By World Israel News Staff
Jeremy Corbyn, the former leader of the British Labour party, has been suspended from the party pending investigation, a party spokesman said Thursday.
Corbyn’s suspension followed a damning report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission on anti-Semitism in Labour.
“I’m proud to be a member of the Labour Party. I joined the party at the age of 16. I’ve fought racism all my life and I will fight racism for the rest of my life, and as leader of the party I did everything I could to ensure we were an anti-racist party,” he said.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC) applauds the decision of the UK Labor Party over the suspension of its former leader, Jeremy Corbyn, after a watchdog report found that the party failed to properly take action against allegations of anti-Semitism during his time in charge.
“Jeremy Corbyn’s led UK Labor Party was Simon Wiesenthal Center’s number one of the top 10 anti-Semitic incidents of 2019 By allowing and encouraging anti-Semites to flourish within his party, Corbyn did terrible damage to the Jewish community and terrible damage to linger by allowing hate and anti-Semitism to flourish in the mainstream of the political and social culture. This move is a critical first step to push back anti-Semitic bigots to the margins of political and social discourse in the UK,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, SWC associate dean and Global Director of Global Social Action.
“No one has done more to mainstream anti-Semitism into the political and social life of a democracy than the Jeremy Corbyn-led Labour Party,” said the Simon Wiesenthal Center in December. “Members and staff who have dared to speak out against the hate were purged, but not those who declared ‘Heil Hitler’ and ‘F–k the Jews.’”
Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis warned in a Nov. 2019 op-ed of the threat to the Jewish community posed by Corbyn and the Labour party. Corbyn dismissed Rabbi Mirvis’ concerns in a widely viewed television interview that followed, refusing to apologize and claiming that the chief rabbi was wrong.
Labour suffered a staggering defeat in the country’s Dec. 12 elections under Corbyn’s leadership.
