Why is the left trying to politicise a key community institution?

“Today’s British Jewish community is descended from refugees and/or migrants. We have significant concerns at the potential for newly proposed migration legislation to breach both the Refugee Convention and the Human Rights Act.” pic.twitter.com/HO0Y1VoPso

— Board of Deputies of British Jews (@BoardofDeputies) March 8, 2023

ABOVE: The statement yesterday by the Board of Deputies

The attack made against Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman’s Illegal Migration legislation yesterday, issued in the name of the Board President, Marie van Der Zyl, cannot pass without challenge.

Some within our community may object to the bill, as is their right. Others, such as myself, will strongly support it as a vital measure to curb the huge numbers of migrants arriving illegally in small boats, many of them claiming asylum on spurious grounds and most of them organised by criminal gangs.

The key point is this: members of every community will hold different views, as is their right. However, it is outrageous that the Board of Deputies appears to have been hijacked as a vehicle to push a left leaning agenda, using the platform as a megaphone to berate the British government.

It is in bad taste to invoke the historically traumatic migrant experience of the Jewish people as a means to press gang the whole community and its institutions into this partisan campaign. This is a nuanced issue that cannot be explained through cryptic and simplistic social media posts.

Now is the time for Deputies, who represent dozens of local and sectional Jewish groups, to make a clear statement to the leadership of the Board: the good name of the Board of Deputies of British Jews must not be taken in vain.

Lord Polak is a Conservative life peer