General election: Chief rabbi's suggestion Corbyn is 'unfit for high office' is unprecedented
Antisemitism allegations have followed Jeremy Corbyn since running for Labour leadership in 2015, Tamara Cohen writes.
Tuesday 26 November 2019 12:40, UK
The word unprecedented can be devalued in politics, but today we have something that is: the chief rabbi making a stinging intervention, in the heat of an election campaign, to suggest the leader of the opposition is "unfit for high office".
Ephraim Mirvis, the spiritual leader of Britain's Orthodox Jews, doesn't mince his words in an article in The Times, saying "the soul of the nation is at stake" and a "new poison - sanctioned from the top - has taken root in the Labour Party".
Without going so far as to tell people how to vote, he urges "every person to vote with their conscience", having travelled around the UK and detected rising anxiety among Jewish people.
This issue, previously seen as more prevalent on the political right, has dogged Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party since he ran for the leadership in the autumn of 2015.
A history of associations with people who had expressed antisemitic views and even Holocaust denial, while he was a little-known backbencher, came under intense scrutiny.
As new cases have continued to emerge and the leadership's handling of them continues to attract controversy, Labour candidates concede it is hurting them on the doorstep.
Several candidates have told Sky News the issue is being brought up by voters more often than it was in 2017.
One candidate in a northern seat with only a handful of Jewish residents, who expected to be battling criticism of the party's Brexit position, said: "People are bringing up antisemitism. It has really cut through."
The past continues to haunt the Labour leader.
Ten years ago, he invited representatives of Hamas to parliament and called them his friends, for which he would later express regret.
He questioned the decision of Tower Hamlets council to whitewash an antisemitic mural in 2012, which years later he conceded was "deeply disturbing and antisemitic", and he was captured on video in 2013 saying Zionists "don't understand English irony" - which he said was misinterpreted.
After becoming leader, an inquiry he commissioned into antisemitism by Baroness Shami Chakrabarti, who was then given a peerage - was branded a whitewash, and controversy erupted at the launch of her report as the Labour leader greeted a left-wing activist who heckled a Jewish MP.
Since then, criticism has focused on the party's handling of accusations among its members, including high-profile allies of the leader such as former mayor of London Ken Livingstone, who later left the party.
Figures released by the party's general secretary Jennie Formby in February this year revealed 769 Labour members had been disciplined in just a 10-month period, but only 12 had been thrown out.
The departure of Jewish MPs Luciana Berger to the Lib Dems, and Louise Ellman, who said she could no longer advocate voting Labour, has deepened unease in the Jewish community.
One prominent critic of antisemitism and Mr Corbyn, Ian Austin, has even urged Labour voters to back Boris Johnson.
Mr Corbyn has been asked about antisemitism several times during this campaign, and insisted that he deplores it.
He told the audience at ITV's debate last week: "Antisemitism is an absolute evil and scourge within our society.
"Racism in any form is a scourge in our society. I have taken action in my party where anyone who has committed any antisemitic acts or made any antisemitic statements, they were either suspended or expelled from the party and investigated every single case. We do take this very, very seriously indeed."
That claim has been disputed by Jewish Labour activists who claim there are dozens of cases outstanding - and the chief rabbi referred to the leader's claim that every single case had been investigated as a "mendacious smear".
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Vocal supporters of the Labour leader, including some Jewish activists, defend Mr Corbyn, saying antisemitism in the party is being exaggerated - given the size of the membership - and used against him by political opponents.
They point to antisemitic candidates being ejected from other parties, which they have, and offensive remarks made by Mr Johnson.
But even some of his allies in the shadow cabinet concede that Labour should have acted faster, and that recent events - in particular a protracted row last summer over whether to adopt an international definition of antisemitism - caused avoidable damage.
Labour is being investigated by the Equality and Human Rights Commission over institutional antisemitism, with which it is cooperating, and a ruling is now expected after the election.
Tuesday's race and faith manifesto, to be launched in north London, is now highly likely to be overshadowed by questions about antisemitism.
With just over two weeks to go until polling day, this issue shows little sign of going away.
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