Margaret Hodge stands by her accusation of antisemitism against Jeremy Corybn in a BBC interview. Image: BBC News.

A prominent supporter of UK Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn has blasted one of Corbyn’s most prominent Jewish critics for allegedly exploiting her family’s experience during the Holocaust and aiding a party whose “roots were in classical nazism.”

Corbyn has been dogged by accusations of ignoring and enabling antisemitism in his party for years. After the party refused to adopt the government’s official definition of antisemitism for fear it would implicate many of its members and activists, Jewish MP Dame Margaret Hodge confronted Corbyn, calling him “an antisemite and a racist.”

In response, pro-Corbyn activist David Rosenberg went on a tirade in the far-left publication Morning Star, saying Hodge “has cynically drawn on her family’s direct experience of the Holocaust to bolster her special right to pronounce on the subject.”

He went on to claim that Hodge had aided the far-right BNP party in an election in her constituency. He referred to a warning issued by Hodge that many “white working-class people were thinking of voting BNP.” Rosenberg called this “manna from heaven” for the right-wing group. He also cited a statement by Hodge asserting that British citizens should take priority over refugees in receiving certain services.

Rosenberg appeared to believe that Hodge somehow intended to aid the BNP, writing, “It is just a tad embarrassing and tasteless even that a politician who wields her family’s Holocaust history as a weapon to give her licence to say what she likes in arguments with fellow Labour MPs was being criticised then by leading refugee bodies for bolstering the racism of a party whose roots were in classical nazism.”

Having accused Hodge of aiding and abetting Nazism, Rosenberg then dismissed Jewish concerns about antisemitism in the Labour party, saying Hodge “sees Corbyn as a more suitable target because this is not really about anti-semitism but is a battle to defeat the left of the Labour Party and defend Israel from criticism.”

Another prominent critic of Corbyn, Jewish Labour MP Luciana Berger, has also taken a stand against antisemitism in the party, citing a Facebook post by a certain Peter Arif saying, “When JC wins next GE if Jewish people aren’t happy they will be welcome to leave the UK.”

The Daily Mail reported that Berger said the post would keep her up at night. Corbyn supporters claimed it was a fake.

Arif also issued another post saying, “Why people here are scared of Jews? They might have more money but certainly not above the Law. They CAN NOT swear at our Leader, and get away with it!” referring to accusations that Hodge used an obscenity when criticizing Corbyn. Hodge has denied that she did so.

Another post by Arif said, “To all the Jews, your mask slipped long ago. Your hatred of Muslims is not rational.”

Berger attacked such sentiments directly, saying, “It is anti-Semitism of the worst kind; suggesting that I’m a traitor to our country, they have called me ‘Judas’, a ‘Zio-Nazi’, an ‘absolute parasite’, telling me to ‘get out of this country and to go back to Israel.”

Labour MP Ruth Smeeth, another high-profile Corbyn critic, was also subjected to antisemitic abuse, with online messages saying, “The first job for Jeremy Corbyn tomorrow: expel the Zionist b**** Ruth Smeeth from the party” and “Hang yourself you vile treacherous Zionist Tory filth, you’re a cancer of humanity.”