Labour's new guidelines show it is institutionally antisemitic

Ok, so who else would be on the shortlist of the least suitable people to draw up a definition of antisemitism?

Perhaps you can tell where this is heading.

This week, the Labour Party adopted its own definition of antisemitism. That’s right. The party that has spent the past two years mired in allegations that it refuses to take antisemitism seriously has drawn up its own 16-point code of conduct on antisemitism, a definition that is unique to the Labour Party.

Not one other organisation on the planet operates the same criteria that Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour has just adopted. And yet somehow the same Labour Party expects the Jewish community – and everyone else – to take this as serious evidence of its commitment to tackling antisemitism.

To say they are taking us for fools doesn’t even come close. Because this is hard left politics at its most cynical and shameful.

Labour has taken some of the language used in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which is now widely accepted as the most useful definition and has been adopted by the government, the Crown Prosecution Service, many local councils and many other countries.

But instead of adopting the definition as agreed by all these bodies, Labour has excised the parts which relate to Israel and how criticism of Israel can be antisemitic.

Let’s stop here to make the ritual point which shouldn’t be needed but is, that there is nothing antisemitic about criticising Israel. Israelis criticise Israel. Jews do. Everyone is – of course - free to do so. The only people who say that the accusation of antisemitism is used to stop criticism of Israel is antisemites.

But this isn’t about that. This is about Labour going out of its way to ensure that party members can be free to use antisemitic language and that they can use Israel as part of that.

The guidelines, for example, suggest at one point that Israel's "description of itself as a 'Jewish state' can cause particular difficulty in the context of deciding whether language or behaviour is anti-Semitic."

The guidelines go on to say that the use of "Zionist" and "Zionism" in a positive way by pro-Israel supporters is problematic.

This is the nub of it. The guidelines demand that “antisemitic intent” is necessary if any criticism of Israel is to be held as wrong: “It is not antisemitism to refer to ‘Zionism’ and ‘Zionists’ as part of a considered discussion about the Israeli state.” So you can feel free to go right ahead and scream “Zio” at any random Jew you encounter, and remain a Labour member. Labour has no issue with this, so long as you mean well.

Or go further, if you like. Scream “Zio-Nazi”, because so long as your heart is in the right place, that’s just fine. As the guidelines put it: “Discourse about international politics often employs metaphors from examples of historic misconduct.

"It is not antisemitism to criticise the conduct or policies of the Israeli state by reference to such examples unless there is evidence of antisemitic intent.”

Every time the issue of Labour antisemitism raises its head, the same pattern repeats. The party – and its Dear Leader - says that they are deeply committed to the fight against antisemitism and it is outrageous to suggest otherwise. A smear, even.

And then that same party goes on to show why anyone who falls for that is, to put it at its most charitable, an idiot.

Look what’s going on this time, with this new definition.

Antisemitism is being given its own rules, separate to any other form of racism. Labour will say this shows just how committed it is to fighting antisemitism.

Meanwhile on planet real world, what this really means is that, because antisemitic intent is held to be necessary for any Israel-related language to be antisemitic, those who describe themselves as lifelong antiracists - who just happen to have a problem with what they call Zio-Nazis – can say that because antisemitism is indeed racism, and they are anti-racists, then by definition they have no antisemitic intent and thus cannot be antisemitic.

There are still those who think Labour can be dragged from this sewer. Many of them are admirable people.

But they are simply unwilling, or unable, to face what must surely now be clear to everyone else – that Labour is now in the grip of a hard left so malign that the party is no longer a mainstream vehicle for social change but a vehicle for race hate. 

Labour is now institutionally antisemitic.