Jeremy Corbyn struggled to deal with Labour’s Jew-hate crisis because he was emotionally distressed by accusations he was antisemitic, Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry has claimed.
In an interview with the Evening Standard, Ms Thornberry said the Labour leader was “really distressed” to be described as a racist and an antisemite by one his own MPs in the House of Commons.
She said it reminded her of when former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown had been accused of misusing public funds and “found it very difficult in those circumstances to get past his righteous indignation… to be strategic and to divorce the emotion and think things through.”
Ms Thornberry told that Standard that, although Mr Corbyn was usually able to shrug off even strong criticism, he could not do so when he was called an antisemite, “because it goes so against his idea of who he is. He has taken it personally.”
"Calling him an antisemite? Calling him a racist? That just went straight to the absolute core. It really distressed him," she said.
According to a Survation poll for the JC earlier this month, 85 per cent of UK Jews think Mr Corbyn is antisemitic, with almost 40 per cent saying they will “strongly consider leaving the country” if he becomes prime minister.
Dame Margaret Hodge, a Jewish MP, called Mr Corbyn “an antisemite and a racist”, after Labour’s National Executive Committee rejected adopting the full International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of Jew-hate, despite being urged by Jewish communal and spiritual leaders for the party to do so.
This triggered a standoff with the Jewish community that lasted through the summer.
During the row, video of a speech mr Corbyn gave in 2013 was published, in which he talked about a group of British Jewish Zionists, saying: “They clearly have two problems. One is that they don’t want to study history, and secondly, having lived in this country for a very long time, probably all their lives, don’t understand English irony.”
Mr Corbyn’s comments were widely condemned as being antisemitic.
The party eventually adopted the definition with all its examples but with a "free speech" caveat on Israel.
During her interview Ms Thornberry also described how people have come up to her in the street and said “well done Emily. Hopefully Jeremy is going to be Prime Minister, and don’t let the Jews get you down'.
“I say: ‘That’s not acceptable. I have Jewish members of staff. They work night and day to get Labour elected'.”
