Labour Affairs is publishing the comments as they continue to be of current interest.
David Rosenberg of Jewish Voice for Labour posted last night (10 July):
Well the Guardian are sitting on a letter I sent them yesterday morning after their typically duplicitous editorial which included a significant section on Corbyn, Labour and antisemitism. It was even within their word-count. If they still refuse to publish it (it is not in tomorrow’s letters) you can at least read it here:
“I rejoined Labour in 2015, excited that a committed anti-racist was challenging for the leadership. Corbyn’s reign, though, has been dogged by allegations of antisemitism made by party members, and also those with political animus against Labour and Corbyn personally.
“Your editorial (8 July), slipped from accusations within Labour to the “record number of antisemitic incidents recorded in the UK”, as if these were connected. The sharpest UK-wide rise over the last 10 years was in 2013/14, before Corbyn led Labour. Antisemitic incidents and Islamophobic attacks have both risen since 2014.
“I have personally encountered more antisemitism in the last five years than in my previous 55 combined. I have heard it on buses, tube and plane journeys, in pubs, at football matches, and on social media, but almost none within the Labour Party, apart from occasional comments that are immediately challenged. Other Labour members I talk to around Britain are baffled by the claims. In general we haven’t heard it in branch or committee meetings or in our canvassing work, though the media tell us it is happening elsewhere.
“When so many accusations against Corbyn’s Labour come from those within and beyond the Jewish community who give the Conservatives a free pass, it is hard not to react with cynicism.”
“A more obvious political point is rarely aired by the media. Antisemitism has increased under a Conservative Government that not only created the Hostile Environment, but enjoy direct links to a host of antisemitic, Islamophobic, anti-migrant parties in Europe.
Labour Affairs Magazine 