I’ve written recently that although Andy Burnham has made no substantive comments on foreign policy, you didn’t have to be a psychic to know what was coming.
I refer, of course, to Gaza and to Israel. And sure enough, here it comes. Burnham is nothing if not conscious of the views of the people he needs to become prime minister – Labour MPs – and with so many of them viewing Israel as some sort of evil pariah state, it was obvious that he would hurry to give them what they wanted.
In his video released and in comments to the Guardian, Burnham has gone after Israel. He was always going to do that, because Israel is the easy hit for those like Burnham who take every opportunity to tell everyone that, as he put it today, “I…feel passionately about Gaza.” There’s a remarkable symmetry between those who proclaim their passion for Gaza and those who swallow Hamas propaganda – and, of course, between those who say how much they care passionately about Gaza but couldn’t give a damn about the 1,200 dead Jews murdered by Hamas – by Gazans.
Burnham’s video offers the usual pro forma condemnation of Hamas’s October 7 2023 massacre – because he’s not a fool. He knows it’s useful to be able to say he has condemned Hamas. But you can see how meaningless those words are from the fact they take up all of eleven seconds in a three minute and 19 second video. No, this is about Israel. More specifically, it’s about showing Labour MPs – and those Muslim voters they and Burnham are scared witless are deserting the party – that under him, Britain is going to have a very different stance on Israel.
That new stance begins with an apology: “Labour’s initial response to the treatment of Gaza caused huge hurt. We got it wrong and I am sorry for that.” He told the Guardian that Labour’s initial response to Israel’s military action in Gaza, “didn’t get it right” and the party needs to “do better” under his leadership.
For the people Burnham is pandering too, it’s not the scale of Israel’s response to October 7 that is unacceptable, it’s the fact of an Israeli response at all.
Many senior military leaders, such as British General Sir John McColl, have said that Israel is doing far more than other Western armies manage to limit civilian casualties. Hamas embeds itself in civilian areas precisely so that there will be civilian casualties when the IDF takes action (even though the IDF notifies civilians in advance of operations where possible, to give them time to leave). When Burnham and his ilk turn on Israel as a result, they do Hamas’ bidding.
For the activists, any response by Israel to the October 7 massacre is illegitimate because Israel is illegitimate. This is not new. Decades ago, when Israel introduced roadblocks and built its defensive wall in response to a wave of suicide bombings, even these absolutely non-lethal measures to prevent terror attacks were attacked by the Andy Burnhams of the time as “collective punishment” of the Palestinians.
Let’s remember what Burnham is apologising for. Under Starmer, the British government’s relations with Israel have been toxic – and were made deliberately so by Britain. Starmer restored funding to terrorist-harbouring Unrwa, he halted the UK’s objections to the ICC’s arrest warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, he banned some arms exports, blocked IDF soldiers from a training college in the UK – and he rewarded Hamas for October 7 by recognising Palestine.
This is what Burnham is apologising for because it’s not enough.
We all know what’s coming next: sanctions. Israel is a convenient whipping boy for Burnham – a political free hit. He can demonstrate his bona fides as an ally of the antizionists and their fellow travellers by appeasing sectarian Muslim voters and seeking to stem the flow of “progressive” voters to the Greens. Target the Jews – in the form of Israel – and suddenly all your problems melt away.
That’s the theory, at least. In reality what will happen is what has happened under Starmer, only more so: a further rise in Jew hate. When you give a bigot what he wants you don’t sate his hunger; you create an even bigger appetite for bigotry. By pandering to the Jew haters, Burnham is going to unleash a torrent of antisemitism that will make what we have seen since October 7, 2023 seem paltry.
Stephen Pollard’s Substack is at https://simplysaid.substack.com/
To get more from opinion, click here to sign up for our free Editor's Picks newsletter.