When Theresa May appointed John Mann to lead the fight
against ‘anti-Semitism’ it was a case of one racist appointing another racist
Perhaps
the best description of John Mann came from the Employment Tribunal case of Fraser
–v- University College Union. This was a case brought by a Zionist academic, Ronnie Fraser against his own trade
union, UCU, for anti-Semitism. UCU’s offence was supporting the Boycott of Israel.
Their judgment (paragraph 148) concerning Mann’s evidence was that:
Mr Mann could manage without even that assistance
[the MacPherson Report]. He told us that the leaders of the Respondents were at
fault for the way in which they conducted debates but did not enlighten us as
to what they were doing wrong or what they should be doing differently. He did
not claim ever to have witnessed any Congress or other UCU meeting. And when it
came to antiSemitism in the context of debate about the Middle East, he
announced, “It’s clear to me where the line is …” but unfortunately eschewed
the opportunity to locate it for us. Both parliamentarians clearly enjoyed
making speeches. Neither seemed at ease with the idea of being required to
answer a question not to his liking.
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| The Jewish Chronicle, of all papers, accuses the alternative media of 'fuelling' the fake antisemitism crisis. It is such a clear and blatant attempt at censorship that all comment is superfluous |
None
of this stopped Theresa May, back in July 2019, appointing
John Mann MP as her advisor on ‘anti-Semitism’. As his parting shot Mann launched
an attack on Jeremy Corbyn for having given the ‘green light’ to
anti-Semites.
“Every time I go into a meeting with a group of Jewish
people, I wince when they raise the issue of the Labour party and Corbyn. It is
impossible to overstate the anger that I have about that. He has not just
hijacked my political party – he has hijacked its soul and its ethics. I will
never forgive him for that.”
When John Mann talks about ‘ethics’ I feel like reaching for my gun, to quote Goebbels. Mann has about as much acquaintance with ethics as a mafia chief.
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| Mann's racist handbook which he has never explained |
You
might therefore be forgiven for thinking that during John Mann’s 18 years in
parliament that he was a vociferous opponent of racism in all its forms. If so
then I’m afraid you will be disappointed. There was no greater parliamentary
racist than Mann. A bigot for all seasons.
Mann
was one of the few Labour supporters of Brexit in Parliament. Brexit, which was
motivated at its core, by fear and hostility to migrants and dreams of an
independent ‘Great’ Britain of Empire past, was at one with the rest of Mann’s
toxic views.
John Mann, throughout his time in parliament,
has also been distinguished for his pro-war record, voting
in support of the Iraq war in March 2003.
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| Racist Labour MP, Phil Woolas was backed to the hilt by Mann |
Not once did Mann speak out against New
Labour’s demonisation of refugees and asylum seekers. When the racist Labour MP
Phil Woolas was ejected
by an Election Court from the House of Commons for having lied about his Lib
Dem opponent at the 2010 General Election, he had no greater supporter than
John Mann.
Mann was described
by the Guardian as Woolas’s “best friend, best man and political ally since the first day
at Manchester University”. Woolas, he said, was “never
reckless and never thoughtless”.
 |
| A thuggish John Mann screamed at Ken Livingstone that he was a 'Nazi apologist' for having mentioned the truth about the Zionist relationship with the Nazis |
When Harriet Harman, the acting Labour leader
suspended Woolas from the Labour Party after he had been convicted of lying,
she faced
“a backbench revolt” There were calls
for her resignation
Among
those to have spoken out in support of Woolas was John Mann, a close friend of
his. (UPDATE: Although I should make clear that he was in Canada at the time
and has been backing Woolas via telephone calls with a journalist at the
Guardian).
Mann
was quoted
as saying that Woolas’s ejection:
has got profound implications for British democracy.
The idea that a judge rather than the electorate can remove an MP is
farcical". Woolas's is the first case of an MP being disbarred by the
courts for malpractice since 1911.
Let us remember that Woolas did not just lie
when he alleged that his opponent supported violent Muslim Jihadists but he
deliberately sought to stir up a white working class vote by demonising Muslims
by as terrorists and violent jihadists. A decision was taken by his campaign:
to 'make the white folk angry' by depicting an
alleged campaign by those who they described generically as Asians to 'take
Phil out' and then present Mr Watkins as in league with them.
When it came to the 2014 Immigration Act, which
enacted the ‘hostile environment’ policy which led to the Windrush Scandal,
Mann abstained, which in parliamentary terms is the equivalent of supporting
the government of the day.
In 2007 Mann produced ‘the Bassetlaw
Anti Social Behaviour Handbook. It told local residents how to deal with
problems of anti-social behaviour. Included amongst those problems were Gypsies
and Travellers. It said:
This handbook
is designed to help you deal with problems you may face in your street or in
your community. There are lots of different types of anti-social behaviour,
including vandalism, abuse, noisy neighbours and fireworks.
Amongst
these examples were to be found Travellers. Mann’s advice was
The police
have powers to remove any gypsies or travellers, and have powers to direct
people to leave the land and remove any vehicles or property they have with
them
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| John Mann who lives off the holocaust and anti-semitism attacked the Gypsies in the same way as the Nazis |
In
2016 Mann was interviewed
by Police in connection with this pamphlet.
Gypsies are protected
from racial discrimination under the Equality Act 2010.
Ben
Bennett, a 13 year old Traveller, who made a complaint to the Police, told
Skwawkbox that Mann’s pamphlet made him feel
‘very upset’.
I can’t understand why John Mann MP would choose to talk solely about my
community in such a derogatory manner.’
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| The Jewish Chronicle campaigns for a State attack on The Canary and Skwawkbox and anyone who challenges the mainstream media |
If
Mann was sincere in his opposition to anti-Semitism then his remarks are
incomprehensible. We hear a lot about how 6 million Jews died in the Jewish
holocaust but little about how between half and one and a half million Gypsies
were also exterminated by the Nazis in the Porajmos. They were
called a criminal and asocial elements. Precisely what Mann called them in his
pamphlet.
It
is no surprise that Theresa May, the author of the ‘hostile environment’ policy,
should embrace a fellow bigot.
Nor
is it surprising that Boris Johnson, who is notorious
for his racist including anti-Semitic
comments, upgraded
Mann’s role to become ‘anti-Semitism Czar’, elevating him to the Lords. It is a
rather unfortunate title as the Czars were infamous for their anti-Semitism.
Still, on reflection, the title seems apt.
Mann
made
his intentions known from the start.
He was going to concentrate on the Left press. You might think that someone
genuinely concerned with racism would focus on the Daily Mail, Sun, Express
etc. However Mann’s targets are the alternative media such as the Canary and
Skwawkbox.
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| Editor Stephen Pollard has a policy of inventing news where it is politically convenient |
In an article Report:
Corbynite sites feature far-right tropes by
‘Liar’ Lee Harpin, whose inaccuracies have cost
the Jewish Chronicle a small fortune in libel damages, the Skwawkbox and The
Canary are accused of a “heavily negative coverage of Jewish
issues” to audiences
that are “associated with antisemitism”.
We are told that there are ‘parallels
between editorial lines taken by the two sites and that of the extreme
far-right online outlet Radio Albion.’
Note ‘editorial lines’ not actual
content. So if, for their own reasons,
fascists oppose a war abroad then if the left press oppose those wars they are
likewise fascists. This is the reasoning applied throughout the report.
What are
‘Jewish issues.’ We are not told but
we can guess. Palestine and Israel/Zionism. The same Israeli state which has
just been condemned as an
Apartheid state by the country’s main human rights group, Btselem.
What
Mann is engaging in is a crude form of guilt-by-association. Mann has learnt
well from Joe McCarthy. If you want a text-book lesson in how to corrupt the
English language, take the paragraph below which equates The Canary and
Skwawkbox on the basis of a supposed opposition to fascism. In fact fascists
have never opposed capitalism. Of course they pretend to oppose capitalism. The Nazis called themselves ‘national
socialists’ yet the first thing they did when they gained power was to put
socialists and communists in concentration camps.
“despite the huge differences
in the beliefs that are most foundational to their ideologies, articles
published on all three sites share an opposition to capitalism, globalisation,
and liberalism, adopt similar positions on many questions of foreign policy,
and fulminate against a supposed adversary whose Jewishness is extensively
highlighted (even if in different ways).
So even though Mann is forced to
concede ‘huge differences’ in their
ideology, i.e. the Skwawkbox and The Canary are anti-racist unlike fascist
sites, Mann draws an equals sign between
them.
How does Mann’s Report explain the
pro-Zionist stance of TR (Tommy Robinson)?
‘TR News, the official website of
far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, popularly known as Tommy Robinson,
has intentionally attempted to take the side of Jews and Israel,
Perhaps
that’s because Robinson is an openly
declared Zionist, like much of the far-Right today? Mann’s polemics
actually have a lot in common with Nazi propaganda, which also sought to
portray opposites as being the same e.g. when they equated capitalism and
communism, both of which were controlled by the Jews.
TR News has resorted to defending those Muslims who were seen
to embrace pro-Western right-wing ideology, the two left-wing websites sought
to declare allegiance with the minority of Jews who supported their own
viewpoint.
In
other words pro-fascist Black and Asian people, such as the racist supporters
of India’s BJP government are no different from anti-Zionist Jews who oppose
all forms of racism. This is the kind of intellectual sleight of hand that Mann
has made into a fine art.
The
‘research’ for Mann’s Report was carried out by Daniel Allington, Senior Lecturer at King’s College London,
and Tanvi Joshi. They selected the 20 most recent articles on each site that
featured the words ‘Jew’ or ‘Zionist’ for analysis. Perhaps it did not occurred
to Mann that what fascists mean by ‘Zionist’ might differ from what socialists
mean and therefore his whole matrix isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. The
whole Report is based on the assumption that ‘Jew’ = ‘Zionist’.
Dr. Allington is the Campaign Against
Anti-Semitism’s favourite academic. His research is deliberately tailored to
achieve the results he wants. He basically reaches the conclusion first and
then reverse engineers his research! This work is wholly bogus and
contrived.
Together with Zionist academic David Hirsh he devised
a Generalised
Anti-Semitism Barometer for the CAA which found that anti-Semitism was more
prevalent on the Left than the Right. Of course the Zionist
and Tory
press lapped it up.
What had changed from all previous surveys that
found anti-Semitism was far more prevalent on the Right than Left? If true this
was a staggering finding. However what the CAA didn’t put in their press
releases was that they had only achieved this result by adding 6 questions to
the original 6 questions (which were
themselves debatable as Anshel Pfeffer showed in Ha'aretz).
That the CAA is a dishonest political
organisation masquerading as a charity is one thing. That Dr Allington and Dr
Hirsh should allow their support for Zionism to colour ostensibly neutral
academic research should raise questions as to their academic integrity. The
questions were
1.
“I am comfortable spending time with people who
openly support Israel.”
2.
“Israel has a right to exist as a homeland for the
Jewish people.”
3.
“Israel is right to defend itself against those who
want to destroy it.”
4.
“Israel and its supporters are a bad influence on
our democracy.”
5.
“Israel can get away with anything because its
supporters control the media.”
6.
“Israel treats the Palestinians
like the Nazis treated the Jews.”
None
of these statements are in any way anti-Semitic according to the Oxford English Dictionary
definition of anti-Semitism: ‘hostility
to or prejudice against Jews.’
I
wouldn’t be comfortable spending time with supporters of General Franco. Does that make me anti-Spanish? Israel’s
right to exist as a homeland for Jews assumes that Jews aren’t already at home
where they live. Israel having the right to defend itself assumes that it is
under attack for existing rather than for its racist policies. Clearly Israel’s
supporters are bad for democracy, as the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism demonstrates.
And yes the supporters of Israel do control the media. Rupert Murdoch is not an anti-Zionist and
neither is the BBC! It’s only anti-Semitic if you assume Zionists and Jews are
the same, which is an assumption built in to supposedly academic research.
The
most popular ‘anti-Semitic’ statement was no. 6; comparisons between Israel’s
treatment of the Palestinians and how the Nazis treated the Jews. But this is a political statement. It may be right or it may be wrong but how is
it evidence of anti-Semitism?
If
Mann is correct then a number of holocaust survivors such as Israeli Professors
Ze’ev
Sternhell and Yehuda
Elkana were also anti-Semitic. This is the academic employed by Mann.
Both are charlatans. One example of Skawkbox’s 'racism' was
“making throwaway references to ‘a former Chief Rabbi with a
history of supporting racism’ could contribute to the creation of an impression
of Jewishness as inherently suspect.”
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| Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks accused Corbyn of echoing Enoch Powell when he himself recommended a book by Powellite Douglas Murray which advocated the racist (& antisemitic) Great White Replacement Theory |
So
if you accuse former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks of being a racist, which he
was, that is anti-Semitic because he is Jewish!
When
Sacks died, I wrote
an Obituary ‘An establishment bigot.’ and blogged
it. Sacks, who had the audacity to compare Jeremy Corbyn with Enoch Powell endorsed
an openly racist book which advocated the White Replacement Theory by Douglas
Murray, The
Strange Death of Europe. Even Owen Jones found the hypocrisy too much.
Owen Jones, an identity politics supporter
of the fake ‘anti-Semitism’ drivel was also guilty of ‘the creation of Jewishness as inherently suspect.’ This kind of logic
would fail a high school student yet its part of a government
report.
Dishonesty
permeates the Report. Because the far-Right indulges in Jewish conspiracy
theories, the support of Skwawkbox and Canary for the undercover Al Jazeera
programme The Lobby about the influence and activity of the Zionist lobby is
therefore anti-Semitic. No matter that
the latter is true unlike the former. What all these allegations have in common
is a deliberate confusion of ‘Jew’ and ‘Zionist’. And who does this regularly? The same anti-Semites and fascists that Mann
purports to oppose.
Liar
Lee’s article
concludes with a quote from Dr Allington:
“Government and civil society must encourage
use of high quality, reputable sources of information at the expense of
low-quality fringe sources,” it said. “We need not
be helpless in the face of hatred.”
One
wonders just who they mean by ‘high
quality reputable sources of information’ Could it be Britain’s tabloid
press, the Mail, Sun and Express? Clearly there is no criticism of Britain’s
rabidly racist tabloids. Clearly Mann’s real concerns are not Jews or
anti-Semitism but Zionism and Israel.
The only
good thing about Mann’s Report is that it reflects his own mediocre intellectual
talents. It is so poorly argued and
makes such obviously devious and dishonest analogies that only a simpleton or a
rogue like Boris Johnson would fall for it.
It would
seem that Mann has deliberately leaked his Report to the Jewish Chronicle where
it can be guaranteed a warm reception. Let us see whether the rest of the
British press is going to go along with this tendentious and transparent nonsense
Tony
Greenstein
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