Jeremy Corbyn Will Address British Pro-Israel Event
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
Jeremy Corbyn, the newly elected leader of Britain’s Labor Party who has been accused of being anti-Israel, will address a pro-Israel event.
Corbyn will speak next week at the Labor Friends of Israel dinner, his office confirmed Thursday to The Jerusalem Post. Some 400 people, including about 30 members of Parliament, are scheduled to attend the dinner, which traditionally hosts the Labor Party’s leader.
He has called Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah “friends,” and recently defended an Anglican minister who posted anti-Semitic conspiracy theories online. Corbyn also has publicly endorsed a blanket arms embargo on Israel and the boycott of Israeli universities involved in weapons research.
His Jewish critics have said that if he is to be trusted, he must first clarify or backtrack from such remarks or stances.
Labor Friends of Israel chairwoman Joan Ryan, a British lawmaker, called the invitation to the dinner “the start of a process.”
“It’s good that we are opening this dialogue. It would be wrong to turn away,” she told the London-based Jewish Chronicle. “There’s no reason to believe dialogue is not welcome. We have an open door and we will go through it with all our good and strong arguments.”
Corbyn told The Church Times last week that while his immediate family is Christian, he has a “Jewish element” in his background.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
