Jeremy Corbyn appeared to agree Israel could conduct a "false flag" operation to provoke war with Iran, it has been revealed, in the latest revelation about questionable comments he made as a relatively unscrutinised backbench MP.
The latest video was unearthed by The Golem, a Twitter account that monitors Labour antisemitism and has previously revealed other controversial statements by Mr Corbyn before he became Labour leader in 2015.
The clip shows Mr Corbyn giving an interview in 2012 to a YouTuber, who has posted videos with titles such as "Judaism: Just Another Cult" and "On The Need to Dissolve the Jewish Identity".
Mr Corbyn listens while the interviewer, Morris Herman, describes "conversations on the conspiracy channels on the internet" about how Israel could create "a false flag event" - whereby a state uses a faked or exaggerated incident as a pretext for war.
The interviewer asks: "We're playing with fire, surely?"
EXCLUSIVE – In January 2012 @JeremyCorbyn gave an interview in Parliament to an antisemitic conspiracy theorist in which he agreed that “yes of course” Israel may engage in “creating a false flag event” to start a war with Iran. Watch below: pic.twitter.com/8ZLeBtBMnV
— The Golem (@TheGolem_) January 31, 2019
"There's a history of this kind of thing," Mr Corbyn agrees.
"The Gulf of Tonkin incident during the Vietnam War is one that springs to mind. Going back a bit further The War of Jenkins' Ear in the north Atlantic by the British against the French and the Spanish...
"Yes of course there's that danger."
He describes Israel's naval exercise with the United States, which happened the week before the interview, as "an extremely unwise action to take".
He adds: "The danger of something going wrong, an accident taking place and that's perceived to the start of armed conflict."
