Labour Deputy leadership contender Dawn Butler has signed an agreement that attempts to solidify the ongoing attempts to silence left-wing socialist Jewish voices within the Labour Party it has been revealed.
Butler is one of the signatories to the “plan for decency” which expressly forbids Labour from engaging with Jewish Voice for Labour.
“The concern that Labour should not be prevented from engaging with smaller groups within a minority group has been addressed by making clear that this is meant to only prevent engagement with fringe groups that are not committed to non-discrimination, such as Jewish Voice for Labour.”
Plan for “Zionism… sorry, “decency”
Unlike its pro-Israel counterparts in the Jewish Labour Movement, the JVL is the only entirely Jewish voice within Labour and despite the false accusation by the so-called plan for “decency” is committed “to [strengthening] the party in its opposition to all forms of racism, including anti-Semitism… to uphold the right of supporters of justice for Palestinians to engage in solidarity activities”
The pro-Socialist and pro-Palestinian justice outlook of the JVL has made it a major target of attacks from the right and centre as part of the false “antisemitism” witch-hunt.
The discredited Board of Deputies have said that “a tiny organisation whose odious views are representative of no-one but themselves” while the turncoat Momentum founder Jon Lansman has said that the JVL “is an organisation which is not just tiny but has no real connection with the Jewish community at all” and “It doesn’t represent the Jewish community in a way that JLM clearly does represent the Labour wing of the Jewish community.”
Obviously, JLM having members who aren’t even Jewish somehow makes them more representative of the Jewish community somehow.
Following the backlash, Butler stated (contradictory to what she’s already signed) that she “reserve[s] the right to, and will continue to, work with ALL Jewish community groups. Excluding any one group is discriminatory. I will continue to work with groups across the political spectrum and will continue to do so as Deputy.”
Silencing the voice of Jewish Voice for Labour was indicated by the absurd ten demands made of Labour from the Board of Deputies.
Point 8 stated that “engagement with the Jewish community [is] to be made via its main representative groups: Labour must engage with the Jewish community via its main representative groups, and not through fringe organisations and individuals.”
The outrageous demand signifies that Labour should engage with Jewish communities through the BoD alone, a body which is fervently pro-Israel and does not represent the diversity of Jewish communities across the country, silencing left-wing Jewish voices and agency. It is antisemitic.
JVL described the pledges as “staggering in its chutzpah”
“Make no mistake these are not ten requests: they are ten demands and one threat. The threat to each of the candidates for leader of the Labour Party is in effect – accept our demands or we will attack you as enablers of antisemitism just as we contributed to making Jeremy Corbyn virtually unelectable. This not only brings shame on the Board of Deputies. It also brings danger to Jews living in the UK who will be seen as claiming a privileged place in determining how the country will be governed.”
JVL
All the candidates for the Labour leadership have signed up to endorse the ten pledges, including frontrunners Rebecca Long-Bailey and Sir Keir Starmer.
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