What is stopping you speaking out against the attack on freedom of speech and democracy by Starmer & Evans?
In
2015 Brighton Kemptown CLP was fully supportive of the Corbyn insurgency. Colin
Piper, who is now Chair of the CLP, was an active participant in Momentum. In
2019 he was backed by Momentum as a candidate in the local elections in Queens
Park.
Since then he has become Chair of the CLP and adopted the ‘anti-Semitism’ narrative which holds that support for the Palestinians and criticism of Zionism is ‘anti-Semitic’. He berates Paddy O’Keeffe, who has now been suspended twice, for his criticism of Israel. He asks why criticise Israel when there are so many other examples of human rights abuse, singling out India and China, as examples.
Colin
is old enough to remember the campaign against Apartheid in South Africa. This was
the constant refrain of Apartheid’s supporters. They pointed to human rights
abuses in neighbouring Black countries forgetting that there was an
interrelationship between the two.
So
it is that someone who was once a socialist, indeed on the far-left and a
candidate for the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition in 2015, has ended up a
parrot in the service of Starmer and Rayner.
Contrary
to the reverence that Colin holds Israel is unique, not only in claiming the mantle of the holocaust as justification for its
atrocities, but in the role it plays as a surrogate of the USA. In the Middle
East it is the US’s watchdog and has formed alliances with the most repressive
states in that region.
 |
| Indian troops in Kashmir |
But
it’s not just in the Middle East that Israel’s baleful influence is felt. It is
the largest
weapons supplier to India, the very example that Piper uses in Israel’s
defence. India’s occupation of Kashmir under the murderously racist regime of
Narendra Modi is indeed shocking. But Israel is integrally involved in
supporting India’s occupation of Kashmir with weapons and training for the
India forces.
One
of the ironies of Israel’s close alliance with the India of the BJP and
Narendra Modi is the pro-Nazi roots of the BJP. This is part of the reason for
the popularity
today of Mein Kampf which is a bestseller
among India’s nationalists.
It’s
not only India. Israel played a crucial role in Latin America from the 1970’s
in supporting a whole range of murderous and fascist regimes from Chile’s
Pinochet to Argentina’s Junta. A junta
which tortured and murdered
up to 3,000 Jews. Despite Jews being less than 1% of Argentina’s population
they made up to 12% of those who ‘disappeared’. It was a neo-Nazi regime but
that didn’t bother the Zionist regime which never once raised the question of the Junta’s anti-Semitism. Today Israel
is supplying
weapons to the neo-Nazi Azov battalion in Ukraine which should cause people
like Colin to ask some questions. This is what the Jewish state has become.
But
when you become like Colin a renegade from socialism and a loyal servant of the
Labour Party’s apparatchiks you stop asking questions such as who was behind
the ‘anti-Semitism’ wars. Instead you
turn on principled socialists like Paddy instead.
Tony
Greenstein
Open
Letter to Colin Piper
Dear
Colin,
As
you wrote in your email to Paddy O’Keeffe earlier this year, this is a letter
that I didn’t want to write. But on the other hand, if I didn’t write it and just
let your betrayal of comrades to pass in silence, I would feel even more
guilty.
As
you must be aware, there is a massive
witchhunt taking place in the Labour Party
alongside a wholescale
attack on free speech. It is led by Keir
Starmer and his unelected glove puppet David Evans. In previous years you would
have been part of the fightback.
Over
100 CLPs up
and down the country have passed
resolutions demanding the restoration of the Whip to Jeremy Corbyn and/or expressing
no confidence in Starmer and Evans. Indeed 230
CLPs, well over a third, have written to Starmer protesting at his
Inquisition.
These
include Brighton
Pavilion, Eastbourne
and Chingford
and Wood Green CLP where Vice Chair
Naomi Wimborne-Iddrissi, has been suspended. Naomi is Secretary of Jewish Voice
for Labour. When you are trying to ‘tear
out the poison of anti-Semitism’
from Labour it’s always a good idea to suspend a few Jews!
Just
last week 7 members of the Labour Party, 4 of whom are Jewish, filed
a legal action against the Labour
Party. They included Diane Neslen, an 81 year old Jew. As JVL wrote:
In September
2018, five months after the sudden death of her husband and while undergoing
cancer treatment, she received a reminder of conduct from the Labour Party
detailing eleven ‘offences’ she had committed. All were social media postings related to
Israel’s policies and conduct.
Diana
wasn’t the only Jewish victim of the callous ciphers at Labour Party HQ. Others
suspended include 82 year old Professor Jonathan Rosenhead, 83 year old Michael
Ellman and a sprightly 68 year old Mike Howard, a former councillor from
Hastings and Rye. Today’s Jewish Chronicle has an article calling for the expulsion
of JVL.
None
of this prevented Evans and Labour’s regional mafia from doing their best to
prevent discussion of motions on
the pretext of ensuring the
safety of Jews! Even the most obtuse Starmer supporter should be able to work
it out that Jews have become instrumentalised in the war Starmer and Evans are
waging against their opponents. Some with more finely attuned antennae might
think that this is anti-Semitic.
I
am puzzled therefore at the silence of Brighton Kemptown CLP, of which you are
the Chair.
I look forward to hearing your explanation, other than old-fashioned political
cowardice?
In
2015 you were a council
candidate for the far-left Trade Union and
Socialist Coalition in Queens Park. I also stood
for Council alongside TUSC. Unlike you I haven’t taken the road to the right
since then.
I
first met you in meetings of Brighton & Hove Momentum in 2016. At that time
there was no indication of your present politics. In 2018 you were a Council
candidate for Queens Park, losing to the
Greens.
Paddy
O’Keeffe, a member of Queens Park Labour Party, has been suspended for the second
time in as many years. The allegations relate to false allegations of
‘anti-Semitism’. The same allegations that were leveled against Paddy
previously have been regurgitated.
As
Chair of the CLP I would expect you to be to the fore in defending Paddy. Yet
it would seem that you are supporting Paddy’s racist attackers and defamers.
I
don’t know whether or not you or your associates have had a direct input in these
bogus complaints. What I do know is that you and Sim Elliot, who is also a
member in Queens Park, made wholly unfounded allegations of ‘anti-Semitism’ against
Paddy.
I
have known Paddy for over a decade. Paddy has been a long-standing campaigner
against war and racism. The suggestions that you made in your email of 21st
January that Paddy was somehow ‘unconsciously’
anti-Semitic is poppycock as well as insulting.
You
made a number of unfounded assertions which I previously wrote to you about. I
am always interested in what makes non-Jews with no previous interest in racism
such experts on anti-Semitism.
You
asserted that ‘a
cartoon on Facebook showing the Star of David dripping blood on to a pile of
dead babies’
was anti-Semitic because the Star of David is a symbol of Judaism. The Star of
David was a symbol of Judaism but the Zionist movement stole it in order to cloak
its movement in a religious mantle. For Palestinians the Star of David is what
the Swastika is to Jews.
Just
this week a 15 year old boy Ali Abu Alia, who was was murdered
by Israel’s army. A bullet was fired into his stomach. Live fire is never used against Jewish demonstrators.
That is one reason why Israel is an apartheid state. Over 50 children were murdered
by snipers when demonstrating at the Gaza fence. In 2014 551 children were murdered
in the attack on Gaza. The cartoon is clearly accurate.
It
would however seem that you are more concerned with cartoons depicting Israel’s
bloodletting than the actual bloodletting. If I was you I would concentrate
less on unconscious racism than your own, very conscious, racism.
You
also said that you ‘have Jewish blood in me’ when berating Paddy for being a ‘serial offender.’ Some might say that
the concept of ‘Jewish blood’ was itself anti-Semitic. I would be interested in
knowing how ‘Jewish blood’ differs from its non-Jewish counterpart since even
the Nazis couldn’t find the missing ingredients!
You took except to Paddy’s claim that Israel is
the world’s only apartheid state.
‘If
only that were true’ you wrote before asking ‘Why does it seem that some on the
left judge Israel by different standards than the rest of the world?’
Ah, the IHRA’s
double-standards! Perhaps it is because Israel is the only full fledged
Apartheid state in the world. That is not my opinion but that of Ha’aretz,
when commenting on a court decision that the Jewish Nation State
Law meant that the ‘Jewish’ city of Carmiel should
not have to fund the travel expenses of Arab children going to school because that
might encourage more Arabs to move to Carmiel. As Israel’s Prime Minister
Netanyahu explained
“Israel is
not a state of all its citizens. According to the basic nationality law we
passed, Israel is the nation state of the Jewish people – and only it.
Why
do you have such difficulty with what is such a simple concept? On the West
Bank there isn’t even formal equality under the law. There two systems of law –
one for Jews and another for Palestinians.
In
your email you say that ‘As
I write this millions of Indian Muslims are protesting the racist Citizenship
(amendment) Act 2019.’ Whataboutery but it is true. India is becoming an Apartheid
state. And who are their partners? Hindu nationalists model themselves on Israel.
The BJP which now rules India was formed by the RSS which idolises Israel. The founders of the RSS also idolised another
ethno-nationalist state, Nazi Germany. As Wikpedia observes:
During World
War II, the RSS leaders admired Adolf Hitler and Benito
Mussolini. Golwalkar [their leader] allegedly
took inspiration from Adolf Hitler's ideology of racial purity. This did not
imply any antipathy towards Jews. The RSS leaders were supportive of the formation
of Jewish State of Israel."
Not that there is anything unique in the
admiration of anti-Semites for Israel. From Donald Trump to Steve Bannon and Richard Spencer, the neo-Nazi founder of the alt-Right, the
far-Right admires Israel as an ethno nationalist state. Viktor Orban, the
Hungarian Prime Minister combines admiration for Hungary’s war-time pro-Nazi leader Admiral
Horthy (an exceptional statesman) with visceral
anti-Semitism
and a warm relationship with Netanyahu. Tommy Robinson too declares he is a Zionist.
As Foreign Policy noted
‘Israel’s
right-wing government sees the illiberal nationalist leaders of Poland and
Hungary as natural allies. They share a hostility toward human rights,
Enlightenment values, and the European Union.’
So
your point about why we don’t criticise India for its treatment of Kashmir is
fatuous. Or have you forgotten that it was Keir Starmer who unilaterally
tore up Labour policy on support for
Kashmiri self-determination? Kashmir is India’s Palestine.
There
is an alliance between Zionism and Hindu nationalists in this and other
countries. Gideon Falter of the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism
was reported in the Milli
Gazette, as attending a meeting in 2018
at the House of Commons at the invitation of Tory MP Bob Blackman, ‘the
rabidly pro-Hindutva Tory MP from Harrow East’, and a patron of the Campaign
Against Anti-Semitism.
Gideon
Falter, the Chair of the CAA, told the meeting that he and his supporters would
do all they could to help eradicate the ‘duty’
on the government to make Caste an aspect of race in
the Equality Act of 2010. [UK
Government will repeal caste law]
Blackman called for the need to learn from the way the CAA had got the IHRA
definition of antisemitism passed in the Labour Party!
Just
as the IHRA has been used by Zionists to attack supporters of the Palestinians so
‘Hinduphobia’ is being weaponised against opponents of the military occupation
of Kashmir and the pogroms against Muslims, Dalits and other minorities in
India. The ‘logic’ behind the false accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ and
‘hinduphobia’ is that if you oppose racist ethno nationalism it is because you
oppose them as Jews or Hindus not because of what they do.
Israel
and India have an extremely close political relationship. If you want to learn
more then I suggest you read my article
on the alliance between Israel, Zionism and Hindu nationalism.
Your
examples, rather than proving Paddy O’Keeffe is anti-Semitic prove the
opposite. I just hope that instead of imbibing the racism of Starmer and his
supporters you will support motions calling on the terrible 2 to quit and for
the whip to be restored to Jeremy Corbyn.
Fraternally,
Tony
Greenstein
Email sent to Paddy O’Keeffe by Colin Piper
From: COLIN PIPER
Date: 21/01/2020 17:29
(GMT+00:00)
To: Paddy O’Keeffe
Subject: Anti-Semitism and other stuff
Dear Paddy,
Your post on WhatsApp regarding the Board of Deputies
10 Pledges has prompted me to write this letter that I have been putting off
for weeks. Putting off because I don’t want to write it and because I have
things I would rather be doing.
The last 10 years of my life have been dealing with
the issue of unconscious bias. In my case I was concerned to address why so few
girls study physics in England, but I illustrated and explained the problem by
exploring attitudes to race.
The first task was to prove to my audience that they
did indeed have biases they denied or were unaware of, that was easy. The next
thing was to explain that such biases didn’t make you a bad person, and finally
my task was to suggest changes in behaviour that could ameliorate or remove the
effects of such biases.
‘What has all this got to do with the Board of
Deputies?’ I here you ask.
You posted a cartoon on Facebook showing the Star of
David dripping blood on to a pile of dead babies. The Star of David is the
symbol of Judaism, it is the thing Jewish people wear around their necks to
identify themselves as Jewish. Your cartoon is therefore saying that Jews are
responsible for the murder of children. How you cannot see that this is
anti-Semitic is frankly a mystery to me, but it is.
The reason for my rather long preamble is to try and
explain that you don’t have to be a holocaust denier or global Jewish
conspiracy theorist to act in an anti-Semitic way. You don’t even have to wish
ill on a single Jewish person. Behaving in a way that offends Jews merely involves
failing to take account of their feelings when you act. I believe that you did
that, and I think that you are a serial offender.
You are also not the only one. A meme was posted on
the Brighton Kemptown Labour Party Facebook group recently that said, “Critics
of Israel and Jews are justified” (my emphasis). Maybe it’s because I
come from North London and, like most cockney’s, have Jewish blood in me, but I
simply cannot understand how anyone can post such a thing. Just reading it
makes my blood run cold.
There are more subtle examples too. I repeatedly see
the claim that “Israel is the world’s only apartheid state”. If only that were
true! As I write this millions of Indian Muslims are protesting the racist
Citizenship (amendment) Act 2019. China is holding up to a million Uighur
Muslims in internment camps where they are being ‘re-educated’. The annexing of
part of Kashmir by India prompted just one post on the Brighton Kemptown
Facebook page, less than the average daily number of posts about Israel and Palestine.
Why is there this difference in emphasis? Why does it seem that some on the
left judge Israel by different standards than the rest of the world? I am not
certain of the answers to these questions, but I do believe that unconscious
bias plays a part and can understand why some Jewish observers find it
offensive.
And yet you and the person responsible for the meme
above and the person who tweeted that we should ‘march on a synagogue’ and the
rest, all vehemently and loudly deny any wrongdoing, “there’s no anti-Semitism
in the Labour Party” we are repeatedly told.
Of course, the issue of anti-Semitism has been
politicised by the establishment and the right wing, of course the media has
massively exaggerated the problems in the Labour Party whilst ignoring the much
larger problems in the Tories, of course the intervention by the Chief Rabbi
was disgraceful. But the question remains, why has the accusation of
anti-Semitism stuck while the accusations of terrorist sympathiser, foreign spy
and IRA supporter failed?
The answer is that for a lie to be believable it must
have some truth in it. Why does it seem that some on the left judge Israel by
different standards than the rest of the world? I am not certain of the answers
to these questions, but I do believe that unconscious bias plays a part and can
understand why some Jewish observers find it offensive.
This letter makes me very sad Paddy. I have always
liked and respected you in the past but I’m afraid your disgraceful threat of a
law suit against Sim at the height of an election campaign that saw some of us
out every night for weeks in the rain and freezing cold, together with your
posting of a cartoon that I found deeply disturbing and offensive, have led me
to lose that affection and trust.
I very much hope that we can find a way to regain the
mutual respect and affection we once had.
Regards,
Colin
Suspended
Members of Labour Activists 4 Justice
Diana Neslen (age
81) is a General Committee delegate to Ilford South CLP. She is
an Orthodox Jew. She rejoined the Labour
party in 2015 following the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader and is a member
of Jewish Voice for Labour. She has been a long time Palestinian and antiracist
activist. In September 2018, five months after the sudden death of her husband
and while undergoing cancer treatment, she received a reminder of conduct from
the Labour Party detailing eleven ‘offences’ she had committed. All were social media postings related to
Israel’s policies and conduct. There was no indication anywhere as to the
identity of the complainants or the definition of antisemitism the Party was
applying, and some of the postings predated her Labour party membership. Although she contacted the Party to discover
the nature of the ‘offences’, she received no response. In May 2020, while shielding alone, she
received a notice of investigation from an anonymous employee of the Labour
party detailing seven items that required investigation for
antisemitism. The complainants were again anonymous and the definition not
based on the published code. Although she has made contact with the party to
request further information and later on to explain the proper context in which
what she said must be understood, they have at no time had the courtesy to
reply. It is chilling that the Labour party feels emboldened to accuse a Jewish
woman of antisemitism on the basis of a hidden definition, and by its unfair
processes expose the truth of the EHRC findings about its unjust complaints
process.
Jonathan Rosenhead (age 82) is Chair of Hoxton
West branch and serves on the Executive of Hackney South and Shoreditch CLP.
He first joined the Labour Party in 1962, and was a Labour Parliamentary
candidate in 1966; he rejoined the party in 2015. His Notice of Investigation
served in May 2020 cited as evidence i) a speech at the February CLP meeting
nominating Jo Bird for the NEC, in which his mention of her well known
‘Jew-process’ joke was allegedly a disciplinary offence; ii) words which were
incorrectly asserted to be part of his verbal evidence as a witness at Ken
Livingstone’s disciplinary hearing in 2017; and iii) an article he had written
in Open Democracy in October 2017 describing the launch meeting of Jewish Voice
for Labour (but which of the 3000 words were problematic was not specified).
His conduct is being judged on the basis of an unpublished version of the code.
Michael Ellman (age 83) is Auditor of Junction
Ward branch of Islington North CLP. He is a
practising Jew. He joined the Labour Party in 1980, re-joined in 2015, and is a
solicitor and former Vice-President of FIDH (International Federation for Human
Rights), who has fought for human rights and against racism all his life. He proposed a motion in August 2020 to an
internal branch meeting to reconsider the IHRA definition of antisemitism
because it might stifle legitimate political debate, and substitute the Oxford
English Dictionary definition, which was leaked to the Press by an unknown
person and he was immediately suspended from the Party for conduct grossly
prejudicial to the Party following a complaint by an unknown person.
Mike Howard (age 68) Member of Hastings &
Rye CLP. Active Labour
Party member for over thirty-five years, holding office in six CLP’s during
this time. Twice elected Hastings Borough Councillor. Retired (former
office-holding) Unison life member. Unite Community, JVL and PSC. He is a
Jewish, lifelong anti-racist whose family escaped the murderous pogroms in
pre-war Russia/Poland and fought the fascists in their East London
neighbourhood. Mike has suffered real anti-semitism, and finds it completely
unacceptable that Labour Party HQ, knowing that he is Jewish, has not responded
to his solicitors’ request to drop an anonymous complainant’s accusations of
anti-semitism against him which is based on the process the EHRC found was
unfair and based on a code the Party will not publish.
John Davies (age 66) Former Chair, St Michael’s
Branch, Liverpool Riverside CLP. Member
since 2015. He is accused of 7 instances of hostility or prejudice based on
race or religion. The instances are mostly re-posts of material posted by
others, including a former Israeli minister and a Palestinian doctor, and the
charges are based on definitions of antisemitism in a version of an
antisemitism code of conduct that the Labour Party will not publish. Mr Davies
has been an active anti-racist all his life, and denies all the charges.
Colin O Driscoll (age 60) Vice Chair Labour
International CLP (Labour Party’s International Section). First
joined the Labour Party in 1978, rejoined in 2015 (pre-Corbyn). He is accused
on the basis of social media posts of ]various instances of misconduct. The
complaint was made some time before May 2020, by a person or persons unknown.
The charges were laid in 2020 as part of an express expulsion procedure. He
strongly denies the charges, which again are based on an antisemitism code of
conduct that the Labour Party will not publish.
Chris Wallis (age 71) Vice Chair Hazel Grove
CLP (near Stockport) . Member since 2015 (pre-Corbyn).
He is accused of 5 instances of conduct prejudicial or grossly detrimental to
the party relating to racism, and in particular antisemitism. The complaint was
made in December 2019 by persons unknown, but the charges were not laid till
June 2020, and only then after he had requested an update from the Party as he
was about to be Acting Chair of his CLP. He rejects the charges absolutely,
which again are based on a version of an antisemitism code of conduct that the
Labour Party will not publish.
