On 5th December 2019, it was reported that Mr Ali had claimed to have confused Lehman Brothers with the Barclay Brothers, who currently own the Daily Telegraph, and that he had stressed that he would “never peddle” the antisemitic trope that Jews control the world’s finances.
On 11th December 2019, it was reported that Mr Ali had been reported to the police over his comments in [1].
On 28th January 2020, it was reported that Mr Ali was one of only a handful of MPs who had declined to sign up to the International Definition of Antisemitism.
On 23rd February 2020, it was reported that the largest Facebook group supporting the Labour leadership candidacy of Rebecca Long Bailey, of which Mr Ali was reportedly a member, was littered with antisemitic posts. There was no suggestion, however, that Mr Ali had endorsed any of the posts in question.
On 26th June 2020, it was reported that Mr Ali had finally signed up to the International Definition of Antisemitism in the presence of the Opposition Chief Whip.
On the same day, Mr Ali posted on Facebook that he had been amongst the Socialist Campaign Group of MPs who had met with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer to protest against the sacking from the shadow cabinet of Rebecca Long Bailey for having shared an article which contained an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
We do not know whether disciplinary action has been taken by the Labour Party against Mr Ali, and at the time of writing, on 2nd July 2020, we have no record of any. However, the circumstances and outcomes of any such action would remain unknown, owing to the conditions of secrecy imposed by Baroness Chakrabarti’s report on antisemitism in the Labour Party.
In July 2020, Campaign Against Antisemitism put this matter to both Mr Ali and the Labour Party, but did not receive a response.
