Campaign Against Antisemitism’s analysis is that Dr Heald’s actions and statements amount to breaches of the International Definition of Antisemitism and qualify as antisemitic discourse according to our methodology.
By claiming that those complaining about antisemitism, which necessarily includes Jews, are doing so because they have an “agenda” [1a]; by endorsing the assertion that allegations of Labour having a problem with institutional antisemitism are “just b*ll*cks” [1b] and a “fake made-up problem” [1c]; by endorsing the assertion that allegations of antisemitism in Labour are “a huge smear” [2a]; by claiming and endorsing claims that antisemitism is being “weaponised” [2c][2d][2e]; and by endorsing the notion that such claims are “calling wolf” [2f], he was both deploying and endorsing the deployment of the so-called ‘Livingstone Formulation’, by accusing Jews who cite evidence of antisemitism of lying, conspiring or having deceitful motives in doing so, when there is clear evidence that there have been breaches of the International Definition of Antisemitism. In so doing, he was “Making mendacious, dehumanising, demonising, or stereotypical allegations about Jews.”
We note that on 24th April 2018, in an article published in the Evening Standard, Mr Corbyn stated: “We must strive to understand why anti-Semitism [sic] has surfaced in our party…” and “when members of Jewish communities express genuine anxieties we must recognise them as we would those of any other community. Their concerns are not ‘smears’.”
By ‘liking’ the assertion that a Jewish newspaper was “under Tory control” and that to “smear” was part of a “Hard right Jewish agenda” [2b], Dr Heald was endorsing an antisemitic trope common in left-wing discourse, which allows the views and concerns of Jewish people not only to be dismissed, but which also seeks to demonise them by association with political groups already demonised on the left, either by employing the generalised term ‘right wing’, or by explicitly linking them with the Conservative Party, which is often associated with the notion of ‘evil’ in left-wing discourse. As such, and by ‘liking’ the assertion that allegations of antisemitism, characterised as “smears”, were being made as part of a shadowy plot by “powers [that] be” in order to prevent “giving power to the people…[and] fair distribution of wealth” [2g], he was further endorsing “mendacious, dehumanising, demonising, or stereotypical allegations about Jews.”
