LISA FORBES

Labour Candidate for Peterborough

A JVL statement, 4th June 2019

JVL is fully behind Lisa Forbes in her bid to become the Labour Member of Parliament for Peterborough. We are appalled that, once again, accusations of antisemitism are being used in the run up to an election to denounce the Labour candidate and, indeed, the Labour Party.

This trolling of social media accounts is pernicious; it is a deeply reprehensible way to conduct political debate. And in the case of Lisa Forbes it has failed to produce any credible evidence of antisemitism. Typical of this degraded and bullying approach is that saying “I enjoyed reading this thread” is taken as an endorsement of every individual statement posted on that thread. In fact the reference in the thread (not made by her) was to Mossad, not Jews. Her personal approach is well represented by her comment that there is “so much that tries to divide us, but there is so much more that unites us all”.

This remorseless and repetitive conflation of even self-evidently justified criticism of Israel with a supposed disguised intention of criticising Jews as Jews needs to stop. The constant use of these dishonest methods to attack the Corbyn-led Labour Party is dangerous for free speech, for Jewish people, and for wider democracy. Jewish people do not have different interests from non-Jews. We are all part of this society and have the same need for a progressive, socialist government to help us create a fairer society in the interests of all.

For that we need as many Labour MPs as possible and we wish Lisa every success on Thursday.