456. Antisemitism, How the Tories Lost Britain, and Gaza

0:29Thanks for listening to The Rest is Politics. Sign up to The Rest is Politics. to differentiate between the two. The Palestinians were not involved in negotiating this plan, so it would be like a Ukraine peace deal negotiated between Trump and Putin. This was negotiated between Trump and Netanyahu. Even if the fighting were to stop now, peace is not just about stopping wars. Peace is then about what follows and how do you build a durable peace. This episode is powered by Fuse Energy. Now, more and more drivers are moving to electric as the economic and environmental arguments get much harder to ignore.

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2:26Welcome to The Rest is Politics with me, Alistair Campbell. And me, Roy Stewart. And Rory, it's October the 7th, which is one of those dates that is going to go down in history along with September the 11th. And so we'll talk about that two years on. We'll also talk about the terrorist attack in Manchester and the protests that are ongoing on Palestine action and the way that the government is handling those. I think in the second half we should talk about your old party. They're having a very successful conference so far. I'm sure you're really sorry you're not there, aren't you? It's very, very sad.

2:55I've not been invited, but I should probably have gone. I think I turned you away for a fringe meeting. How we got it all wrong with Rory Stewart. That's right, exactly. So where do you want to start? Well, let's start with the attack on the synagogue in Manchester, in which a British Syrian attacker killed a worshipper. A second worshipper was then killed, it seems, in the attempts of the police to provide security, and which has really brought the focus on anti-Semitism in Britain, which we don't talk about enough. I thought the most powerful thing that I've seen recently on this was in fact from Robert Peston on our sister show, The Rest is Money, where Robert makes the point that we can be very, very angry with what Russia is doing in Ukraine, but it doesn't manifest itself with people attacking and killing Russians in Britain.

3:46And that I feel, and there are many complicated reasons for this, but I think that anti-Semitism is very real and that Jews and Muslims are almost unique. I mean, listeners may challenge me, but almost unique in finding themselves victims targeted and associated with what's done by other people. So in the case of Jews, and there was a Matthew Said article about trying to walk around Trafalgar Square talking to protesters. It is the sense that Jews in general are being made to bear the full burden of what Netanyahu is doing in Gaza. And with Muslims, it's the sense that they're being made to bear the full burden of atrocities committed by the Taliban or terrorist attacks are being directed to Muslims in general.

4:34Just a final thing for me, which is that thinking about responding to that attack. I had to be clear with myself about asking myself again and again, would I respond to this attack in the way that I would respond to an attack on a mosque? So if there was an attack on a mosque in Britain, I would be straight out there. Which there was two days ago. Right. Saying, this is completely horrific. This is disgusting. And that is, of course, the correct response to the attack on the synagogue. And we have to challenge ourselves again and again and again, particularly someone like me who is so angry and disgusted with what Netanyahu's government is doing in Gaza and feels that so strongly, to keep that line so, so clear and keep the empathy for the Jewish community, love for the Jewish community, decency towards the Jewish community, respect towards it, protection in exactly the same way as we would for any community, but particularly for the Jewish community at this moment.

5:40Yeah, because I think the history, well, the history of anti-Semitism goes back a long, long, long, long way. But in terms of the rest is politics. Of course, it sort of came to a head during Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour Party and the sense that anti-Semitism was real and it wasn't being properly addressed by the leadership of one of the two main parties, which is now the party of government. And it's interesting you said about how you reacted, because as soon as it happened, and I agree with you, by the way, I thought Robert's commentary at the start of his podcast was really quite moving, because Robert is Jewish.

6:15He is somebody who, as an independent television journalist, doesn't sort of express his own views, but you don't have to watch him very often. to know that he's pretty condemnatory of a lot of the actions of the Israeli government, and does make that observation about around the world. I think there is some anti-Russian feeling because of Ukraine. But if you bump into a Russian person, you don't automatically assume they are pro-Putin. In fact, if they're outside Russia, you think, well, maybe they're left because they're anti-Putin. And you may not automatically talk to them about it. I mean, is that just because they're Jewish, everybody wants to incessantly talk to them about Gaza in a way that if you're Russian, people are not incessantly.

7:04And again, if you're a Muslim, it would be a bit strange if people were incessantly trying to talk to you about the Taliban. And the other thing I'd say is that you and I both had a lot of criticism, particularly not immediately after the October 7th massacre, but because we have become so trenchant. I basically said, I think what Nenya is doing is genocide. you're not far from that position as well and so we have had some response that you know we've been far too critical of israel and that has fanned the flames of anti-semitism which i think is unfair because i think you have to be able to differentiate between the two you know fiona and i've got a lot of jewish friends um and we've got one who is actually does the feel that sense that if you're attacking Israel, you're attacking Jews.

7:53Most of our Jewish friends are absolutely appalled by what the Israeli government has done, particularly in the last 12 months, just when they've taken the campaign in Gaza to a completely different level. And at the same time, do want a sense of assurance from all of us that we understand their pain as Jews in relation to October the 7th and in relation to anti-Semitism and now in relation to the extent to which Israel is so divided. That's something that the Jews I know say about it all the time. You have got no idea what it's like when your country has become so divided and there's so much hate.

8:32So right at the heart of this question is the relationship between being anti-Semitic and being fiercely critical of the horrible actions of the government of Israel. And how can you divide those two? And I think it's really conflated. And actually, there are people in the Israeli government who clearly weaponize the slogan of anti-Semitism to undermine critics. They used it against the Labour government when they tried to sanction Ben-Gavir and Smatrich. They used it against the Labour government when they tried to recognize the state of Palestine. And the Israeli government have weaponized this allegation of anti-Semitism again and again, in a very unjust way and have used it against people who are not anti-Semitic.

9:16I think the litmus test is exactly the one that Peston produces in The Rest is Money, which is ask yourself again and again, if I'm talking to somebody from Congo, am I holding them responsible for the horrors in Congo? If I'm talking to a Russian, does it make any sense for me to judge them, have prejudice against them, feel bad feelings towards them because of what putin's doing in ukraine no i agree with that and robert's clip from the rest is money i thought it was really interesting and quite moving actually and the other thing i found repulsive about the response i mean the action the the the act itself was off the scale horrific there was some amazing courage and i'll tell you some of the biggest courage i've seen has actually been because when i heard a police officer had killed one of the two people had died I thought oh god this is particularly as it came on the morning we'd had this report about the Metropolitan Police which was awful in sexism misogyny racism etc I thought oh my god this is going to become a really bad day for the police but actually was the extent to which I saw an interview yesterday with the ex-wife of somebody who was in been in intensive care who'd been also shot by the police who said she'd spoke to him and he did not do blame the police because they were doing their job trying to keep us safe and likewise i've i've heard no criticism from the family of the guy who was killed by the police which stands in great contrast to the the way that some people some of the shock jocks on our right-wing tv stations some of the i would i would i'm afraid i'd put nigel farage into this camp in relation to the the protests where he basically said these were celebrating the deaths in the synagogue these were protests that had already been planned.

11:01But these people who came out straight away, literally like that, this is on Keir Starmer. He has fueled this. And we got a little bit of that as well. We did. We did an interview with David Baddiel on leading that if people haven't heard, it's maybe worth listening to because that is very, very focused on his experience of antisemitism, his book, Jews Don't Count. He tries to draw a very, very clear line between antisemitism and Israel. In fact, I think he says in the interview, I don't have a view on Israel. I don't have to have a view on Israel. I'm just talking about Andy Sennig. And a lot of our viewers and listeners criticise him for that, saying, it's your responsibility, etc.

11:37But I actually quite, you know, I totally understand what he's saying. It's like somebody meets you abroad and, oh, you're British. Therefore, you must inevitably have a view about every single thing that I know about Britain. Now, as it happens, you and I probably do have views about most things, but most people don't. Absolutely. And I think there's a double thing also, which is he, I think, might also say, I have an identity as a British Jew, not particularly in any way as an Israeli Jew. However, there are other people contacting me. I just got a long, long series of WhatsApps, 14 this morning when I woke up from a friend from a Jewish family in Australia, where this is a very, very live issue.

12:16And he's incredibly angry with Albanese, and he feels that anti-Semitism in Australia is getting out of control, liberals are enabling it. And his view, which again is another view that you'll hear a lot, is that he does not feel there is enough analysis and criticism of Hamas. So a lot of focus on what Israel is doing wrong, not enough talking about who Hamas are, their cruelty, the way they treat people, their terrorism, their savagery, the treatment of women, their links to Iran. I think it was something that a Jewish friend of mine said recently, who is not remotely pro-Netanyahu, in fact, is very, very angry with Netanyahu, but said it really shocked him how quickly the actual events on the day of October 7th sort of receded from the public debate.

13:07And I guess that's why marking these anniversaries is so important. important. And also, again, I was remembering October the 7th and remembering that one of the things that totally threw many of my Jewish friends off balance was how they felt, at least, in their memory of it, is that by kind of October the 8th, there were massive anti-Israel demonstrations happening. And I think Kir Sam is also, I think, today called for people not to demonstrate that they just, what is going on? Can't you give us a couple of days before this gets going? Yeah, and the only other point I make, though, is I think one of the, I understand, and we've criticized the Israeli government for not allowing international media in.

13:49But I think that has been another byproduct. Because you're having most of the world's top international journalists reporting from Israel about what's happening inside Gaza, to which they have very, very limited access. I think you probably would find there'd be more focus on Hamas if there was proper media access. I couldn't agree more. I was talking to somebody from the Israeli government about this. And I said, well, why won't you let the journalists in? And he said, well, you know, I'm worried. We're worried that if they went in, they would, to be honest, take the Hamas line. I said, no, come on.

14:20These are very experienced international correspondents. They've operated in Afghanistan. They've operated in Syria. You cannot have anything worse than what you've currently got by not letting the journalists in. At least take the risk. There will be some stories analyzing what Hamas is doing. Right. Meanwhile, we're in a fake news environment. So again, a very interesting moment for me last night, which completely threw me off balance. So as we have explained on the show a couple of weeks ago, the UN process looking at famine in Israel is a very rigorous, objective process. They followed exactly the same process they followed in South Sudan and Sudan and Somalia.

15:00They looked at three indicators. They measured the width of people's arms. There was some issue around access to weighing machines, but it was the same process exactly done in those other three places. And they concluded there was a famine in a governorate in Gaza. And that's about as objective as you get. It's not journalists, that's professional experts going in with literally tape measures producing the stuff. And then last night, somebody said to me, well, since the peace has happened, people have been in and apparently it's all a lie and lots of photographs of fat Garzans. And I said, well, where is this coming from?

15:36Where did you read this? At which point, they got a bit sort of vague. And presumably, the answer is this stuff is going out on social media. Part of the problem there is that the Israeli government is relentlessly, we now know, paying influencers, pushing out stories which are not true, which again doesn't help any kind of objective analysis. On Saturday, I was up in the Midlands for my sins, Rory, doing another Labour Party fundraiser. And I was in a hotel and it came on Sky News, whoosh, breaking news, Netanyahu to make a statement. and I'm looking at my watch thinking, oh, we're going to be able to see it before I have to leave or what have you.

16:15Anyway, it was a long wait because they said he was going to make the statement at six o 'clock and it was, I think it was gone seven by the time. And what had been happening seemingly is that Ben Gavir and Smotrich were going in saying, no, you cannot say that. No, you cannot say that. So he ended up not saying very much. This was about the Gaza 20 point plan, which we'll talk about. But meanwhile, this guy, Adam Parsons, who's Sky Middle East correspondent, He was in Jerusalem, endless two-way, as they were. Yet I was still waiting for Betty Bledeo. So they replayed a couple of times a report that Adam Parsons had done inside Gaza with the IDF.

16:54And it was very interesting because, and he made the point, they made the point, we are only allowed to see what they show us, and we have to clear our reports with them. Okay? So they made that point. But just by showing the pictures, he was able to paint a picture of absolute devastation. And then, even though he's been covering it from the off, say just how shocked he was to see the scale of that devastation. And he said he was only allowed in there for quite a short period of time. And he came out. And that's when I thought, I actually do think if Israel had been much, much more open, they'd have.

17:35I don't think they'd been quite the, you know, the state in international terms that they're in. I was, before the synagogue attack, when we were talking over the weekend about, you know, before the end of last week, what we're going to talk about next week, I'd read this piece in Foreign Affairs magazine, analyzing Israel's relations with all the countries around the world, big and small. And it's impossible really to point to a single relationship that is actually strengthened they've they've pretty much all weakened and so i just i think there is there is something in this sort of you know the the just the complete shutdown and the and the sense of relentless propaganda the other thing i should say on which we should you know by the way shout out to our social media team i don't know if you've been watching some of the films they do but itn last it was last night or the day before they did this uh john irvine was reporting and they found some old footage of Gaza on October the 6th two years ago and they showed this big busy street high rise blocks, cars moving around what have you and they've now got pictures of the same place today and it is rubble.

18:47Let's now do the transition to the peace plan. So listeners will have heard us do what was almost a kind of emergency episode around the peace plan as it was announced in the 20 point plan. At the time we pointed out that there are There are unbelievable problems for this plan, and I suppose there are two major problems. Number one is that Palestinians were not involved in negotiating this plan, so it would be like a Ukraine peace deal negotiated between Trump and Putin. This was negotiated between Trump and Netanyahu. And the second issue, which is that Netanyahu presents it as a total victory, a surrender for Hamas, everything achieved, and how difficult that would be for the other side to sign up to.

19:25Since then, Hamas has very much come back with a yes, but. And a lot of the Arab states have said also some version of, yes, this is almost our plan. Some of the details got lost in what Trump and Netanyahu presented in the end, but broadly speaking, we want this. So let's try to understand why that is. And it's not, I think, if you talk to Palestinians or if you talk to Qataris or people from UAE that they think this is some sort of just peace deal. It's that they have concluded that there are no options left. That if you are in Gaza at the moment, all you want is to stop being killed. The advance on Gaza City is beginning.

20:11The power stations are being hit. The high-rise buildings are coming down. 700 ,000 people have been displaced and are moving towards very inadequate shelter. There are children being born already with malnutrition at the moment of their birth. 67 ,000 people have been killed. Just stop. Enough already. And the pressure now on Hamas from both the people of Gaza and from the Gulf States is, you've lost. There's nowhere to go now. There's no point actually holding onto these hostages anymore. The story was you were holding onto the hostages because by holding onto the hostages, you had some leverage and maybe Israel wouldn't hit you that hard.

20:54Give back the hostages. There's no guarantee that Israel will withdraw. There's no guarantee that they'll even release your prisoners. But take the chance, there's a 10 % chance maybe that Trump will put pressure on Netanyahu to do what he says he's going to do. And what have you really got to lose? Because things can't actually get any worse. And so it's a surrender. I mean, I think Netanyahu's right. He's saying total victory. And of course, for people looking around the world, it is of course total victory and will be interpreted by many other countries around the world as total victory and vindication for Netanyahu's methods.

21:26He will essentially be sending the message to the world, it doesn't matter that the International Criminal Court or the International Court of Justice or the UN or any of this stuff, we won. It worked. This is the way you do it. No consequences. Victory. We're in a much stronger position towards Palestine than we were two years ago. Yeah. And yet Donald Trump seems quite irritated with Netanyahu's response to the way this thing's gone. Netanyahu is talking at the moment about implementing the first phase of this plan. There was a report of a conversation in which Trump used the F word and said, why are you all so F-ing negative?

22:04This is a win, take it. We said when we did the part, we talked about this last week, this isn't really a plan. It's a sort of wish list of all the things that, if they all happened, might really lead to the end of the war. It's not really a peace plan. It's a sort of let's just stop fighting plan. And Netanyahu is not really engaging with the stuff beyond the immediate, which is Hamas have to release the hostages. And he said, the one thing he did absolutely clearly say in this statement on Saturday night is the IDF is remaining in most of the Strip. So that goes against what we thought was being said.

22:41Exactly. The January-March plans were basically hostages would be released, and in return, Israel would withdraw its troops, cease fire and withdraw. This plan is hostages must be released and in the fullness of time maybe no indicators and of course as you say Netanyahu's indicating that he won't. You see and I think we've got what we've got here again this is something we reflected last week. This is so complicated, it's so fraught, there are so many players, there are so many factors. People say Donald Trump can sort this out on his own, he can't. there's so many he can set a framework and and to be fair he's done that i worry that what we're seeing here is a clash between his style of leadership his style of negotiation which is to slap something on the table and say right take it or else and then lots of people outside who don't really worry that much about the or else including netanyahu netanyahu's not actually delivered what Trump thought he was.

23:42And I honestly do think that the pending date this Friday of the announcement of who wins the Nobel Peace Prize, I mean, I hate to question the guy's motivations, but I do think that's a big part of this. And he sort of woke up a few days ago and thought, if I'm going to get this peace prize, I've got to stop this fighting now. And he's really, really gone for it. And by the way, I have to say, well, I don't have to say, but I will say it, even if the fighting were to stop now, I think it would be absurd because peace in the end is about, peace is not just about stopping wars. Peace is then about what follows and how do you build a durable peace.

24:23That's why you should get a peace prize. A ceasefire is not a peace. Do you think it would be more motivating for Trump to remain engaged if he won the prize on Friday, or if they dangled the possibility that if he did a good job over the next 12 months, they might give him the prize next year. Well, he's convinced himself that he's already stopped. Sometimes it's four, sometimes it's seven, sometimes it's 11 wars. So he thinks he deserves it anyway, regardless. And of course, the people of Albania and Cambodia are very grateful. My friend Irabah was sailing close to the wind. I hope Trump didn't see that video of him with Macron and the leader from Azerbaijan saying, you know, Donald Trump, he's stopped us fighting and here we are.

25:01Thank you for your supportive role, Emmanuel. you all no i i yesterday we're recording this on tuesday yesterday the the the group representing the hostages and the families they wrote to the nobel peace prize committee and said please give it to him but just presumably but but so he stays engaged let me push you one more time for the break do you think he would be more engaged by the holding out the carrot that they might give it to him in a year time i think he does here and now i asked for it this year i want it this year And you don't think the risk is that if he gets it this year, he's, yeah, well, I've got that now and can now focus on my golf game.

25:34Yeah, 100%. 100%. So what's the point of getting to that? And also, somebody was also… So at least take the risk that he might stay engaged for it next year. Well, somebody was also making the point that one of the points in this 20-point plan is that he, with Tony Blair alongside him, chairs this board of peace. Absolutely. He'll be thinking about it all the time. So they have to build a golf course in the new Gaza. that yeah we should briefly before the break just reflect on these the palestine action protests so the government legislated to make or they prescribed palestine action as a terrorist organization you and i both suggested at the time we didn't think that was properly thought through and we haven't really been given clarity of reasoning as a result of which it is a criminal offense to hold up a sign saying i oppose i support palestine action stop genocide and thus far we're to the thousands now of people who've been arrested at these protests for Palestine action.

26:29So the government, new Home Secretary Shibana Mahmood, now saying that she may legislate, bring forward an amendment to a bill going through parliament now to give police more powers and her more powers to stop repeat protests. So what do you think of that? I think it's a hiding to nothing. And I think it's a dangerous route for the government to go down. We began talking about antisemitism. I think antisemitism is real, and that synagogue attack should make us all focus on the fact there's a very nasty undercurrent of antisemitism in Britain, and a very nasty undercurrent of extreme Islamophobia in Britain and right the way across Europe.

27:08And the government has a real duty to work out what we do to deal with anti-Semitism in this country and reduce it. But this going after the Palestine Action Protest is mad. You end up arresting thousands of pensioners. And just to be brutal, as somebody who used to be a prisons minister, our prisons are full to bursting. We need those prison places. They're violent. They're out of control. And we need them for murderers, burglars, violent criminals. We do not need them for elderly professors, even if they are poorly informed about Hamas. I also, I mean, I spoke to somebody who was at one of these protests who said that the police were basically saying to them that, you know, as long as you don't keep coming back, there's no chance you're going to jail.

27:50So, no, I think this is one of those instances where you've got to be very, very careful about the long-term consequences. And usually, legislating to respond to something in the moment is, you should be a little bit wary. Because the other thing i heard somebody pointing out that some of those people who are supporting the idea of greater powers to stop protest are also the people who think they should be allowed to stand outside abortion clinics and stop people you know and would be angry very angry or to stand outside asylum hotels yeah and yeah you know so you've got to be very very careful about about how you handle it.

28:32And I do think it's one of those where there might be a case for just sort of stepping back a bit. And the other thing is, I mean, I feel, you know, when that Tommy Robinson march was on recently, one of the ministers I heard on the radio said, you know, when people feel very, very uncomfortable, well, I felt very uncomfortable. You know, I don't want to be surrounded by Tommy Robinson and his mates, but I still think you have to defend the right to protest. Small ray of light of many people be aware that an Israeli minister issued an invitation for Tommy Robinson to visit Israel. So Tommy Robinson, convicted criminal, football hooligan, very much the far right, well beyond Nigel Farage, extremely dangerous character associated with basically fascist movements, now being invited as almost a state guest by the Israeli government.