Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

British Jewish Lawmaker Threatened by Jeremy Corbyn Backers

— A Jewish member of the British Parliament was put under police protection after receiving an anti-Semitic death threat on Facebook.

Ruth Smeeth, 37, a member of the Labour Party, told British media that she holds party leader Jeremy Corbyn personally responsible for the actions of his supporters.

The Facebook message repeatedly called Smeeth a “Yid” and said that “the gallows would be a fine and fitting place” for Smeeth to “swing from,” the Jewish Chronicle reported.

The death threat also expressed strong support for Corbyn, who is currently in a race to remain in his job as party leader.

Smeeth reportedly has received 25,000 abusive or anti-Semitic posts. She had panic buttons and CCTV surveillance cameras installed in her home, the Chronicle reported.

“I expect Jeremy to show true leadership, which means calling out individuals at times by name to say what they are doing it is unacceptable,” she told the British Sun newspaper. “He must stand up and say enough is enough, and he has done nowhere near enough yet.”

Smeeth represents Stoke-on-Trent North located in Staffordshire, England.

Corbyn, who has called Hezbollah and Hamas “friends,” has been accused of fostering an atmosphere of anti-Semitism in the party.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.