British Labour MP Tells Corbyn to Show Leadership Against Antisemitism by Backing Jewish Electoral Candidates
by Algemeiner Staff
A prominent British Labour Party parliamentarian has urged that his Jewish colleagues be guaranteed their candidacies in future elections, in order to show Labour’s determination to root out the antisemitism that has plagued the party since Jeremy Corbyn became its leader in 2015.
MP John Mann — who is not himself Jewish — told Sky News that guaranteeing Jewish MPs would stand again would “shut up some of the extremists.”
“What Jeremy Corbyn should be doing is leading… ‘We’ve had enough of this intimidation, this bullying, this racism, you are automatically candidates at the next election,'” Mann, who chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Antisemitism, stated. “That’s what I call leadership… Jeremy get leading.”
Mann said that he had once been the subject of a death threat from a Labour member, adding: “Thugs, bullies, extremists, racists… they need throwing out of the Labour Party.”
Mann’s comments came as Luciana Berger — the Jewish MP for Liverpool Wavertree who has been critical of Corbyn over antisemitism — was told by a senior Corbyn ally to “get on board” with the Labour leadership or she “will have to be answerable to us.”
Approximately 60 percent of Labour’s current membership have joined the party since Corbyn’s election, leading to fears among Labour centrists that MPs who are critical of the far-left leader will be “deselected” as parliamentary candidates by pro-Corbyn activists in the party’s local branches.
On Thursday, veteran Labour MP Frank Field quit the party’s whip after accusing Corbyn of being a “force for antisemitism.”
And on Friday, a second Labour MP, Mike Gapes, said he was considering resigning over antisemitism in the party.
Gapes told the Evening Standard newspaper that he would wait to see what transpires next week, when Labour’s governing body will vote on whether to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism.
The refusal to do this in July sparked a huge row between the party and its Jewish supporters that has raged through the summer.
“I am agonizing every day about the situation and the state of the Labour Party,” Gapes said.