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Labour activist, who escaped expulsion over throat-cutting threat, made other antisemitic statements

John Shaw said 'Zionists' should leave the country but added 'normal Jews... not indoctrinated in the Zionist ideology' could stay

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A Jeremy Corbyn-supporting Labour activist, who escaped expulsion from the party despite joking about cutting the throats of supporters of Israel, has written other antisemitic online posts, the JC can reveal.

John Shaw, a member of the Easington Labour Party, County Durham, was recently told by Labour’s Complaints Team the would take no action beyond urging him to tone down his online rants after investigating his Facebook post from earlier this year and another which suggested any MP who was a member of Labour Friends of Israel should be “isolated by colleagues and the membership.”

As revealed by the Mail on Sunday, when someone said "cut the ties", Mr Shaw replied: "I’d prefer to cut elsewhere but close to where a tie goes!!!"

But Mr Shaw has also called for “Zionists to leave the Labour Party and return to Israel,” adding: “They should take with them any Labour MPs who are in the pay of the Israeli Government.”

He then added: “Normal Jews, those not indoctrinated in the Zionist ideology, are more than welcome to stay as members and comrades.”

Mr Shaw also said allegation of antisemitism within Labour amounted to “Friends of Israel is trying to justify their 30 pieces of silver as they attempt to knife their elected leader in the back.”

He added in the same post: “Time to take a leaf out of Jeremy’s book and do what is right for the many and not the few string pullers.”

Mr Shaw has also shared a posting written by someone else that said: "The only people at the minute who are trying to suppress my free speech (I say this as an atheist) is Jewish people.”

After reports of Israeli Likud Party policy towards African refugees, Mr Shaw wrote: “This puts a new slant on the story of the 30 pieces of silver.

“Hopefully our own Judas’s will follow the example shown by the real remorseful Judas and hang themselves.”

The party's failure to take action against Mr Shaw was reported the day before Labour’s shadow education secretary Angela Rayner told Monday’s Board of Deputies Chanukah celebration that “progress” had been made with internal procedures on dealing with antisemitism.

Senior Labour sources told the JC it was “laughable” for Ms Rayner to claim there had been improvements in the party’s disciplinary procedure – when MPs such as Luciana Berger and Yvette Cooper remained in the dark about serious threats members made against them earlier this year.

Jackie Walker has been suspended for more than two years - after she said she had never found a definition of antisemitism she could work with and attacked Holocaust Memorial Day for not focussing enough on other genocides - as the party fails to address her case.

Another activist, who shared an antisemitic trope about circumcision in Stella Creasy’s Walthamstow constituency, has been suspended for more than two years.

News the party had not expelled Mr Shaw emerged at the same time as reports confirmed party bosses warned any activist who makes accusations of Jew-hate against another member public risks being disciplined and having any formal complaints they have made dropped.

A Labour spokersperson said: "The Labour Party takes all complaints of antisemitism extremely seriously and we are committed to challenging and campaigning against it in all its forms.

"All complaints about antisemitism are fully investigated in line with our rules and procedures and any appropriate disciplinary action is taken."

But a party source said Mr Shaw was still under investigation for some of his posts. They added they were unaware of some of the posts the JC reported and asked to see copies.

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