The Judaic hierarchy’s big fear – as in the days of Jesus

Never to my memory has there been an election where wealthy Jews have been so frightened. Many of them have a large influence over and ownership of the media and even it may appear over the Church of England. Just in case you had any chance of missing it when they start a story like this it hits all the media en bloc: Telegraph, BBC, Guardian, Mail, Express, Financial Times, Jewish Chronicle and many other outlets in a carpet spread.

The boringly incessant cliché used to blacken Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party is an unsubstantiated claim of anti-Semitism. There is an old adage that if you say something often enough people will start to believe it. That is what the wealthy Zionists and their Neo-Con allies are hoping for because let me tell you for all these claims of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party none of the media outpourings produces any credible evidence or examples of anti-Semitism. They just say it is there.

It is a bit like saying there are aliens among us. Aliens may be among us. How would anyone know without proof? Likewise there may be the odd incident of careless thought and thoughtless words that make it appear anti-Semitism is an issue. I have not seen aliens. I have not seen anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.

The big fear for the rich is not racism of any kind – the Labour Party has always been opposed to racism – including the persecution of Palestinians in the apartheid state of Israel. The big fear is that some of the accumulation of wealth might be more equitably distributed. That is the real fear.

Those who circulate this nonsense are not poor Jewish families trying to eke out a living in these days of austerity. They are not persecuted like Anne Frank’s family, forced to move abroad because of Nazi ideology. They are rich. They are bankers. They are owners of corporations and owners of the media – or those who can put pressure on the owners of the media.

Yes, people are leaving the Labour Party. Sometimes they blame it on anti-Semitism without citing examples. But the real reason is that they do not belong in a party that is trying to bring social justice and equal opportunities for all – including the poor. They belong in opportunist parties where they can have a more-than-comfortable lifestyle for themselves and their families perpetuated into old age. Take for example, Lady Neuberger, who is not even a Labour peer, but quoted in the Guardian article linked above.

“Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Lady Neuberger said that under Corbyn’s leadership “there has been this insidious antisemitic tone to quite a lot of what’s happened and an unwillingness to really face it.””

This is it: accusatory words. This is the total “argument”. The words are there and make it appear that anti-Semitism is an issue. However there are no examples to back this “argument” up.

We hardly ever hear of rabbis making political comments except occasionally on Radio 4’s thought for the day. This statement by the Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, that the “overwhelming majority of British Jews are gripped by anxiety” that Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party might win the election is misguided at best but most likely untruthful. First there would have needed to have been some kind of poll on this which I have yet to see.

The tentacles of power politics stretch far and wide bringing the Archbishop of Canterbury into their clutches. Justin Welby, has issued in a tweet a statement about the “deep sense of insecurity and fear felt by many British Jews”. There is certainly anxiety. But it is not about anti-Semitism. Instead it really appears to be about the existentialist threat to a change in the social structure bringing the needs of the poor into the frame. I wish they would say that was their worry because I am sure this anti-Semitism nonsense will backfire on them. And so it should.

It is not new for Chief Priests and Rabbis to be worried about the threat of a change to their comfortable way of life. The same thing happened 2000 years ago. Hopefully today they will not be as severe in their punishment of an innocent man and his followers as they were then!

Cartoon by Bob Moran