closeicon
News

Momentum founder Jon Lansman to discuss Jeremy Corbyn and Labour in Israel

The event organisers want to 'engage with Labour and the Israeli occupation'

articlemain

The founder of the pro-Jeremy Corbyn Momentum group is to discuss the Labour leader's rise and the current state of the party in Israel.

Jon Lansman will appear at the offices of the left-wing Rosa Luxemburg Institute in Tel Aviv on Thursday to give a talk at the event which is billed as: "Corbyn, Labour, Israel, Palestine".

The event has been organised by the Stand Together movement in Israel, a leftist group of both Jewish and Arab activists that promotes itself as "grounded in Socialist principles, and organizing and mobilizing for peace, equality and social justice".

It said of the event with Mr Lansman: “We aim to engage with the issue of the Labour Party and the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the promise of Corbyn's and Labour's manifesto for Britain, and the tasks that Socialists are faced with - in Britain, Israel and elsewhere - in light of a reality that breeds crises and wars.”

The venue for Thursday’s meeting – the Rosa Luxemburg Institute – belongs to an organisation with close links to Die Linke, the German Left Party which grew out of the old East German Communist Party and is not Labour's sister party in Germany, which is the less leftwing SPD.

While Mr Corbyn is yet to visit Israel, Mr Lansman first visited when aged 16 where he worked on a kibbutz in the Negev.

In an interview with the JC, Mr Lansman said: “When I did my bar mitzvah I saw myself as a Zionist and I think after I went there I felt it less.

“I was more interested in the kibbutz and what I liked about it was the pioneering spirit, the sense of community and radicalism of it.”

He also argued that it is possible for Zionist Labour supporters to remain within the party under Mr Corbyn, citing his support for a two-state solution.

But in April Avi Gabbay, the leader of Israel’s Labour Party, said he will cut ties with Mr Corbyn and his office over how the party handled antisemitism, but would preserve the link with the party as a whole.

There have also been attempts by some of Labour’s left to forge closer links with the more radical Meretz party which is seen as holding policies more agreeable to British socialists that the official Israeli Labour Party.

It is not known if Mr Lansman will be meeting with any Meretz representatives on his visit to Israel.

Share via

Want more from the JC?

To continue reading, we just need a few details...

Want more from
the JC?

To continue reading, we just
need a few details...

Get the best news and views from across the Jewish world Get subscriber-only offers from our partners Subscribe to get access to our e-paper and archive