Calling Gypsies and Travellers a ‘Nasty
Blight’, targeting Women and Black women especially for abuse and making false
accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ is all
in a day’s trolling for Lukey
 |
| My initial response to Stanger's racist comments |
At
the end of last year, one of the nastiest of Labour’s right-wing trolls, Luke Stanger,
was suspended by the Labour Party. Even by the standards of Labour’s odious Right
Stanger is in a league of his own.
His
speciality is in targeting women, Black or ethnic minority women in particular.
People such as Labour’s Black council candidate in the Brighton and Hove Council
elections, Alex Braithwaite, or Haringey’s Seema
Chandwani. It says a lot about the current state of the Labour Party that
the target of Stanger’s abuse, Alex Braithwaite, has herself now been suspended.
 |
| Another Stanger tweet attacking the only Black candidate in the local elections in Brighton & Hove |
Luke claims Jewish ancestry. It seems every non-Jewish
racist in the Labour Party is now searching their family tree for a trace of Jewish
blood! In reality Luke is about as Jewish as a ham sandwich.
Stanger
has a nasty habit of accusing anti-racists of ‘anti-Semitism’ – especially if they are Black or Jewish! As Alexei
Sayle, the Jewish comedian, said ‘There can be no greater injustice than anti-racists being accused of
racism by racists"
To
be fair (and I always try to be fair) Stanger is a few sandwiches short of a
picnic. He doesn’t seem to understand that non-Jews accusing Black people of racism and Jewish people
of ‘anti-Semitism’ is both racist and anti-Semitic. But what can you expect
from a White person for whom racism is simply an abusive epithet to hurl at your
opponents?
 |
| Luke Stanger with Simon Cobbs (right), founder of Sussex Friends of Israel, a supporter of the neo-Nazi Jewish Defence League, Cobbs has demonstrated with the EDL |
What
makes Stanger’s behaviour so inexcusable is that there has never been the
slightest evidence that he (or the rest of the Labour Right), has ever had the
slightest interest in combating genuine racism.
 |
| Stanger accuses Jewish group the JVL of 'antisemitism' without a trace of irony - I'm also not a member! |
You
won't see Stanger protesting outside Yarl’s Wood or Campsfield Detention
Centres for asylum seekers which New Labour set up and ran. The
idea of him or fellow Zionist trolls campaigning around Grenfell Tower or
any other form of state racism would be to indulge in a flight of fancy. Only
‘anti-Semitism’ concerns them.
And not the kind of anti-Semitism that we are
seeing amongst Israel’s best friends in Hungary,
Poland
or amongst Trump’s supporters. Stanger’s concern about ‘anti-Semitism’
only arises in the context of criticism of Israel or Zionism.
 |
| Zionist group that supports Tommy Robinson attacks Richard Burgon |
 |
| Founder and owner of JHRW in a promotional video with Tommy Robinson |
Indeed
Stanger has taken to retweeting from the far-Right Jewish Human Rights Watch, a group that is neither
Jewish nor interested in human rights.
It is led by Manchester solicitor Robert Festenstein, who made a guest appearance in a promotional video with Tommy Robinson.
 |
| Given that Joan Ryan's departure broke Stanger's heart, one can only assume he will soon be following her |
Stanger
learnt the tricks of the trade when he was an intern with crooked MP,
Joan Ryan. People may remember Ms Ryan from her starring role in Al Jazeera’s The
Lobby when she tried to frame Labour conference delegate Jean Fitzpatrick as an anti-Semite.
Unknown to Ryan, the conversation was being taped. The Labour Party had to
unsuspend Jean when it became clear that Ryan was a brazen liar.
 |
| Joan Ryan has now thankfully departed to the Funny Tinge Group - hopefully Stanger will follow her |
Ryan
of course was a model of probity. She was forced
to repay more than £5,000 in mortgage interest in the parliamentary expenses
scandal. Ryan’s only achievement,
apart from being Chair of Labour
Friends of Israel, was to claim more expenses than any other MP in 2006-7 having
been runner up the previous year. Given the stiff competition this was indeed a
remarkable achievement.
 |
| It speaks volumes that Stanger praises Lansman's 'thoughtful' speech at the JLM |
Stanger
is well connected. It’s rumoured that the reason he wasn’t suspended earlier
was because of support from Tom Watson.
Despite
accusing others of racism, Stanger is quite clearly an accomplished racist in his own right. On August 8th
2018, in response to a Daily
Mail story ‘200 travellers moved from Surrey common invade village SIX MILES away’
Stanger tweeted in response:
‘I am perplexed by how some on the left have
any sympathy for such matters. The
traveller community are frequently a nasty blight on communities who wreak
civil unrest onto areas.’ (my emphasis)
Anyone
who doubts the racist nature of this post should substitute ‘Jews’ for ‘travellers’. It met with a strong response from other Twitter
users.
 |
| Gypsies waiting to be put to death at Auschwitz |
Luke’s
initial defence was that ‘Highlighting that some in the traveller community
cause civil disorder and wreak havoc onto local communities makes me a racist?’ This
was disingenuous. Luke didn’t talk about some but all
travellers. But even if he had used ‘some’ that
would not make the Tweet any less racist. Instead of concentrating on the
hounding of travellers and Gypsies from one area to another, the deprivation
and attacks they suffer, Luke joined in those attacks portraying Gypsies and
Travellers in terms of anti-social behaviour or as the Nazis put it Gemeinschaftsschädlich, damage to the community.
 |
| Stanger doesn't understand why calling Travellers a 'nasty blight' might be racist - perhaps Nigel Farage's Brexit party would be more understanding? |
 |
| Another attack on Anne Mitchell. The Mark in question is lawyer Mark Lewis, a Zionist solicitor recently fined £12,000 by the Law Society for wishing an early death on his critics! Lewis is a far-Right Zionist and member of Herut UK, the party of Benjamin Netanyahu. This is who Lukey keeps company with when attacking socialists |
For
someone who professes to be so aware of ‘anti-Semitism’ that he can attack anti-Zionist
Jews as ‘anti-Semites’ Stanger is seemingly unaware of Porajmos, the extermination of the Gypsies by the Nazis. Of course that is
not so surprising since the Holocaust and the extermination of European Jewry are
treated as being synonymous.
Contrary
to Zionist mythology and the propaganda of the Holocaust mongers, the Jews were
not the only victims of the Holocaust. The Gypsies were murdered in much the
same proportion as the Jews. An estimated half a million died in the camps and
Nazi ghettos. There were Gypsies in both Warsaw and Lodz, the two largest
ghettos in Nazi occupied Poland. But whereas the Jewish Holocaust has been harnessed to the
needs of western imperialism and its support for the Israeli state, the Gypsy Holocaust has been all but forgotten.
The same is true of the T4 ‘Euthenasia’ campaign which marked the start of the Holocaust.
The murder of up to ¾ million disabled people is barely mentioned.
 |
| Pamela Fitzpatrick, a Labour candidate in Harrow, is another woman that Stanger became fixated upon |
The
Holocaust has been the principal ideological justification for the Israeli
state. As Israeli Professor Edith Zertal wrote in The Politics of Nationhood [pp. 4, 91] there hasn’t been a war involving Israel ‘that has not been perceived, defined, and
conceptualized in terms of the Holocaust.’ Israel has mobilised the Holocaust
‘in the service of Israeli politics.’
Even
the definition of anti-Semitism which conflates anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism
is called the International
Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. Israel receives the largest amount
of US aid in the world, all of it military, because Israel is a state which operates
as the West’s armed watchdog in the Middle East.
The
Gypsies play no such role and are instead the scapegoat of the European Right. Last
June the fascist Deputy Prime Minister of Italy, Matteo Salvini promised
to expel thousands of Roma and conduct a census of the remainder in a chilling
reminder of what happened under Mussolini.
 |
| Stanger is 'sick to my stomach' because Seamus Milne is part of Labour's negotiating team with Theresa May in 'constitutionally historic talks'. Clearly Stanger is in the wrong party and should be helped to migrate. |
It
is because there is no political utility in opposing racism against Gypsies
that the Labour Right, not just Stanger, have demonised them. In his Defence
after having been suspended Stanger drew attention to the anti-Gypsy racism
that is prevalent amongst MPs and Councillors.
 |
| John Mann's racist anti-Gypsy booklet |
Stanger
mentioned John Mann MP in particular. Mann, who famously called Ken
Livingstone a ‘Nazi apologist’, issued
a pamphlet on Anti-Social Behaviour in which Gypsies were demonised as
a social pest and nuisance.
There is a certain logic in Stanger’s Defence. Why
hasn’t Mann been suspended? However it is no defence against racism
to point to the treatment of other racists. It’s like complaining of being
prosecuted for speeding and pointing to the fact that other people were also breaking
the speed limit.
 |
| Romani children who were victims of the medical experiments of Auschwitz Dr Mengele - what Stanger calls a social blight |
Stanger has engaged in a
non-stop campaign against the Labour Party’s only Black candidate in the
local elections in Brighton and Hove, Alex Braithwaite. Why? Because she cast
doubt on the existence of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party and suggested it
had been a means of attacking Corbyn. That is obviously true. Why else would
the Mail and The Sun be so concerned about
Labour anti-Semitism? Is it seriously suggested that newspapers who employed Katie ‘migrants
are cockroaches’ Hopkins are seriously concerned with
anti-Semitism? Why is it anti-Semitic to cast doubt on the motives of those who
are weaponising anti-Semitism?
 |
| A few of the reactions on Twitter to Stanger's views on Gypsies |
Anti-Semitism
in the Labour Party was never raised until Corbyn was elected Leader. It was
only after the 2017 General Election, when to everyone’s surprise, Corbyn
achieved the biggest swing to Labour since 1945, that claims began to be made
that Labour was ‘institutionally anti-Semitic’. As Bob Pitt observed:
[Luciana] Berger
wasn’t alone in undergoing a dramatic conversion to the view that Labour is
afflicted by a plague of antisemitism. Back in 2016 Berger’s fellow Independent
Group founder Chuka Umunna
similarly dismissed suggestions that party was institutionally antisemitic (“I have not seen one incident of antisemitism
in almost 20 years of activism within my local Labour Party”), as did
Jewish Labour Movement vice-chairs Sarah Sackman and Mike Katz (“neither of us has ever experienced any incidence of anti-Semitism from
within the party”), only for all of them to discover just a couple of years
later that the Labour Party was riddled with antisemitism from top to bottom.
To
people like Stanger and the JLM denying the existence of anti-Semitism in the
Labour Party is in itself proof that
you are anti-Semitic. It is the same logic that prevailed in the Salem Witch Trials. Denial
of the existence of witchcraft was proof that you were a witch! This is the
medieval standard of justice that Stanger and the Labour Right employ.
 |
| Did Yvette Cooper know she was giving a misogynist and racist a photo opp? |
What
makes it worse is that whilst Stanger has repeatedly harassed Alex Braithwaite for
exercising her freedom of speech other Labour council candidates who hold the
same opinions and who, like Alex, oppose the IHRA, have not been targeted. Why? The only conclusion is
that they are White.
Alex
has now, quite shamefully, been suspended and such a decision increases the likelihood of the Tories retaining a marginal seat. It is shameful that Jenny
Formby and Jeremy Corbyn have effected a regime that takes its orders from the Tory Press
and Guido Fawkes. Helping the Tories retain a seat is what
Stanger calls his ‘love’ of the Labour Party.
Stanger’s
Self-Pitying Whines
What
is truly pathetic is how Stanger whines and sobs about how terribly he is
suffering as a result of his suspension! He is quite happy to harass others who
are vulnerable and for his political enemies to be suspended without good cause
but when he is suspended he engages in one long self-pitying whine. He pleads in his Defence
that::
I also wish to set out my mental health
problems as I believe you should take these into account.
As noted above, I suffer from
depression, anxiety and ADHD. I don’t wish to invoke my mental health as an
emotive matter. Nor do I wish to use it as a prism with which to contextualise
any mistakes I have made.
However, the process my suspension has
so far entailed has sent me down into a deep depression and seen my motivation
affected. Being so abruptly formally suspended from the organisation that makes
up such a significant part of my heart and soul was crushing.
Skwawkbox appeared to know more about
the reasons for my suspension than I did, shaking my faith in the integrity of
the party’s disciplinary process
This
special pleading by someone who has done so much to inflict depression and
suffering on others is symptomatic of the Labour
Rights self-obsession and sense of victim-hood. A lack of
empathy and understanding of how others feel is certainly part of Stanger’s
condition but this is not so much a mental as a political affliction. Not once,
in his incessant abuse of women in particular has he ever thought about the
effects of his own actions on others. In his self-indulgent whine, he tweeted
that:
‘I
am so desperately sad to be informed that my Labour Party membership suspension
has been referred onto the NCC... From the outset this process has been marred
with an absence of due process... vindictive spirit... the letter of my formal
suspension containing only unspecified allegations in mid-October relating to
‘social media conduct’ to the leak to Skawkbox several weeks later who were
given prior notice of my charges before I was... the sense of powerlessness
felt by the matter’s unreasonable conduct...’
And
so it goes on. Whine after whine, bleat after bleat, moan after self-indulgent moan. It’s strange
how the Right only talk about due process when they experience their own treatment of others. Civil liberties are only applicable to them. One person, Carl Sargeant, even
committed suicide after being suspended but I don't recall Luke Stanger displaying the
slightest interest or concern. One might have an ounce of sympathy for this
wretch if Stanger hadn’t done his
best to inflict as much pain and suffering on his political foes.
I
was suspended for two years for comments I was alleged to have made. I wasn’t even
told what those comments were still less who had made the complaints. A letter arrived in the post one sunny spring day in 2016 and when I emailed and rang up Labour HQ I was given no information whatsoever.
The first
that I knew of the reasons for my suspension was when my son alerted me to
articles in The Telegraph and Times online two weeks later. Powerlessness? Depression? Vindictiveness? Stanger and his cronies gloated at my suspension and that of many others. They called the Chakrabarti Report a ‘whitewash’ because it called for due process and natural justice.
So
you might not be surprised that I don’t feel too much sympathy with Stanger’s plaints.
As for Stanger’s mental health problems. I do not accept that his vitriolic,
racist and misogynist behaviour are a consequence of his mental health. If Stanger suffers
from anything it is a political pathology for which there is probably no cure
this side of socialism.
 |
| Harris Fitch in the middle with two Sussex Friends of Israel members |
On 9th July in Brighton after an Annual General
Meeting that the Left won by 2-1 (& which was almost immediately set aside
because of lies by Councillors Emma
Daniels and Warren
Morgan) there was an ugly
incident in a pub afterwards. Two right-wing Labour thugs, one of whom
was Harris Fitch, threatened and abused Seema Chandwani and Michael Calderbank
who were told “get the fuck out of Brighton now, scum”. They had previously addressed a packed to overflowing Momentum
rally at the Brighthelm community centre. The person who pointed
out Seema and Michael to these thugs was Stanger:
I was in conversation with two
individuals at the bar... I pointed out to them that also in the bar was a man
called Michael Calderbank who had previously worked for John McDonnell. I
suggested he might have been in Brighton to organise for Momentum’s attempt to
win the local party AGM. ... At no point did I foresee what occurred next,
which was that the two individuals were abusive and threatening towards Mr
Calderbank and his partner, Seema Chandwani. The subsequent offensive conduct
by the two individuals was entirely unpredictable...’
And if you
believe that you really do believe in Father Xmas. Stanger by his own admission, having targeted Seema and Michael did nothing to restrain his associates.
 |
| Stanger blamed the objects of his attacks for 'bullying' him |
Stanger
claims that he harassed Alex Braithwaite and wrote tweets attacking
her candidature ‘because I am extremely
concerned about incidents involving antisemitism in my local party, which have
been common knowledge in recent years.’ Really? What incidents? There haven’t been any anti-Semitic
incidents in Brighton and Hove Labour Party so why should he be concerned
about a non-existent threat?
Of
course people criticise Israel and Zionism but that is not
anti-Semitism unless Stanger believes that Jews and Israel are one and the same
thing. If so then it is he who is being anti-Semitic
because he is saying that British Jews bear a responsibility for the actions of
Israel.
 |
| More Black women that Stanger has fixated upon |
What
puzzles me is why someone who has been active in the Labour Party since 2010, and who has had no
involvement in anti-racist or anti-fascist activity, suddenly be so concerned about
‘anti-Semitism’? In April 2012 there was a mass mobilisation of hundreds of people in Brighton
and Hove which prevented the English Defence League marching through the city centre. We stopped the fascist march. Stanger played no part in this unlike the people he is now
vilifying.
 |
| One of many tweets from Stanger attacking anti-racist members of the Labour Party as 'antisemitic' |
Another person that he has demonised as an ‘anti-Semite’ is Hove Labour Party Executive Member Anne Mitchell. Active in Palestine solidarity and anti-racist
work she too has now been suspended. Anne’s offence according to Stanger?
‘stating
antisemitism is being ‘privileged’ against other forms of racism. I am unable
to determine how any racism can be privileged against any other and therefore
concluded that she in some way is trivialising antisemitism compared to other
forms of racism.
The Labour Opposition under Ed Miliband supported
the 2014 Immigration Act and Theresa May's 'hostile environment policy' which led to the Windrush deportations of hundreds of Black people. Has Stanger ever raised concerns over genuine issues of racism such as these? Has he or his Labour Right trolls shown any concern
over the Grenfell fire which was as much the responsibility of New Labour as
the Tories?
Anti-Semitism has been the only
form of racism that has been raised in the Labour Party by Stanger and his fellows. What is this if not privileging anti-Semitism? Jews in
Britain are not subject to deportation, do not suffer from Stop and Search or
Police violence or over representation in the prison estate. Jews in Britain are not economically discriminated against. Those whose only concern is a non-existent 'antisemitism' related of course to Israel are obviously privileging anti-Semitism.
 |
Stanger attacking the Chair of his CLP as well as Anne
|
According to Stanger ‘Anne Mitchell has also asked JLM to
justify reports of IDF violence.’ Apparently this is ‘invoking a
traditional antisemitic trope in suggesting British Jews have split national
loyalties that involve Israel or are collectively responsible for the
actions of a state they are not usually citizens of.’
The hypocrisy is breathtaking. The JLM sponsored the IHRA definition of
anti-Semitism which states that ‘Denying
the Jewish people their right to self-determination (e.g. by claiming that the
existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour)’ is anti-Semitic.
If words mean anything then this means that Israel is, as it claims to be,
the nation state of all Jewish people, including British Jews. That is what Israel’s
Jewish Nation State Law claims. Zionist mythology holds that Israeli Jews are
part of a world wide Jewish nation. If this is so then Jews in Britain are obviously
responsible for what Israel does since they are part of one, world-wide Jewish nation.
But Anne wasn’t even doing that.
She was querying a Zionist organisation,
the JLM which is affiliated to the
World Zionist Organisation and what its view was on Israeli army violence. The
JLM is the British wing of the Israeli Labour Party. The JLM only accepts
Zionists, Jewish and non-Jewish, as members. Of course it is perfectly right to
challenge it on where it stands on the violence of Israel's military.
So worked up was Stanger that he made a Complaint
Against Ann Mitchell. Anne tweeted him: ‘Can
we please stop talking as if all Jewish comrades are in agreement and hold
similar views, because they do not.’ By conflating the JLM with all Jews it
is Stanger who is guilty of the very crime he accuses Anne (& Alex)
of. In her tweet to the JLM she
specifically referred to ‘Zionist orgs’.
It is Stanger’s anti-Semitism which translates ‘Zionist’ into ‘Jew’ when
as Stanger knows, the worst Zionist racists are, like himself and the neo-Nazi founder
of the alt-Right, Richard Spencer, non-Jewish. Spencer even calls himself a White
Zionist, an apt description for Stanger.
Tony Greenstein
