A festival has disinvited a speaker from the controversial pro-Jeremy Corbyn, fringe group Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL), saying her presence would have stoked Labour's “febrile” antisemitism crisis.

JVL co-chair Leah Levane, who is also a Labour councillor in Hastings, was due to appear on a panel at the Greenbelt Festival, discussing religious ideas about mortality. But her invitation was rescinded days before it was due to start.

The festival said in a statement saying that Ms Levane’s contribution would divert attention from “the rich history and wider Jewish conversation that we have had the privilege of fostering over the years”.

“Because of a whole web of delicate, inter-related issues and programming that we’re staging over the weekend… we reached the point where we recognised that a disproportionate amount of attention would have been focussed in Leah’s direction, on this particular panel, and on our decision to include her,” the statement said.

“In disinviting her, Greenbelt must make it clear that Leah was not coming as a representative or spokesperson for the Jewish community in the UK.”

Greenbelt is an annual arts, faith and activism festival that takes place over the August Bank Holiday weekend in Northamptonshire.

It has previously hosted controversial speakers such as Robert Cohen, an anti-Zionist blogger who described former Momentum vice-chair Jackie Walker as a “longstanding anti-racist campaigner”.

Ms Walker was expelled from Labour earlier this year over her interventions in the antisemitism crisis.

JVL responded to Ms Levane's disinvitation, saying: “Withdrawing the invitation is disappointing and will be counterproductive and JVL’s involvement and the response to it is still likely to be ‘the story of the festival’”

JVL has been accused of existing solely to deny or downplay the extent of antisemitism within Labour.

Jon Lansman, the Jewish founder of pro-Corbyn campaign group Momentum, described JVL as "part of the problem" because "too many of its members self-define as 'Jews' only to attack other Jews".