The public health expert exposed by the JC after repeatedly comparing "Zionists" to Nazis also launched attacks on two former Jewish Labour MPs, Dame Louise Ellman and Luciana Berger.
Professor John Ashton – who appeared on the BBC's Panorama on Monday to criticise the supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) for NHS staff – wrote in 2014 in response to a Tweet accusing ex-Liverpool Riverside MP Dame Louise of being a "Vile Zionist": "Is it time for a human being to stand against Louise Ellman in next year’s general election."
In a message sent to Ms Berger, the former Liverpool Wavertree MP, after she highlighted the rising problem with food banks under the government in 2012, he wrote: "What about the Palestinians?"
In June 2013 he wrote of her: "She is from London and a Zionist. Full stop. Doesn't fit with Liverpools universalism. End iof [sic]."
He later alleged that Ms Berger was "...silent on full disclosure of campaign funds received from Labour Friends for [sic] Israel."
On Tuesday, after the JC revealed how Prof Ashton, a former regional director of public health for north-west England, had tweeted inflammatory statements on numerous occasions regarding Zionists and Jews, he claimed on Twitter that one of the reasons he had quit the Labour Party in 2019 after being a member for over 50 years was because of the treatment dished out to Ms Berger and Dame Louise "by antisemitic elements".
But an analysis of his social media activity shows he had attacked both women, along with other leading Jewish figures, such as journalist Melanie Phillips, of whom he tweeted in 2013: "She is the biggest Jewish joke of all."
Mr Ashton has repeatedly referred to the Holocaust in his attacks. On Holocaust Memorial Day in 2017 he wrote: "It would be helpful if everybody remembered that the Holocaust was about Gays, Gypsies and the Disabled as well as Jews."
In May 2018, after a Holocaust exhibition opening in his home city of Liverpool he tweeted: "And the Gay holocaust and the holocaust of those with learning difficulties?"
After a 2014 offensive by the Israeli military in Gaza against Hamas, Prof Ashton wrote: "Is it now satisfied about how many children it has murdered? What price the Holocaust?"
That same year he wrote: "It’s very sad how intransigence of the Zionists has sullied the universal empathy for the victims of the Holocaust."
In 2017 he wrote: "And homosexuals and people with learning disabilities. The Holocaust was not just one group."
Responding to a Twitter user named Steve Silberman who had written that female genital mutilation was in decline in Africa, Mr Ashton also wrote: "What about male circumcision in America? Its child abuse."
Asked today about his tweets towards Ms Berger and Dame Louise and his claim to have left the party last year in protest at their treatment in relation to antisemitism, he told the JC: "Yes I left the Labour Party in part because of the treatment of Luciana and Louise. This correspondence is now closed.”
He declined to comment on the tweets relating to the Holocaust, Melanie Phillips and circumcision.
On Tuesday, the JC revealed how Prof Ashton had tweeted: "Time to isolate Zionists and all religious fundamentalists whatever colour of black."
The former President of the Faculty of Public Health from 2012 until 2018 has equated Zionism with Nazism. Writing in November 2012 in response to Israeli military actions in Gaza, he stated: "Sickening to see Zionists behave like Nazis."
After being contacted by the JC yesterday, Prof Ashton said: "I think this is mischievous and I don’t recognise most of what you have just read to me. My position about antisemitism is very clear. I have always stood firm against antisemitism."
He added: “I really don’t know what you are about.”
Asked about his comparisons between Zionists and Nazis he said: “I have never compared Jews to Nazis. I would suggest in the interest of world peace to really try to make something out of this is really unhelpful. I am very strongly for interfaith understanding."
