Anti Semitism in Labour Party and Universities.

Good summary, niggly. I disagree about it not being worth putting down one's tuppenceworth though. People's views do sometimes change when they have heard, through listening to others, a different point of view. Mine have on various subjects, including this one.

To be honest, I'm not sure that there is any point continuing this conversation. We have all got our diametrically different points of view and perhaps it is best to agree to differ and leave it at that. The only thing I would point out is that imo historically both sides have an equal right to be on this land, bearing in mind that the state of Palestine didn't exist before 1988. Both Arabs and Jews for centuries lived in these lands collectively, which were governed by a variety of other countries including the Romans, Egyptians, Turks, to name but a few, and finally on request by Turkey after WW1, the British. Therefore the state of Israel was not created by annexing someone else's country and to argue differently simply doesn't hold water. Israel has a perfect right to exist peacefully as a state, as do the Palestinians, the trouble is if one side is hell bent on annihilating the other, then that simply is never going to happen. There's not much more to say really!

What about the intransigence of some people in the lands bordering Israel, that of simply not accepting Israel's right to exist? That has to happen before a peaceful, negotiated settlement can be worked out. It's not Israel that is preventing such.

And it's not anti-Palestine/Palestinians to say that.

you don't have to be Jewish or Zionist to support Israel
Venus surely the opposite is also therefore true, that you are not necessarily anti-Semitic to deplore Israel's intransigence.
Anti-Semitism means anti-Jewish in every respect, in business, politics, politics, one's social life. I am none of these, but ......Israel's policy vis a vis Palestine is for me too redolent the God of the Old Testament. No good can come of it.

Annododomini, you are right, you don't have to be Jewish, or Zionist to support Israel. It is what most sensible people consider right to protect western interests and democracy.

Trisher, you don't have to leave me with any thought! I won't repeat any more then what I've already said, except to tell you that young Israel soldiers are getting maimed and dying every day protecting their people and their country against terrorists groups that don't care a jot for their people, their sole aim being to destroy Israel. As thatbags rightly says in her post, the Jews have always been the scapecoat, the underdog, my own relatives were murdered in the death camps, and the Jews are never, ever going to let that happen again. So don't preach to me how the Palestinians are being treated. Israel helps these peope as I mentioned, which is more than the Nazis did for the Jews.

And before you you stand on your high horse preaching about how the Palestinians are being treated, just remember how the British have acted, in Ireland, India and many other parts of the world. Protecting a country's interest is not just peculiar to Israel. It happens all over the world.

The OP is about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party. The waters are indeed muddy as it's not a simple left-right situation. If you look at the Labour Friends of Israel website, you will see the breadth of support for Israel in both Houses of Parliament. Only a few of these are Zionists, most of them are not even Jewish.

Support for Israel's right to exist is no more Zionism than support for the Palestinians can be called anti-Semitism.

This thread was started to discuss Anti Semitism in the Labour party and I wonder as it's digressed into the inevitable discussion about Israel, whether subliminally, although some deny that, Jews per se are still lumped together with the aggression of right wing Zionists, that seems to the consensus that is emanating from a small percentage of the left. I completely appreciate the argument that Palestinians have been treated badly in what has been their own homeland for centuries, nevertheless, Israeli citizens are living with the daily fear of random attacks. Of course the Palestinian land grabs are a great injustice. If only there were a solution to such a conundrum that would give satisfaction to both sides and allow the existence of Israel and a Palestinian state that have parity. We could do with the wisdom of Solomon on that one.

Personally I abhor the way Jews have been singled out for the treatment they have over the centuries, losing them as a community from any country, in my opinion would be nothing less than a tragedy. I hate this whole premise that a minority hold that they are a bunch of subversives that control the world, I put that down to jealousy because they tend to rise to the top of their chosen profession. I think anti Semitism is on the rise and it's very regrettable. I believe someone stated a while back on this thread that the anti Muslim sentiment was greater or more worrying. Whilst hate campaigns against any community are reprehensible, with another atrocity playing out in Brussels, if these happenings continue, as they surely will, then tensions will rise, particularly when those behind them spew out their hateful rhetoric aimed at the general public. I know there have been one or two Jewish terrorist, Menachem Begin, later to become Prime Minister of Israel and no doubt he would have been reviled if he had operated here in such a way.

Trouble with the Israeli question is that it muddies the water of what is and is not anti-semitism. There was a student being interviewed on R4 about his allegations of anti-semitism in his university. He cited a poster which called for a boycott of Israel and the staging of a play that looked at the Palestinian issue as examples of anti-semitism. Many would disagree and argue that they are valid expressions of freedom of speech.

The centuries long attempt to subdue the Jews has been unsuccessful too. That's why Israel was created post WW2.

Venus is never going to accept any criticism of Israel. The fact that she refuses to recognise any responsibility that country must accept for the conditions Palestinians are living in and the way they have been treated indicates that it is useless to argue with or question her. I leave her with the thought that historically the process of subduing a race of people has never been 100% successful. In the words of Maya Angelou "Still I rise".

Should be 70%. Apologies.

Nothing to do with Labour Party. I said that before. Why not ask other posters the same question?

Where was this 94%? Sinai?

Why won't you answer how this has anything to do with the Labour Party?

To achieve peace with its neighbours Israel has given away 94% of the territory it once held. To put it another way, if Britain did the same today, it would lose England, Wales, N. Ireland and a bit of Scotland.

There are few nations in history of the world that have returned lands taken in war. Did the France return Alsace-Lorraine to the Germans after defeating them in World War 1? Did Czechoslovakia return the Sudetenland or Poland return the Oder-Neisse territory to Germany after WW2? If we do not expect this from other nations, why the double standards with Israel?

The borders of the UN partition plan for Israel was not legally binding borders but suggestions.

Israel retained areas in the 48 war that had large Jewish populations

The Palestinians have never defined their borders, which means their accusations of theft are unfounded

Israel has returned 94% of the territory it captured since the 67 war

While it is true that Palestinians civilians in the Gaza strip have been killed in conflict, it is also true that Israel does what it can to warn cilvilians to vacate targeted areas while the terrorist organization, Hamas, does everything it can to make sure civilians are around their military instillations in hopes that Israel will continue to lose world opinion by killing inocent people.

Their hatred of Israel is stronger than their concern about the very people they claim to defend. This conflict was also initiated by Hamas when they began firing rockets into Israel. Rockets have been firing into Israel since 2005, as a gesture of thanks when Israel abandoned the Gaza strip. Those who think that all hostilities will cease if Israel simply gives back the 'occupied territory' should keep the example of Gaza in mind. Hamas does not reconize Israel's right to exist. Neither does the Palestine charter. The return of land makes no difference whatsoever.

Niggly can you understand why the people who had been inhabitung the area for many many generations, quite legitimately, might not be100% supportive of splitting their homeland into two and giving it away? Especally as the bits being given to Israel split the area into two bits and took away the capital city! You make the Palestinians sound like a truculent child who won't share a bag of sweets from grandma. It was their homes and livlihoods they were being told they had to leave and give to people newly come to live there. Of course there was resistance!
Imagine England having to give Essex, Kent Surrey Sussex London , Berkshire Oxfordshire & Glocestershire to France.

'nothing wrong'!! sorry!

Most conversations have a habit of evolving into other aspects of an original question, surely there is not being wrong with that. It can sometimes help to understand why things are as they are,and why people feel so strongly about particular situations.

It's true the thread has gone off piste a bit, but that is the nature of threads.

And what I said a number of posts back thatbags but foolishly got drawn into the tangled knot that is Palestine!

You've gone back to the history of countries, niggly. What absent was saying is that the OP was about prejudice against individual Jews, not anti-Israeli foreign policy. Jews in this country are being targeted by anti-Semitism. That is wrong regardless of what the state of Israel is doing.

Thats not how Jews see it absent. For them the creation of Israel was a culmination of what they had been striving for since the Romans expelled them from the kingdom of Israel and Judea, the promised land, 2.000 odd years ago, and they believe that they have as much right to be there as Palestinians. Israel was willing to create two states right from the start, but that was rejected by the Palestinians, and that's been the case ever since. Britain administered Palestine after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire who had ruled the area since c1840. The history way back is extremely complicated, but both sides imo have a right to be there, and instead of threatening Israel with annihilation, wouldn't it be better to create a Palestinian state, and a peaceful coexistence to the mutual benefit of both communities? Or is that too simple?!

Well said, absent. It's really quite shocking how so many don't seem able to distinguish between criticising Israel and criticising (even attacking) Jews.

How interesting that the OP of this thread posed a topical question about anti-Semitism (referring specifically to prejudice against Jews) in UK politics, but most of the thread is about the state of Israel and its history, plus its treatment of and political relations with Palestinians. Once again it seems, in spite of protests to the contrary, that anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are unhelpfully conflated.

Trouble was nigglie it was not Britain's land to give away to create a new state hence the supporters of Palestine trying hard to regain stolen land for their friends.

Within hours of its creation the tiny state of Israel was under attack from Jordon, Syria and Egypt. The hastily cobbled together forces mostly armed by Czechoslovakia and France proved more than a match for these attackers who sued for peace in 1949. If it were my country, surrounded by neighbours who were much larger and who from virtually day one wanted to destroy it, I think I would be defending it very fiercely.