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The Labour party has denied Jeremy Corbyn compared the actions of Israelis to Nazis when he referred to the sieges of Leningrad and Stalingrad during a speech on Gaza.

The party issued the denial as shadow chancellor John McDonnell faced questions over his backing of the creation of a controversial anti-Zionist group in 2008.

The incidents threatened to draw Labour's leader and his de facto deputy further into the escalating row over the handling of anti-Semitism in the party.

Footage has emerged of a speech Mr Corbyn made at a rally outside Parliament in 2010 when he compared the blockade of Gaza to the sieges of Leningrad and Stalingrad in the Second World War.

He told the crowd: "I was in Gaza three months ago. I saw the mortar shells that had gone through the school buildings, the destroyed UN establishments, the burnt-out schools, the ruined homes, the destroyed lives, the imprisoned people, the psychological damage to a whole generation who've been imprisoned for as long as the siege of Leningrad and Stalingrad took place."

The speech came six months after Mr Corbyn hosted a Holocaust Memorial Day event at which speakers are said to have likened the actions of Israel in Gaza to Hitler's regime. He apologised for this on Wednesday.

The Labour leader acknowledged that he had appeared alongside people "whose views I completely reject" and apologised for the "concerns and anxiety" that caused.

Mr McDonnell said today that he wanted the party's approach on anti-Semitism to be resolved soon, adding: "It's shaken us to the core."

However, he also faced questions over his support for the controversial International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), the creation of which he backed in a 2008 Commons motion.

The IJAN's charter asks prospective members if they "feel enraged and saddened that the holocaust against Jewish people is being used to perpetrate other atrocities?"

A Labour spokesman said Mr McDonnell "was welcoming the creation of an organisation that represented an important strand of radical Jewish political campaigning".

"Of course he didn't and doesn't endorse all of the language and views expressed in their charter," the spokesman added.

Meanwhile, the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) has referred Labour to the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

The CAA has also made a complaint to the party about comments by Islington North MP Mr Corbyn and his hosting of the 2010 event.

The campaign's chairman, Gideon Falter, said: "Jeremy Corbyn has spent his political career sharing stages with anti-Semites and honouring them.

"This apology rings utterly hollow. Mr Corbyn did not merely attend the event, he chaired it, and in response to the criticism of the Jewish community in 2010 he did not apologise."

Additional reporting by Press Association