]], where there is a large minority with degraded [[Israeli]] citizenship.<ref>''[https://www.seedsofpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Or-Commission-Report-Summation-English.pdf "THE OFFICIAL SUMMATION OF THE OR COMMISSION REPORT"]''</ref> [[US]] police forces, on the other hand, profess, often unconvincingly, to be driven by a "protect and serve" ethos. 

==‘Global pacification’==
In taking action against [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]], [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]], a former lawyer known for his forensic skills, made a telling, false allegation. He told the [[BBC]] that the [[Maxine Peake|Peake]] interview had indulged in [[antisemitic]] “conspiracy theories” – in the plural.<ref>''[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-53183085 "Labour’s Rebecca Long-Bailey sacked in anti-Semitism row"]''</ref> But only one [[Israel]]-related claim, about the knee on the neck chokehold, was made or cited.

Further, [[Maxine Peake|Peake]]’s claim, whether correct or not, is patently not [[antisemitic]]. [[Israel]] is neither a [[Jew]] nor the representative of the [[Jewish]] people collectively – except in the imaginations of [[antisemite]]s and the hardcore [[Zionist]]s who people the [[Israel lobby]]. 

More significantly still, in condemning [[Maxine Peake|Peake]], [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] wilfully ignored the wood as he pointed out a single tree. 

[[Israeli]] scholar [[Jeff Halper]], a veteran peace activist, has documented in great detail in his book [https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745334301/war-against-the-people/ "War Against the People"] how [[Israel]] has intentionally positioned itself at the heart of a growing “global pacification industry”. The thousands of training sessions held by [[Israeli]] police in the [[US]] and around the world are based on their “expertise” in repressive, militarised policing. 

Tiny [[Israel]] has influence in this field way out of proportion to its size, in the same way that it is one of the top 10 states – all far larger – that profit from the arms trade and cyber warfare. Every year since 2007, the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Global_Militarization_Index Global Militarisation Index] has crowned [[Israel]] the most militarised nation on the planet. 

A senior analyst at the liberal [[Israeli]] ''[[Haaretz]]'' newspaper has described [[Israel]] as [https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/.premium-welcome-to-the-country-known-as-israeli-securityland-1.5381652 “securityland” –] the go-to state for others to improve their techniques for surveilling, controlling and oppressing restive populations within their territory. It is this expertise in “securocratic warfare” that, according to [[Jeff Halper|Halper]], has allowed tiny [[Israel]] to hit way above its weight in international politics and earned it a place “at the table with [[NATO]] countries”. 

==Western bad faith==
It is on this last point that the [https://twitter.com/labourleft Labour left,] including many of the party’s half a million members, and the Labour right decisively part company. A gulf in worldviews opens up.

Along with the climate emergency, Israel symbolises for the Labour left some of the most visible hypocrisies and excesses of a [[neoliberal]] global agenda that treats the planet with slash-and-burn indifference, views international law with contempt, and regards populations as little more than pawns on an updated colonial chessboard. 

[[Israel]]’s recent history of dispossessing the [[Palestinians]], its unabashed promotion of Jim Crow-style ethnic privileges for [[Jews]]<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/george-floyd-us-america-republic-white-supremacy "The American republic of white supremacy"]''</ref> in the form of the nation-state law, its continuing utter disregard for the rights of [[Palestinians]], its hyper-militarised culture, its decades-long occupation, its refusal to make peace with its neighbours, its deep integration into the West’s war industries, its influence on the ideologies of the “war on terror” and a worldwide “clash of civilisations”, and its disdain for international humanitarian law are all anathema to the left.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israeli-curriculum-palestinians-nation-state-law "Reading, writing and racism: 'Nation-state' law now official Israeli curriculum"]''</ref> 

Worse still, Israel has been doing all of this in full view of the international community for decades. Nonetheless, its crimes are richly subsidised by the United States and Europe, as well as obscured by a sympathetic western media that is financially and ideologically embedded in the neoliberal establishment.

For the [https://twitter.com/labourleft Labour left –] for [[Maxine Peake|Peake]], [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]] and [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] – [[Israel]] is such an obvious example of western bad faith, such a glaring Achilles’ heel in the deceptions spread on behalf of the [[neoliberal]] order, that it presents an opportunity. Criticism of [[Israel]] can serve to awaken others, helping them to understand how a bogus western “civilisation” is destroying the planet through economic pillage, wars and environmental destruction.

It offers an entry into the left’s structural, more abstract critiques of capitalism and western colonialism that it is otherwise difficult to convey in soundbites to a uniformly hostile media.

==Antisemitism redefined==
The problem is that the stakes regarding [[Israel]] are understood by the Labour right in much the same way. Their commitment to a global [[neoliberal]] order – one they characterise in terms of a superior western civilisation – stands starkly exposed in the case of [[Israel]].

If the idea of [[Israel]] is made vulnerable to challenge, so might their other self-delusions and deceptions about western superiority. 

For each side, [[Israel]] has become a battleground on which the truthfulness of their worldview is tested. 

The Labour right has no desire to engage with the left’s arguments, particularly at a time when the climate emergency and the rise of populism make their political claims sound increasingly hollow. Rather than debate the merits of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_socialism democratic socialism,] the Labour right has preferred to simply tar the [https://twitter.com/labourleft Labour left] as [[antisemites]].  

With [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]]’s unexpected rise to lead Labour in 2015, that crisis for the Labour right became existential. The backlash was swift and systematic.

The party’s right-wing scrapped the accepted definition of [[antisemitism]] and imposed a new one on Labour, formulated by the [[International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance]] (IHRA), to ensnare the left.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israels-hand-behind-attacks-jeremy-corbyn "Is Israel's hand behind the attacks on Jeremy Corbyn?"]''</ref> It focused on criticism of [[Israel]] rather than hatred or fear of [[Jews]]. 

The [[Jewish Labour Movement]], a pro-[[Israel]] group, was revived in late 2015 to undermine [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]] from within the party.<ref>''[https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/jewish-labour-movement-was-refounded-fight-corbyn "Jewish Labour Movement was refounded to fight Corbyn"]''</ref> It was all but sanctified, even as it refused to campaign for Labour candidates<ref>''[https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/31/jewish-group-removes-campaigning-support-for-labour-in-election "Jewish group removes campaigning support for Labour in election"]''</ref> and referred the party to the [[Equality and Human Rights Commission]] for a highly politicised investigation.<ref>''[https://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/jlm-submits-bombshell-document-on-labour-hate-to-equality-watchdog-investigation-1.493993 "JLM submits bombshell dossier on Labour hate to investigation by Equality watchdog"]''</ref>

The Labour right openly conflated not only the left’s anti-[[Zionism]] with [[antisemitism]] but even their socialist critiques of [[capitalism]]. It was argued that any references to bankers or a global financial elite were code words for “[[Jews]]”.<ref>''[https://labourlist.org/2019/03/siobhain-mcdonagh-links-anti-capitalism-to-antisemitism-in-labour/ "Siobhain McDonagh links anti-capitalism to antisemitism in Labour"]''</ref>

After this lengthy campaign helped to destroy [[Jeremy Corbyn|Corbyn]], the candidates to succeed him, including [[Rebecca Long-Bailey|Long-Bailey]], opted to declare themselves [[Zionist]]s<ref>''[https://www.timesofisrael.com/keir-starmer-elected-uk-labour-chief-apologizes-to-jews-for-party-anti-semitism/ "After Corbyn, UK Labour elects Keir Starmer, Zionist with Jewish wife, as leader"]''</ref> and to sign up to “10 Pledges” from the [[Board of Deputies]], the [[UK]]’s main [[Jewish]] leadership organisation.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-israel-lobby-new-ten-commandments "Labour contenders are wrong to have signed up to these antisemitism pledges"]''</ref> Those demands put the board and the [[Jewish Labour Movement]] in charge of determining what [[antisemitism]] was, despite their highly partisan politics on [[Israel]] and their opposition to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_socialism democratic socialism.] 

==Political charlatans==
The problem for the Labour right and [[Israel]]’s lobbyists, and therefore for [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] too, is that [[Israel]], egged on by [[Donald Trump|Trump]], is working overtime to blow up the carefully constructed claim – proposed by the [[IHRA]] definition of [[antisemitism]] – that [[Israel]] is just another normal western-style state and that therefore it should not be “singled out” for criticism.<ref>''[https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/how-ihras-anti-semitism-definition-threat-british-democracy "How the IHRA's anti-Semitism definition is a threat to British democracy"]''</ref>

[[Israel]] is on a collision course with the most fundamental precepts of international law by preparing to annex large areas of the [[West Bank]]. This is not a break with [[Israeli]] policy; it is the culmination of many decades of settlement activity and resource theft from [[Palestinians]]. 

This is a potential moment of crisis for those on the Labour right, who could quickly find themselves exposed as political charlatans – the charlatans they always have been – by [[Israel]]’s actions over the coming weeks and months.

[[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] has indicated he is determined to tightly delimit the room for criticism of Israel within Labour as the annexation issue unfolds. That will leave him and the party free to issue their own carefully crafted, official condemnations – similar to [[Boris Johnson|Johnson]]’s.

Like [[Boris Johnson|Johnson]], [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] will play his allotted role in this political game of charades – one long understood and tolerated by [[Israel]] and its [[UK]] [[lobbyist]]s. He will offer some sound and fury, the pretence of condemnation, but of the kind intended to signify nothing.

This has been at the heart of UK foreign policy towards a [[Jewish]] state built on the theft of [[Palestinian]] land for more than a century. [[Keir Starmer|Starmer]] has shown that he intends to return to business as usual as quickly as possible.

==References==
<references/>