First Old, Then New - Now Meet Conspiracy Labour
Lots of words have been written about anti-Semitism in and around the Labour Party in recent days, but none better than this powerful article by David Aaronovitch in The Times.
The key point is that Jeremy Corbyn did not stumble into the latest 'mural' controversy like some kind of innocent abroad - it's the political world in London that the Labour leader has lived in and operated very happily in for many years.
The difference this time is that he's been caught out.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/corbynite-left-has-fallen-for-conspiracy-theories-jcq7zh76f
Corbynite left has fallen for conspiracy theories
By david aaronovitch - The Times
The growing row over antisemitism shows how many Labour members have swallowed the lies and delusions we thought we’d seen the back of
Years ago I wrote a book about conspiracy theories and how they had affected the world. I started with the great antisemitic forgery, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which the historian Norman Cohn called “a warrant for genocide” and ended, more or less, with the demeaning “Birther” theory that Barack Obama was not really an American citizen.
But I now realise that the tone of the end of the book was wrong. Written before social media took off, I had presumed that in the West we had conspiracism more or less licked. In the last couple of years, however, not only has conspiracist thinking prospered, in some cases it has come to power. The Birther Donald Trump is in the White House and the prime minister of Hungary seeks reelection, claiming to be fighting a conspiracy run by the Jewish financer George Soros. Meanwhile, the Russian state pumps out falsehoods on an industrial scale and now, here in Britain, large parts of the official opposition tolerate the dissemination of conspiracy theories by people close to the leadership.
Let’s start with the case of “Mear One”, the American anarchist who specialises in painting street murals. In 2012 he came over here and imposed one of his works on a regularly-graffitied wall in London’s East End. Residents complained to the mayor of Tower Hamlets that they thought the mural was antisemitic, since it seemed to depict at least some of the money-counting exploiters (sitting under occult masonic symbols) as Jewish. The mayor agreed and the mural was “buffed”.
The artist denied the charge on his Facebook page. The next day two British left-wingers added comments on the site deprecating the attack on the mural. One was the former Respect Party activist and Iranian Press TV presenter, Yvonne Ridley. The other was the backbencher Jeremy Corbyn.
When the mural story broke again last week the first reaction of several Corbyn supporters was to say (as they had over Russia’s involvement in the Salisbury poisonings) that Corbyn’s original judgment had been correct and that the mural was innocent.
Unfortunately for them, the artist pitched up on the website of David Icke this week to explain himself. “The only platform, apart from my own, that I will choose to speak through,” he said, “is this one.” Icke is the former professional footballer who declared himself the Messiah, has endorsed antisemitic conspiracy theories including the Protocols and, in the words of Wikipedia, believes that “many prominent figures belong to the Babylonian Brotherhood, a group of shape-shifting reptilian humanoids.” One of whom, I seem to recall, is me.
In his exchange with Icke, Mear One concedes that some of the figures in his mural are indeed Jewish and adds barmily, “There are several other hidden symbols, which some may argue have Jewish influences, such as the star configuration that rises above the eagle crest forming a two-dimensional tetrahedron, considered by some as the star of David, I always wondered why?” Lizards, that’s why. Or the Kabbalah. Whatever, just lay off the patchouli in future.
Anyway, just to make sure readers get the point, Mear puts the ultimate villain into the frame by writing “Mayer Amschel Rothschild once said, ‘Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who makes the laws.’” Wicked money-grubber. But, if you check it, this quote is apocryphal, probably originating with an American lobbyist in 1913. Though I’m coming back to it.
So the mural which Corbyn carelessly praised and that some of his followers defended was the product of a conspiracist view of the world. But to err is human, so now consider the case of Elleanne Green. Ms Green, a Londoner, is a member of the actor’s union Equity and a leading light in Artists for Palestine.
She also set up and was for a while the administrator of the 3,000-strong closed Facebook group Palestine Live, of which Jeremy Corbyn was a member for at least two years until 2015. The aim of the group was “to gather together a group of good friends all of whom wholeheartedly support the people of Palestine in their struggle”. In addition to Mr Corbyn, the Labour MPs Chris Williamson and Clive Lewis were members, as was the former Liberal Democrat peer, Jenny Tonge.
In 2015 Ms Green added a Carol Foster as a group administrator. Ms Foster is associated with the Trotskyist group “Socialist Fight” whose most notorious member was Gerry Downing. Mr Downing was on the General Committee of Brent Central Labour Party when, in 2016, he was outed by David Cameron and only then expelled by Labour for his antisemitic views. Mr Downing told Andrew Neil on the BBC that he was not antisemitic but that “Zionism is in the vanguard role in the capitalist offensive against the workers”, and that he was against “the millionaires and billionaires of Zionist persuasion (who) have dual citizenship, most of them.” Mr Downing was on the counter-demonstration against Jewish organisations protesting about Labour antisemtism on Monday night.
Ms Green was also on very cordial terms with Mr Corbyn. When, for example, she went on her hols to Havana he wrote to her to “have a wonderful time and record it all, a very special time for Cuba!” But there were other posts by Elleanne Green, liking or linking to stories or YouTube posts with headlines such as: “Ex-MI5 agent knows that Israeli Mossad was behind 9/11” and “Mossad’s Fingerprints on Paris Attacks” or to a picture of a man and the legend “Hi, I’m Marcus Agius, the new CEO of BBC News (sic). I’m also married to Katherine Rothschild of Rothschild banking Dynasty”. These links comprised a virtual catalogue of the anti-Jewish conspiracy theories of the 21st century.
I owe a debt of gratitude to the freelance researcher David Collier for bringing all this to light. Because at the very least it shows that important sections of the Labour Party are prepared to tolerate or turn a blind eye, or even quietly endorse those spreading the most florid of conspiracy theories. And I haven’t even touched on Ken Livingstone, Corbyn ally Ken Loach and the purveyors of the “Zionists helped the Nazis” libel.
There is an argument that the decline of Marxism and class analysis is behind this phenomenon. Once upon a time left-wingers believed that a system — capitalism — was to blame and now they believe it is people — evil bankers, Tories or Blairites, who are acting in cahoots with the mainstream media. But I’d add a caveat. That fake Rothschild quote that Mear One reposted on the Icke website? You’ll also find it lazily reproduced in articles for The Economist and The Huffington Post. In 2018 we all need to be much more careful.
