Labour, Palestinian Rights & Surviving the Party's Ruling National Executive Committee
Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi & Mark Seddon on Labour, Palestinian rights & surviving the party's ruling National Executive Committee.
Mark Seddon is live with Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, co-founder of Jewish Voice for Labour and newly elected member of the UK Labour Party's National Executive Committee (NEC).
Naomi topped Jeremy Corbyn's list of recommended candidates for the recent NEC elections, despite Jeremy having been suspended himself from the Party in October 2020.
Mark Seddon is also a former elected member of Labour's NEC where he attempted to persuade Tony Blair from within the Party that a war on Iraq would be disastrous, as well as costly and illegal.
Today Naomi Wimborne–Idrissi faces momentous challenges in the Party too, including addressing the significant rightward shift of Labour policy under leader Keir Starmer, including his refusal to acknowledge and accept the findings of leading human rights organisations' exposition of Israel's apartheid.
Join us for this unique conversation between current and past NEC members illuminating the challenges of advocating for meaningful change from within Labour's inner circle as well as examining what leftwing members ought be prioritising and pushing for today.
📽️ | "How can Palestinians express their own experience of dispossession & oppression if they can't criticize the basis of the state which is doing the oppressing? That's the danger of what the IHRA definition does."@Naomi4LabNEC & @MarkSeddon1962
— Palestine Deep Dive (@PDeepdive) September 14, 2022
🎙️ https://t.co/6zZpScW6xN pic.twitter.com/yDwKR5rJZW
TRANSCRIPT:
(This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.)
Mark Seddon: Well, welcome to Palestine Deep Dive. By our calculation, I think this is possibly the 60th or more show that we've done. Well, actually, this evening, we're here in the UK. Welcome to all of you joining us from around the world. Literally, before we just came on air, the RAF flight carrying the Queen's coffin from Edinburgh to London flew directly over here and is going to Heathrow Airport, and probably just landed now. We are having this discussion at a very interesting time, a sad time for a lot of people in this country and around the world.
It's also a very interesting time because we will be focusing on the Middle East, but from a British domestic point of view. Just by way of saying, the late Queen of the United Kingdom took a quiet interest in the Palestinian issue, we understand. She was overheard saying how dreadful it was when she was shown a map of the camps and the occupied territories in the Palestinian areas, many years ago.
Anyway, without further ado, we're joined by Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi. It's an absolute delight to have you here, Naomi, with us. Thank you very much for joining us. I think you're in North London.
Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi: That's correct. Yes, Mark, a pleasure to be with you.
Mark: Thank you. Welcome to all of you joining us from around the world. Naomi, we were just discussing before and many times in the past, but we've probably been on various platforms and we can't quite remember where we did last week. That doesn't matter because we've actually got something else in common, which is the fact of the matter is that you have been elected to the ruling body of the British Labour Party. It's called the National Executive Committee.
Some people looking in might think the NEC refers to National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, but no it does not. It refers to the governing body of the British Labour Party. The seats for this body are hard fought over, and especially the constituency section. Naomi, you remember that line, I think it came from some American politician who said that politics is show business for ugly people. What he was saying was that he was talking about the professional politicians, I believe, because back in the day, if you recall, the fight for these constituency seats was amongst in, the constituency section, members of parliament, and every year we would vote. You and I, we would probably be voting for the most left-wing candidates. When Tony Blair became leader of the Labour Party, as part of his reforms of the Labour Party, what they called his democratic reformers, which were actually, as far as we could all make out, just the opposite of that.
They decided that they were going to get rid of these MPs, that the show business was going to go, and they were going to open it up to ordinary members of the Labour Party, hoping that lack of name recognition would mean that various leftists, such as Naomi and myself would be kept off it.
What happened, of course, is that, given half a chance, the members voted for people such as Naomi and myself many years ago, but Naomi's just been elected and that's the most marvelous thing because she's been a very brave outspoken member of the Labour Party. I just actually wanted to begin, Naomi, because, when I was talking to Omar, our show host, earlier, and we were saying, "Why is Naomi doing this now?" You could be having a nice quiet life. Because the one thing that you'll probably find more than I did actually, is that you are going to be running into some really quite unpleasant people.
Naomi: I have been warned.
Mark: Why, Naomi, have you, as a member of the Labour Party, a prominent campaign, prominent socialist, prominent Jewish socialist, why did you decide to stand? Tell us something about what happened in the run-up to that, because I think that also, at some stage recently, in all the terrible machinations of Labour, you were suspended and reinstated, and now you've had this ultimate victory, so good for you. Tell us how it happened and why.
Naomi: Oh, goodness. I probably need to have my head examined, but it seemed to be a very important thing for one of us, somebody on the left with a pro-Palestinian outlook to do. Why? Well, unlike you, Mark, who've got the history of the Labour Party going back a few decades at your fingertips, I only joined in 2015. I joined because Jeremy Corbyn had been elected leader, and he was somebody who I knew of already because, prior to that, from a good number of years, I've been one of many Jewish socialists who have actively supported the course of justice for Palestine. Jeremy was somebody who was part of that movement. To have him at the head of Britain's leading opposition party, your viewers may not know that we have a two-party oppositional system by which really, definitely, over the past few generations, only the Tories, the Conservative Party or the Labour Party have ever led governments. That's the situation.
The Labour Party is a very important organization. Historically, it was founded by and has close links with the organized labor movement to the trade unions. It's meant to be the parliamentary voice of ordinary working people. It is natural that it should support people fighting oppression such as Palestinians. Hasn't always done. We'll probably discuss that at some point in our chat today, but it wasn't seen to be necessarily the natural home in the early 2000s under Tony Blair as prime minister and leader of the party, for people of the left, because he'd taken the party in quite a neoliberal tinkering around with the capitalist system direction.
He certainly wasn't somebody who was going to show any great sympathy for Palestinian opposition to Israeli occupation. Lots of us joined the party and very quickly it became clear that Jewish members of the party could play a specific role because the people of the right-wing, the right-wing faction, those loyal to Tony Blair, and those loyal to the system in the UK, to the establishment as it exists, found that they could make common cause with those who had long been criticizing and attacking the Palestine Solidarity Movement on the grounds of antisemitism.
This is a longstanding project of Zionist movements to try and undermine and portray as antisemitic anybody who is a critic of Israel. We knew all about that because we faced it and tried to deal with it and developed the arguments and listened to the arguments of the other side, how do they try and justify this?
We could see what was happening when these accusations were thrown at Jeremy and those associated with him. That's why we formed a small grouping called Jewish Voice for Labour.
Mark: I wanted to come on that in a minute, Naomi, if that's all right. I was interested listening to you talking about the time of Tony Blair. Of course, this was also the time when he was prime minister that he took Britain into war in Iraq with President Bush, but at the time, told the National Executive Committee and he told Clare Short, the minister at the time, and Robin Cook, who he hoped that would support him, but never did, of course. In response, there was going to be this roadmap for peace in Palestine. John Prescott, who was then deputy leader, was very keen in trying to persuade those of us who were rather doubtful that this was a serious proposition to get behind Tony Blair.
I only say that for interest for you, because when the actual-- as you were just explaining to people who are looking at this, the National Executive Committee sounds, as some people might compare it to a politburo, I suppose, but it's actually- its democratic, you see. As you know, it comes from these different constituencies. Actually, you should be able to have a say over policy.
This will be very interesting to see what you think you might be able to do. Tell us something about the people who you got elected with, and what you hope to do, because the general election may not be too far away, perhaps two years [inaudible 00:09:53] but the Labour Party has gone off really back to where it was under New Labour in many respects. It's back to square one. What do you hope to do?
Naomi: I haven't really answered your question about why I chose to take on this poisoned chalice at this stage. It's consistent with answering what you just put to me. Having formed this organization, we worked very closely and tried to develop alliances with many other small groups on the left and individuals, of course, who had the same sympathies and who also wanted to see Jeremy Corbyn succeed as a leader.
It came to a point, yes, I was suspended. So many people have been suspended. Some have got back in, some have been expelled permanently. I was suspended and readmitted with a slap on the wrist. Let's not go into that unless people want to talk about this in more detail later. It came to a point when the left groups were getting together to think about who should stand for election to the NEC, right at the beginning of this year, that it suddenly seemed logical to put someone like me forward who has a record of standing up against the accusations of antisemitism, which had been used as in the Forde Report a very important report, which came out recently looking at the internal workings of the party. The Forde Report had identified that the disciplinary system, including antisemitism allegations have been used as a factional tool. They've been used by the different factions in the party and primarily the, what we call, the right-wing faction. Somebody needed to stand up to them. Now there were already on the NEC four members who represented the left from the last time around. There were more actually but one or two of those were not going to stand again. We wanted to make sure we could replace those four. Three of them were standing again, and there was a possibility of getting five people onto the NEC, in the CLP section.
In the discussions with other people on the left, my name was put forward. I'm one of a number of people in Jewish Voice Labour who've got quite a high profile in the party for defending the left and for putting forward [lefting] LEFT-WING policies. People said, "Okay, if she's willing to do it, if she's fool enough to do it, we'll back her." In the end, and it took a lot of negotiating, I can assure you. The left is very fractious and finds it difficult to form what we call a slate, a list of candidates who everybody will rally around.
In the end, we had 13 organizations supporting a slate of five, three sitting members, myself, and another young woman who's made a name for herself as the chair of Young Labour called Jess Barnard. We waged a campaign as a United grouping and it was very effective, and it obviously answered a need for many thousands of Labour Party members who have felt themselves to be marginalized because they have been. Some have been suspended, some have been expelled, a lot have left in despair, but of those remaining--
Mark: I'll just throw that one in there as you won and congratulations. At the same time, that turnout was very low. I think when Jeremy Corbyn was leader, about 230,000 members were voting and that fell away to 70 odd thousand, I think. This is pretty enormous. Look, Naomi, the thing is, I do remember when, for what it's worth, I was working at the UN when, first of all, I began to read about antisemitism in the Labour Party. Bearing in mind I joined it when I was 15 or whatever, 1977, and like lots of other people in the Labour Party, grown up with Jewish socialists in our constituency parties.
I have to say, in all of that time, I never ever heard a single person in the Labour Party talk about an antisemitism problem, which is not to say that it may not have been around. I wouldn't have been the first person to pick it up, but nobody ever said it was an issue. Of course, and you'll remember this, the British Labour Party has had a very powerful Jewish socialist tradition. I grew up with the like of Ian Mikardo and Leo Abse, who is a friend of our families. They would never have believed that there was an antisemitism problem in the Labour Party. Gerald Kaufman, I knew him very well too. None of them. Gerald Kaufman, of course, Naomi, as you know, very supportive of the Palestinian course. What, on earth, happened? I've spoken to some Labour MPs who are involved in the disciplinary process. They said, "Well, there was, you should have seen it."
I'm sure with a membership of 500,000, you're bound to have some antisemites and Islamophobes, and racists come in, but why, on earth, you'd want to join the Labour Party as an antisemite or a racist, it's beyond me. Tell me, how did this all come about? Because it was just a total mystery to all of us.
Naomi: Yes. I'm sure it is. It's complicated. Goodness. First of all, no political party is free of all kinds of bigotry and prejudice. Usually, there's a lot of it about there in society, isn't it? There are people who will utter crass remarks about other people from different backgrounds, from different ethnicities. Quite often, unaware that they're doing anything wrong, there needs to be constant education and discussion.
We've always said that if you want to deal with anti-Black racism or anti-Muslim bigotry or antisemitism or homophobia or all these prejudices, you need a lot of open discussion, free flow of opinions and views so that people can air views that may be offensive to some, but can then be challenged and dealt with. That's the way it should be dealt with. I've no doubt that there is, in Labour Party, as elsewhere, undercurrents of foolish ideas about Jews. Jews are very wealthy. Jews are a bit greedy. Jews are good with money. Jews look after one another.
There are all sorts of tropes about Jews that are current. Let me refer you to a survey done, I think it was 2017, by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, which looked at attitudes to Jewish people. It made a very interesting distinction because what it said was that although you find, in the general population, and Labour Party was no different to this, there are 3% to 5% of people who have quite a number of consistently nasty beliefs about Jews.
You have maybe 10% who have 1 or 2 little silly prejudices about Jews, and the people doing this survey said those people were ones who have a smattering of prejudices about Jews or anybody else. They're not antisemite, they hold a few antisemitic ideas. Now, that distinction might sound like a set of excuses to some people who want to suggest that there's this wave of antisemitism in labor. In fact, it just reflects the society in which people live. These are not people who are a threat to Jews or who would discriminate against Jews in an employment situation or who would publicly denounce and upset Jewish people. They have some ideas which need to be discussed and dealt with as with other prejudices. How did we come to a situation where, under Jeremy Corbyn, we are told that the Labour Party is awash with antisemitism and that it has to be, all this terminology comes up, rooted out, zero tolerance, expel them all.
Our deputy leader, Angela Rayner, is on record as saying that if thousands and thousands have to be expelled in order to get rid of, uproot this terrible virus of antisemitism, then so be it. This is the language that we've had to get used to. Of course, what happened was that they changed the definition for what antisemitism is.
It didn't happen overnight. This has been going on for decades. I can recommend a book, which I'm just reading now by Anthony Lerman, who used to be the head of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research. He's studying the way the whole conception about what antisemitism is, how it should be combated, how Jewish populations can be protected. The role of Israel in that whole equation and where Zionism fits in. It's absolutely fascinating.
Basically now, in a situation where expressions of opposition to Zionism, the suggestion that Israel is not the solution to antisemitism, because it's critical to the Zionist idea that if you have an Israeli state, if you have a Jewish state, antisemitism will be solved. Now, obviously, this has proved not to be the case. The fight against antisemitism shifts to a fight in defense of Israel. On that-- [crosstalk]
Mark: I would like to come onto that, but the issue of criticizing Israel, supporting the Palestinian, and how this has been interwoven into all of this, but a couple of comments from folk around, Louise in Ramsgate says, "Many congratulations on your victory in the NEC elections. Please, can you--" We'll get onto this in a minute, but we will come back to this, Louise. "Please, can you help me understand why someone like Luke Akehurst, who actively lobbies for Israel, a state now widely acknowledged to be practicing the crime of apartheid is able to remain in the party and even being an elected represented on the NEC? Where is the justice here? Why should people stay?" Mr. R. Waters, who could well be Mr. Roger Waters, "What a great spokesperson Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi is for the working class." There you go. Naomi, now the thing is-- Again, when I was growing up, the very famous socialist in the Labor Party, it was Robert Maxwell, who of course was one, but he was MP for this constituency where I'm sitting now. We don't spend too much time talking about Robert Maxwell, unfortunately, because-- but we can talk about Ian Mikardo, Phil [Parrington] PIRATIN, from the Communist Party, Rennie Short, Frank [unintelligible 00:21:22] a whole panoply of great Jewish socialists inside and outside the British Labour Party.
When I was growing up, again, many of them were members of an organization called Poale Zion. Someone like Ian Mikardo, for instance, he would say he was very rooted into this Jewish socialist ideas, supported the Kibbutz. It was very much plucky little Israel against the whole of the rest of the world back then in the '60s and the '70s. I wasn't around in the '60s, but I got to know people like him in the late '70s and early '80s.
There was also quite clear from them, that they supported the Palestinians. Something has happened, because the Labour Party, not just the Labour Party, but beyond that. I wonder if you could give us a fairly tight, if you can, but historical explanation for The Bund Poale Zion, the Jewish socialist, the Zionists, who believed in this kind of exclusive Jewish state, but alongside the internationalist Jewish socialists, best represented by people such as yourself, who were secular, and who believed in human rights, whether you're Jewish, Muslim, Christian, or from Mars. What has happed
Naomi: I've not got many Martians in my constituency.
Mark: There's a few Martians where you might be going for your meetings, they're from another planet. [inaudible 00:22:56]
Naomi: This is such a fascinating subject. Can I start with the slogan that Jewish Voice for Labour has on its banner? It says, always with the oppressed, never with the oppressor. This is what Marek Edelman, one of the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 said was a principle that every Jew should follow just by virtue of being through what Jews go through in life, always with the oppressed. For many Jews on the left, this has just seemed-- Well, many Jews, full stop, this has just seemed self-evident. If you've got a history of centuries of persecution and exclusion, and being regarded as alien and unwanted in the societies where you live, you have to make common cause with the other oppressed people in the society where you live. You've mentioned the Bunds, the Jewish Labour Bund, which was a mass organization of socialist workers in all parts of Eastern Europe prior to the second world war.
It was actually founded in 1897, the very same year as the World Zionist Organization was founded. That's a pivotal moment, really, because basically, there are so many fascinating elements in this. My grandparents were all refugees from Eastern Europe at the end of the 19th century, and very early in the 20th century. Interestingly, my mother's mother came over from Kyiv, where she was a victim of Ukrainian antisemitism right at the beginning of the last century, 1903, she was one of the last to come over.
You have this wave of Jewish immigrations to various other countries because of this, and they had to-- obviously, Jews everywhere were thinking, "What do we do? How do we combat this terrible persecution that our communities face over and over again throughout history?" One answer developed over time and finally brought together under the heading of the World Zionist Organization was Jews need to get out, Jews can't live with people who are non-Jewish in non-Jewish societies, because it's almost like there's this infection called antisemitism.
That's a term, by the way, coined by an antisemitic activist in, I think, it was German, Wilhelm Marr. It's a term which is used by people who hate Jews to justify their hating Jews. This was one answer. "We need a state of our own. We can't be aliens sitting like a foreign body in other societies anymore. We have to form our own society." That's what World Zionist Organization stood for.
At the same time, there were mass Jewish movements by people who were influenced by the growing socialist ideas at the time. Of course, Zionism was influenced by nationalism. It is a nationalist movement regarding Jews as a people who deserve their own homeland, which is something we can discuss. It's a fascinating and complex idea. On the other side, there are people who said, "No, we are oppressed people. There are many other oppressed people. There is an oppressed class in the societies where we live. We have to be in solidarity with them." They have this wonderful slogan, which I absolutely love, there's this word 'Doikait'. It means hereness. It means, where we are, that is our home, and that was the basis on which The Bund organized mainly among the working classes, and of course, it had its intellectual leaders. It was a fantastic and vibrant movement, right through up until the holocaust, which took so many millions of Jewish lives, many of them not Zionist.
The Bund was not a Zionist Movement, it worked together with Zionists in the Warsaw Ghetto even. The fighters who puts up a struggle and fought to the death against the Nazis who were setting up to exterminate them, included religious Jews and secular Jews, Zionist Jews, Socialist Jews, and so on. People worked together where required, but it was nice that you acknowledge the fact that Israel, the project of Zion, it was seen as a progressive cause plucky little Israel, because there were many Socialist ideologues among those who led the early Zionist Movement, people who thought that they could create some utopian society that would live together with the indigenous people.
There were also those who didn't give a darn about the indigenous people the Palestinians and really thought they didn't exist, they were just like dust. All their achievements were completely nullified. There was strong currents. Poale Zion is Workers of Zion. It was affiliated, it's a group of left-wing Zionist who affiliated to British Labour in, I think it was 1920 going back a long time, and for a long time, it was just assumed that if you were on the left, you would support the Zionist Movement. It wasn't seen as a colonizing movement of the West, it was seen as a liberating movement of persecuted Jews, and that spirit was very much in the hearts of some of the people who propagated it.
It's very interesting to read accounts of many, many Jews [unintelligible 00:28:49] who shifted. Israeli Jews who've come to see what the reality of Zionism means on the ground when you are an oppressor. As Marek Edelman said, Jewish should always be with the oppressed, not the oppressor. That's all very sloganistic and simplistic, but [inaudible 00:29:11]
Mark: No, it's not, you see, Naomi. I think it's absolutely fascinating, it's really important to have this debate. The problem for an awful lot of people I suspect out there is it's- everything, it's on Twitter, everybody's got like two, three lines to write and people don't think anymore. If half of them who have been throwing these claims of antisemitism around could listen to you for just half an hour, they'd probably realize that they need to get things, they need to really understand the history. Again, I was quite taken aback, because one, when you were elected, there was this ferocious reaction and as I read it and I thought, "This is bonkers." If I was, like the vast majority of people, I suppose, not a Labour Party member or whatever, and took a cursory interest in all these things, and I suddenly switched. I saw, "Oh, goodness me, this is a nice Jewish lady's been elected to this body in the Labour Party, but all these Jewish people are attacking her. What, on earth, is going on?"
Naomi: And non-Jewish people.
Mark: And non-Jewish people. My question is-- You explained the historical coming together in times of crisis, the Warsaw Ghetto, but what is it that now divides? Because how is it, in the context of the British Labour Party, you can have the Jewish Voice for Labour, your organization, and the Jewish Labour Movement? Why? This is what people don't understand is why has there been this great fallout? Is it primarily Israel or is it something else? Or both?
Naomi: The Jewish Labour Movement is Poale Zion renamed. After the formation foundation of the state of Israel, I suppose the need for a Zionist organization linked to the Labour Party became less urgent, really, the attention shifted elsewhere. It fell into a [unintelligible 00:31:18] ABEYANCE UNTIL 2004, apparently. I wasn't paying attention at the time, but I understand this is what happened. The group that remained, dropped the name Poale Zion and changed to Jewish Labour Movement, but it remained dormant. It didn't play any role that was noticeable in the Labour Party at all.
However, in 2016, just after the election of Jeremy Corbyn to the leadership of the Labour Party, this website appeared, it sprung to life with allegations of antisemitism against the Oxford University Labour Club, where people had passed a motion in support of students who wanted to hold events for Israeli apartheid week. That's where it began.
Honestly, the accusations that were made against the Oxford University Labour Club have been investigated and found to be almost entirely fabrications. We face a lot of fabrication and exaggeration, which is tragic because, if there is real antisemitism, it needs to be identified and talked about, and dealt with. Instead of which we've got this mad idea of zero tolerance, which is a totally discredited idea in pedagogy. If you want to teach people stuff, you don't just say, "Oh my God, you just said a bad word. Leave the class." How would anybody learn? Zero-tolerance is a discredited idea and it's foolish.
Mark: Zero-tolerance some might argue is being practiced by some policemen against the odd demonstrator, who's holding up a sign saying, "Not my king." We can see where all this madness leads –
Naomi: Yes. Indeed. You've got the Jewish Labour Movement, we are not an affiliate. We are a group which sprung up in order to say –
[addressing image of Tweet on screen of Jewish Labour Movement expressing disappointment at Naomi’s election to the NEC] Oh, there they are. That's their reaction, to me!
Mark: This was the reaction, which is what I saw.
Naomi: That's right.
Mark: You know what? Then I saw a tweet from Margaret Hodge who, by the way, I remember back in the days being an extremely hardline, left-wing socialist who was-- We even had the red flag that she used to fly over Islington Town Hall and the Tribune office. I used to know Margaret Hodge back in the day. Again, when I was working for the UN, I thought, "What on earth has happened to her? Why has she gone crazy like this?" Anyway, there you had that statement from Jewish Labour Movement condemning your victory as a Jewish socialist, which seemed totally bizarre.
Naomi: That's right.
Mark: People really don't understand this. You took that back a moment ago to this Oxford Labour Club. It's effectively saying apartheid is being practiced by Israel. Of course, we now know because the United Nations says it is too. The Special Rapporteur for the Palestinians says it is. Amnesty International says it is. Everybody in the world says it is. Haaretz says it is. Everybody more or less is saying apartheid was being practiced by Israel in the Palestinian territories. You can't have organizations attached to the Labour Party surely saying, "Oh, that's antisemitic." This is a special kind of madness.
Naomi: I did want to pick you on that because you asked why can Luke Akehurst whose job is promoting an organization We Believe In Israel--
Mark: That was Louise's question. It was Louise who asked this question.
Naomi: That's fine. I think, and this surprises some people, although the Jewish Labour Movement, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Jewish Leadership Council, a whole host of other mainstream Jewish groups think that I should be expelled, and anybody that thinks like me, we actually don't think they should be expelled. We think they have the right to express their views, which we think are deeply misguided, and they should debate them. They don't, you see. They never answer the question.
They throw out things like, "You don't believe in the right of Israel to exist," and I'm thinking, "What does that even mean?" Israel is a state that's been in existence for 70 years now at great cost of the Palestinian people of course. One can definitely question the structure of that state, the legitimacy of that state. In many ways, you can question that, and people should be free to do so. If you want to defend it, defend it. Don't just say, "You've questioned the legitimacy of our state. Therefore, you are an antisemite. Therefore, you are vermin and don't deserve to be debated with."
I'm absolutely happy for the JLM to continue as part of the Labour Party. I just don't accept their right to speak for every other Jew and the same applies to the Israeli state actually. It does not have the right to speak for the Jews of the world. There is a global Jewish network of many groups from all over the world who are coming together and saying, "This state does not represent us. Zionism does not--"
Mark: You could also say the same about the British Board of Deputies who also condemned your election, apparently telling the National Executive Committee which committees you should be on or committees you should not be on, which is quite extraordinary because I suddenly was transported back to the 1980s and the Catholic church telling Labour MPs, which where they should vote on abortion, issue of abortion.
I thought that the British Labour Party and the socialist tradition really had nothing to do with religious figures telling people what to think, what to do. Look, here we have one or two other questions if we can get them in. This goes-- this is Andy-- well, another quick point from Mr. Roger Waters, "What a pleasure to be able to sit here in Vancouver, being educated by this extraordinary eloquent woman."
Andy in Newcastle asked, "Jewish Voice for Labour have been incredible allies for Palestinians in the UK, have proudly and unapologetically stood up for Palestinian rights. Would it be fair to say that British Jews can only do so much in helping Palestinians reclaim the narrative? Isn't it time for there to be an organization loudly and proudly institutionalizing Palestinian invoices in the UK, whether it be officially affiliated to the Labour Party or not? Is that a call for something like Palestine solidarity to be affiliated to the Labour Party? I think that's--
Naomi: That's a very intelligent and interesting question. There is a Palestinian solidarity campaign obviously, which does quite a lot of good work. There are many small local groups, active, [touring] TWINNING with Palestinian communities, bringing people over to explain to communities here what it's like to live under occupation or indeed within the boundaries, which have never been properly defined, of Israel, what it's like to be a Palestinian refugee living abroad and wanting your right of return, to reclaim your homeland. See, Labour Party policy as dictated by the conference last year is very much in support of Palestinian rights. It questions the arms trade with Israel. It acknowledges the apartheid analysis, although it doesn't adopt it exactly. It talks about the need for some sanctions which is quite a big step because it talks about boycotting Israel – this regarded as -- people say, "Oh, it's just like the Nazis boycotting Jews," but you see a state is not a person. Israel is not a person. I totally dispute the idea--
Mark: Well, Israel, as we know like South Africa was, is in breach of international law repeatedly. South Africa, as we know, was subject to sanctions as was Southern Rhodesia, and many people are saying the same should be happening now with Israel because the time [unintelligible 00:40:01] it is occupying Palestinian land quite illegally. We've got another couple of comments here. This is from someone who's calling him or herself Tosh. Tosh, I'm wondering if it's perhaps Tosh the former ASLEF general secretary-
Naomi: Tosh McDonald.
Mark: -but I suspect not.
Naomi: Maybe not.
Mark: Anyway, "This is why they try and de-platform Jewish Voice for Labour because organizations such as JLM don't debate because they fear debate as it shows them up for what they are." Well, that's more or less what you were saying, but you were quite happy to debate them and you wish you could.
Naomi: We have offered over and over again. One of the interesting things that came out in the Forde report which it's a bit complicated, but the Forde report was set up by Keir Starmer two years ago, more than two years ago, to look into a report that had been leaked about the internal workings of Labour which seemed to indicate that there was a bureaucracy within, which was deliberately undermining Jeremy Corbyn and which was using antisemitism allegations to destabilize the left of the party and so on and so on.
Forde report came out after long delays a couple of weeks ago and said, "Yes, that was happening." It also said, on the one hand, on the other hand, because that's what official reports tend to do-- I forgot where I was going with this. [laughs] One of the things it said was that it's unfortunate that education or training, they tend to say, it's an awful word, you train dogs to jump through hoops, you educate human beings. Jewish Labour Movement runs training for Labour Party members which the Forde report said is of questionable value.
Mark: Yes, I saw that.
Naomi: It's top-down didactic. It actually said, the Forde report said that it was regrettable that Jewish Voice for Labour's expertise in this area had not been called upon. This is the situation that we face. They don't-- even in their education sessions, they won't let people ask sensible questions. It's just, "Watch a video. Tick boxes."
Mark: Naomi, you're going to go on the NEC shortly. The horrors of it, the internal boredom of it, of course, as well, but also the hilarious moments. I used to sit next to a bloke called Dennis Skinner. [crosstalk] who used to say, "Never question people's motives." You always said that. That was the best advice you could ever give. Never question people's motives, but you're going to be right in there having to deal with all of this stuff.
Dealing with a cumbersome structure with often machine politicians, there's some wonderful trade union people who really always want the best and hope they're going to get a Labour government last, and you spend 20 years usually waiting for them when they come along like a late bus, not much gets off the bus, but you've got all of that. Unfortunately-- because I'm listening to you thinking, do you know what, you are a wonder, Naomi, and you remind me so much of so many of the people I grew up with in the Labour Party, but so many like you have now left because you're just banging your head against the brick wall against some really quite thuggish people.
Actually, I sometimes sit back and I think I don't like the idea of some of these people having their hands near power. They've got an authoritarian streak in them. At the end of the day, you mentioned Jeremy Corbyn. I've known him for years and years and years, I've known him for about 25 years. I was a Tribunite, I was never a Corbynite, but I voted for Jeremy because he was the only person who was standing, who really believed in what he was saying.
I thought his break away from the Blair years, the idea that he is some kind of antisemite is so absurd. I don't know if you're allowed to answer this question now. "Do you think he should be let back in the Labour Party?" says Keith in Doncaster, but don't answer that if it'll get you into trouble. I'll leave that with--
Naomi: Oh, that's very kind.
Mark: I'll leave you and the NEC to keep up the brilliant-- Isn't this a [unintelligible 00:44:10] ask a question that we might get into trouble, but anyway, we'll move on from that. What else should we--
Naomi: While you're pondering, shall I say something briefly about the NEC that I was quite amusing?
Mark: Yes.
Naomi: The Mail on Sunday did a piece attacking me for daring to be elected to the NEC, and they have this line about, "This powerful body, she will have a direct influence on Labour Party policy." I'm thinking, "You don't really know how political parties or certainly the Labour Party works." The NEC is indeed formally the governing body of the Party between annual conferences. In fact, it meets irregularly. It's like that old thing about being treated like mushrooms, they keep us in the dark and shovel us with shit.
I know because people I've spoken to who've been in there recently, they may have been different in your day. The actual power of the body as a whole is denuded, and the influence of the left is tiny. Do you realize it's got about 40 members? We've got four on the left in the constituency section. We've got four on the right in the constituency section. We've got one kind of middle-of-the-road person, and then you've got maybe four or five left-wing trade union representatives, the rest aren't, and then you've got mass of Labour MPs, and you've got councillors, and you've got representatives from the regions.
Our voice is going to be minute. Anyway, policy in so far as members have any influence on it is devolved to National Policy Forums which have been pretty well stripped of any actual influence on [unintelligible 00:46:01]. [crosstalk]
Mark: No. You can only ever really use it as a platform. Unfortunately, the policy function was taken away a long time ago. They used to be the home policy committee, and all this, and actually made policy. They had serious people who came in from the trade union movement, academics. There was a whole raft of policy. In the Labour History Museum, if you go there, you see the preparation that was being made in the middle of the Second World War by the shadow cams of the NEC. They had a government program ready together. I doubt there's hardly any policies being put together by people who know what they're talking about now.
Jenny in Maryport said, "What it's like to try to persuade Tony Blair not to invade Iraq?" Well, this is a little something for you, Naomi, because it was actually impossible. What would happen is that-- well, just very briefly, what happened was that I got together with the then-president of the [United Nations] General Assembly in New York and Robin Cook and we put together a resolution calling essentially for the Secretary General to rule as to whether Britain joining in the US invasion would be legal or not. That was ruled out of order, not once, not twice, but three times. All we could do, Jenny and Maryport, is to publicize and stand up for what we believed in and use the office that we held to do that.
Nadia in Leeds has a question. I think this is a really interesting question, especially when you look at what's happening in Hungary, for instance, "What does Naomi think about the growing alliance between far-right movements, often entertained antisemitic tropes, and the Israeli right? What does this say about the claims of organizations like the ruling Conservative Party to be committed to the fight against antisemitism?"
Naomi: Ah, yes. Now, this is a really major and very dangerous development. Basically-- well, actually, if you go right back to the beginning of the Zionist movement, it depends on the existence of antisemitism. You can't have a Zionist movement calling Jews to come together and go and set up a state somewhere other than where they previously lived, unless you can propose it as being a solution to antisemitism. Without antisemitism, there isn't really any need for Zionism.
That may seem a bit misused, but basically, what's happened now is you have in many countries-- America is a very good example, you have far-right organizations and movements, many Christian evangelicals sadly come into this category, people with extremely conservative reactionary views on social questions who are ardently supportive of Israel. There's a sort of messianic religious base to some of these beliefs. Christian Zionism actually predates Zionism as an aspiration for Jewish people, as a political aspiration for Jewish people. There's always a spiritual hankering for a biblical Jerusalem, biblical Zion, but that's quite different, and you do have some very religious Jews who regard political Zionism actually seizing by military might, a state as [unintelligible 00:49:23] as actually an anti-Jewish thing to believe in. Sorry, I'm straying.
You have this idea that there's a biblical prophecy that Christ will come again when all the Jews of the world are gathered in Zion, the ingathering of the exiles, and there are Christian Zionist movements, millions of them, I'm not talking about a few cranks, talking about the mass base of Trump, for example, millions of people who believe that Israel is working towards the realization of that prophecy by encouraging Jews to come from all over the world and settle in Israel.
When Christ comes again before [unintelligible 00:50:06] the apocalypse and armageddon and that will happen, and hurray, all the people who are not believers in Christ will be wiped out including the Jews who helped but then didn't convert. Those who believe will ascend. They actually call it the rapture. They will ascend to live with God in heaven, and it'll be wonderful.
I'm sorry. It feels really weird, but there are films about this and books about this, and people who go to Israel praying for this to happen. They want it to happen, and that aligns with other aspects of far-right politics which are deeply racist. You have people who can combine hatred of all non-white, non-Christian religions and ethnicities with support for the Israeli state, and in some of them, the clever ones, it's quite explicit. "Oh, great. It's a white supremacist state." It's suppressing its minorities--
Mark: EDL in this country, the English Defence League.
Naomi: Yes, that's right. Tommy Robinson, there are pictures of him in Israel with a gun in front of a tank saying, "Yay, go Israel." It's awful for people who are well-meaning Zionists, who believe-- I know my old mom used to say, "Oh, but we have to have a home to go to," there's a fear. The fear is real. I hope that people watching this realize Jews have a long history of persecution, which has led to genocide against them.
It's not something you can take lightly. It really isn't. If people are brought up with this belief that the answer to that is the creation of a state where Jews will be perpetually in the majority and able to rule, then that's going to be the saving of you when the next Holocaust comes. Unfortunately, there are people for whom the perpetuation of that fear is necessary for their political existence. They keep on stoking the fear.
Mark: Naomi, I wonder-- we haven't got a huge amount of time left, sadly, but I wanted to come back. There's one quick-- because Roger Waters mentioned this in one of his points, the IHRA definition of antisemitism. You were talking about the historical persecution of the Jews and you can quite understand why people want to be absolutely clear about antisemitism and to stamp it out and clearly know what it is.
Now, we have a situation, for instance, today, the United Nations General Assembly, the new elected president is a Hungarian diplomat. Hungary has the presidency. The deputy presidency is held by Israel, and one of the-- on their agenda this year is to try and get United Nations to adopt the IHRA definition of antisemitism. We'll see if that happens. It seems fairly unlikely, but who knows? It seems fairly unlikely that that will happen. Tell me though, what does it actually mean, and is there any truth in the fact that the architect of the definition is actually rather concerned about its usage, how it's being used in some quarters now? Can you tell us something about that?
Naomi: Absolutely. Yes, there he is. Kenneth Stern. He was one of the main lead authors of a document, which was put together, oh my goodness, it must be 2011, '12, I don't know exactly when [unintelligible 00:53:49] in that article. It was meant to aid people who were trying to monitor incidences of antisemitism all over the world, and it was becoming quite a common belief that some people use hatred of Israel as an excuse to cloak their real hatred of Jews.
I think that is a very minuscule element in what's going on in the world, but people believed it was true. It is true of course that every time Israel slaughters a few thousand Palestinians, genuinely antisemitic incidents do increase in frequency, unfortunately, because people wrongly believe that Jews are responsible for what Israel does.
This definition, which before it was adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance in 2016, it had already been pushed around by various Zionist groups. We encountered it going back years before that. It was put before a body called the European Union Monitoring Committee on Xenophobia and Racism, and they had it on their website for a while as a working definition.
It didn't work as a working definition because as Kenneth Stern-- a bit like Robert Oppenheimer helping to develop the atomic bomb and then thinking, "Oh my God, what have I done?" Kenneth Stern looked at the way his document has been distorted and used to crush debate in universities. He's an academic. He expressed his horror at this many times on public platforms in letters to Congress.
What this definition does is it has a few words which are virtually incomprehensible. I can't remember them off the top of my head, but it says things like antisemitism may be conceived as or may be expressed as hostility to-- it says things like to Jewish and non-Jewish institutions, and you read this thing, it tells you nothing. Because it tells you nothing, there are then a whole load of examples attached to it, which may, it says, and this is the form in which it was adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, these are examples of how antisemitism may present itself in modern society.
There are 11 examples, 4 of which are incontrovertible, accusing Jews of being responsible for all the ills of the world saying that Jews dominate finance, media, traditional stuff, or calling for the extermination of Jews, that sort of thing. Yes, we agree, that's antisemitic. Then there are seven examples which are all to do with Israel. You must not suggest that what Israel does is anything like the Nazis did to Jews. You must not sign up to boycott, because that would be antisemitic. You must not deny Israel its right to exist or you must not question the establishment-- I think it said you must not call into question the project of establishing a state of Israel, and it goes on and on with these weasel words that can be so easily and are being used to just chill any discussion about Palestine.
It's basically saying to the Palestinians, "We don't want to hear from you. What Israel has meant to you is not to be spoken about," because how can Palestinians express their own experience of dispossession and oppression if they can't criticize the basis of the state which is doing the oppressing? That's the danger of what the IHRA definition does. There is a much better alternative knocking around now.
In response to that, a large group, an international group of mainly Jewish scholars have produced the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism, which has its own website. It's long and rather wordy, but it's a genuine attempt to say, "What do we really need to know about antisemitism if we're really going to combat it?" Telling Palestinians just to shut up and not speak is not the way. I've completely forgotten what the question was now.
Mark: Well, I think you've answered it pretty well, which is to explain the IHRA definition. The fact that Kenneth Stern as the key author now is really concerned about how it's being implemented and rolled out in universities up and down the land in this country and elsewhere too, yes, it's a pretty state. Now, some people are asking, can we catch up on this show? You certainly can. It has been recorded. Go to the Palestine Deep Dive website, and you will see it in total.
Now, I just thought, because sadly, we have to bring this to an end, one final question, actually, given the history of Jewish socialist involvement in the British Labour Movement and Labour Movements right across the-- including today is Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Party in America. What a great man he is.
The thing is, what's very difficult for people to understand is how it is that antisemitism has become this-- almost it's been described as a weapon that's being thrown around in a most gratuitous and dangerous way that exaggerating, over-exaggerating anything can do. If you're not serious about it, if you are using it to attack other people because you disagree with them over Palestine or whatever it might be, do you think this whole period, which has been really deeply unpleasant for everybody, but particularly for Jewish people, do you think this has really quite damaged relations amongst people? Because people are very worried, there's antisemitism everywhere, but for those of us brought up in the British Labour Party, we just didn't see it. It wasn't around.
Naomi: Oh, of course, the answer to that, Mark, is that that was before Jeremy Corbyn came along and thousands of antisemites flocked into the party. That's what they say. Saying that you've been in the party for decades and didn't see any, that's irrelevant, man.
Mark: Yes. I suppose--
Naomi: It's very damaging. It's damaging to relations between different sections of the community, it is divisive. We've now got Black and Muslim members who are in a ferment, a fury because their concerns have been completely sidelined as for this Forde report thing I mentioned earlier, as that report indicates because the bureaucracy was fanatical about perceived antisemitism, failing to deal with real antisemitism over and over again.
There are cases where people have said, "We've got a Holocaust denier in our branch, what are you going to do about it?" "Oh, let's have a look at his credentials. Oh, he's a right-winger. No, no, he's fine, he can carry on," while dreaming up all sorts of things about people on the left. Incredibly divisive and damaging, and honestly, one of the things I pitched when I was standing for the election to the NEC, apart from the fact that I want to improve communication with members about what goes on in the NEC, was that members need to have their voices heard and we need to deal with the division that this has sewn. How can you put yourself forward as a party of government if you can't even manage divisions within your own organization?
Mark: Yes. A very, very good point. When we first started this conversation, I was worried, I thought, "Oh my goodness, she's going to go right into the lion's den," but I have a feeling that they're going to be listening to you, and I think you're going to make some great headway. By the way, I just remembered, last we were talking all the years ago when I was elected because there was a great campaign to try and stop myself and Liz Davies who you probably know, who's a lawyer and member of the Islington Labour Party, and what have you-
Naomi: Yes, indeed.
Mark: -they did try and stop us. They weren't as vile to us as they have been to you, but I do remember the first meeting of the NEC was at the Labour Party conference in Blackpool in the Imperial Hotel. They put myself and Liz and another couple of truculent lefties opposite Tony Blair in the Shadow Cabinet, and behind Blair in the Shadow Cabinet were these huge windows, with the sun beaming in, and we couldn't even see Blair and the rest of them. Even then, the equivalent of shining a torch into our eyes or [unintelligible 01:02:55]. You are walking-- you're very brave. We should--
Naomi: I will be? polite and civil as I always try to be, Mark.
Mark: Absolutely, you don't need to try. You clearly are, and that advice to Dennis Skinner about never doubting people's intentions, I think probably that's the best advice anybody can say. Good luck. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for all of you tonight from wherever you've been. We have people from all over the world.
Naomi: [unintelligible 01:03:25]
Mark: People from Vancouver, of course. [laughs]
Naomi: [unintelligible 01:03:29]
Mark: All over the world. Thank you so much for joining us here at Palestine Deep Dive. Thank you so much also to Omar, to Alex, to Ahmed for making this happen. Naomi, we wish you the very best of luck. We hope you will come on again.
Naomi: [unintelligible 01:03:43]
Mark: You'll always have a space here.
Naomi: I'll be coming to you for advice, Mark, with your background and history. Thanks.
Mark: Thank you. Take care. Bye-bye.
Naomi: Bye.
