Thread by @PeriHankey

One day after #GE2019, @guardian let Kenneth Stern (who drafted the #IHRA definition of Antisemitism) say if "[Jared] Kushner or I had been born into a Palestinian family displaced in 1948, we might have a different view of Zionism, & that need not be because we vilify Jews."

Kenneth Stern wrote in @guardian with readers in the #US in mind. He explained that @ZOA_National sees the #IHRA definition as stopping @NationalSJP from calling for ‘#intifada’. But he says @NationalSJP has the right to make “calls” he doesn't like. "That’s called free speech."

Here @BoardofDeputies has told candidates in the #LabourLeader elections to apply the #IHRA definition "with all its examples & clauses", "without qualification". But, as @JVoiceLabour explains, they don't require the #IHRA definition of others. Why not? jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/statement/resp…

It's been said that some parts of the world have 'more history than they themselves can consume'. But we have some of our own. We have fought civil wars that gave the @churchofengland for some time more power & more control than we wanted. We have won some freedom of thought.

That happened because, in the end, it was not politically possible to treat all other Christians or in the end all other thought as excluded from all parts of our state. So whenever some group demands exceptional treatment, we absolutely must examine by what right it does that.

In 1760 @BoardofDeputies was established. That was one step in our collective struggle for progress towards the freedom of thought & religion of which they are part, in which they have gained the status they have. A history in which they rightly take pride.

So @BoardofDeputies's #TenPledges claim cannot be answered by channeling Stalin: "The Pope? How many tanks does he have?" We have to know by what right that group makes the exceptional claims that it makes. Who questions their right? @JVoiceLabour: jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/statement/resp…

Our social, political & constitutional advances since 1760 have enabled @BoardofDeputies to become a valued & respected part of our community. But in light of that historical context we can see their #TenPledges as a grossly arrogant & unacceptable claim to exceptional rights.

This was a shocking scene. @davidgraeber describes Margaret Hodge MP calling #JeremyCorbyn in Parliament (in her words) “a fucking antisemite & a racist” because of a dispute about the examples & clauses of the #IHRA definition of antisemitism.: nybooks.com/daily/2020/01/…

But it is even more shocking to see the candidates in the #LabourLeadershipElection falling over themselves to accept demands that would see decent rational Labour members & members of @JVoiceLabour grossly insulted as blackshirts like Oswald Mosely:

It is now clear that when #UKLabour accepted the full & unqualified #IHRA definition of antisemitism, it opened the door to a vicious campaign of character assassination that will be used to 'eradicate Corbyn & Corbynism' from the party:

That is an unacceptable & unhelpful objective. "Consistently dismissed as “unelectable,” Corbyn [in 2017] achieved the most dramatic swing to Labour since Clement Attlee ousted Winston Churchill in 1945". @davidgraeber has produced an essential analysis: nybooks.com/daily/2020/01/…

@davidgraeber @threadreaderapp unroll please