Urgent Jewish Voice for Labour Emergency rally today, Monday, to oppose Board of Deputies attack on Jeremy Corbyn 5.00pm Outside Portcullis House Westminster

JVL is calling on all supporters of Jeremy Corbyn to attend a rally to oppose Board of Deputies/Jewish Leadership Council cynical selective outrage. Tory current chief executive is a former chair of the Jewish Leadership Council.

Jeremy Corbyn is not an antisemite. Jeremy supports Palestinian rights and is campaigning for a socialist vision for Britain. The BoD and the JLC oppose both of these.

JVL has issued this statement to the press

Labour Jews support Jeremy Corbyn – oppose Board of Deputies selective outrage

Pro-Corbyn Labour Jews:

oppose Board of Deputies’ Parliament Square demonstration Monday March 26

urge BoD and Jewish Leadership Council to “stop playing party politics”

Following several days of attacks on Jeremy Corbyn by members of the Parliamentary Labour Party hostile to his leadership, the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council have chosen this moment, just as campaigning begins in earnest for local government elections in May, to call a demonstration in Parliament Square on March 26 holding Corbyn responsible for alleged antisemitism.

Jewish Voice for Labour has issued the following statement in response:

We are Jews in the Labour Party currently actively campaigning for Labour in local elections. We are appalled by the actions and statements of the Board of Deputies. They do not represent us or the great majority of Jews in the Party who share Jeremy Corbyn’s vision for social justice and fairness. Jeremy’s consistent commitment to anti-racism is all the more needed now.

As the British people call time on May and the Tories, they are getting more desperate. There is massively more antisemitism on the right of politics than on the left. Any organisation claiming to represent Jews in the Labour Party should be holding up for criticism, the senior ex adviser to the Prime Minister who recently used a national newspaper to dredge up antisemitic conspiracy theories, and the local Conservative party which issued a dogwhistle leaflet aiming to mobilise racism in their local election campaign. The Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council have been silent on both. They have nothing to say either on the global rise of the far right and the toxic anti-immigrant rhetoric of the tabloid press. Jewish history surely gives us an imperative to speak out against both racism and fascism.

The BoD and the JLC and those supporting them must be aware that this is an attempt to influence local elections and has nothing to do with the real and necessary task of challenging racism and antisemitism at all levels of political life. We call on them to stop playing party politics and start representing what our community needs. We believe that is best represented by the politics we fight for and hope to see win on May 3rd.