Conspiracy theories are all about unearthing secret plotting by sinister powerful groups, revealing a hidden hand. Over many decades fascist groups have advanced antisemitic conspiracy theories, which target Jewish individuals or small groups
as responsible for social, economic and political developments which they abhor. Fascists rail against mass immigration to the West, calling it the “Great Replacement”. They claim to see the “hidden hand” of Jews behind this. Very right wing politicians in several countries
like Trump, Orban, Netanyahu, Rees Mogg see the hidden hand of Hungarian Jew George Soros behind protest movements and pro-migrant, pro-refugee movements. When @Keir_Starmer and @BoDPres , Marie Van der Zyl attack Maxine Peake’s claim that American police had learned a certain
deadly police tactic from training sessions with Israeli counterparts, and Starmer sacks Rebecca Long-Bailey for sharing Peake’s interview, describing it unequivocally as a “Jewish Conspiracy Theory”, they completely empty that term of all its meaning.
Police kneeling on the neck of an individual they are apprehending – goes back several decades in US policing of black communities. It precedes cooperation with Israeli services. But Peake's general point was sound: Israeli security units have run seminars for US counterparts.
An article published in the liberal Israeli daily, Ha’aretz, in August 2017 reported: 24,000 American police were trained by Israeli counterparts. There is no conspiracy here. The information is out in the open. The people leading the seminars were the Israeli National Police.
Peake's remarks, and those in Ha'aretz, make no comment on Jews in general but on a unit of the Israeli state. If criticism of Israeli office holders is "antisemitic", then we place off-limits criticism of anything oppressive or discriminatory or lethal done by anyone Israeli.
My two questions to @Keir_Starmer are: Can you explain how Maxine Peake’s comments represent a “Jewish conspiracy theory”, rather than just saying that they do?
And how does Rebecca Long Bailey’s tweeting of an article which, at worst, alleges that an Israeli state unit,
And how does Rebecca Long Bailey’s tweeting of an article which, at worst, alleges that an Israeli state unit,
(not Jews in general) influenced specific policing methods in America, compare with Rachel Reeves' publicly stated admiration for the Hitler/Nazi-supporting antisemite Nancy Astor? Why did you promote her? Why have you not acted against her?
