The chancellor’s speech showed that Labour’s tradition of support for Israel is alive and well

Crucially, too, Rachel stated clearly and forcefully what many of us know all too well: that “hatred of the world’s only Jewish state rests at the core of modern antisemitism”.

From that simple, but too often unstated, truth, real action against the antisemites who have intimidated and harassed British Jews – on the streets of our cities, in our schools and universities, and even in our NHS – can, at last, flow.

This isn’t just about government or legislation. It’s also an intellectual and political fight.

As LFI’s new chair, Mark Sewards, suggested in his impressive opening address, every generation is called upon to “confront and defeat the poison of anti-Zionist antisemitism”.

I am determined that – just as we did in the 1970s and 1980 – this generation of Labour Zionists will do so too.

Under the Prime Minister’s leadership, the struggle against Corbynism, which I and other moderates fought vociferously, has advanced hugely over the past five years.

But as Keir always said, this is a multifront battle. Having achieved so much within the Labour Party to root out antisemitism, we must turn our attention to the wider left and the country as whole.

Rachel’s speech was important because it explicitly placed today’s battle in the grand sweep of Labour history.

Israel, she reminded us, has always had many friends among the giants of our movement: Manny Shinwell, Nye Bevan, Ian Mikardo, Barbara Castle, Dick Crossman, Harold Wilson, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, to name but a few.

I don’t pretend everybody in the party shares our sympathies – they never have – and I know and understand that many in the Jewish community haven’t always been pleased with the decisions of the government.

But what Rachel’s speech demonstrates is that the Labour tradition of support for Israel – encapsulated by LFI – is alive and well.

Its strength lays in the fact that it is part of a wider body of ideas and thinking which animated the Attlee, Wilson-Callaghan and Brown-Blair governments and has been restored to centre-stage by the Prime Minister.

As Mark suggested: “Anti-Zionism is just one thread of that multifarious concoction of far-left attitudes and prejudices which are antithetical to the Labour tradition: anti-western, purposefully oblivious to our national security interests, always willing to see the best in our enemies and the worst in our friends.”

That’s why this government is taking tough action to contain the threat posed by Iran to our national security, and that of our allies in the region, including Israel.

Together with France and Germany, it has instituted the snapback sanctions to ensure the regime does not succeed in its ambition to attain nuclear weapons; imposed new sanctions against the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and placed Iran, together with Russia, on the most stringent, enhanced tier of the new Foreign Influence Registration Scheme; and, in line with Labour’s manifesto commitment, it is introducing legislation which will proscribe Tehran’s terror army.

Our support for Israel is thus not simply because we value it as the homeland of the Jewish people and a fellow democracy, but also because we know that Britain and Israel have shared security, strategic and economic interests and concerns.

That case – articulated with passion and commitment by the chancellor on Monday – underlines that Israel and the community has dedicated and determined friends and allies in the Labour Party. And always will have.

Luke Akehurst is the Labour MP for North Durham