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Irish Times journalist Kitty Holland was forced to issue an apology on Monday after claiming that the overwhelming defeat suffered by British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in last week’s election was “a great result for Zionism”.

“It’s a great result for Zionism. Monsters are roaring their delight,” Holland wrote in a since deleted tweet on Friday.

The tweet caused an uproar and the Irish Times was flooded with complaints. On Monday, Holland tweeted, “Last Friday morning, in the aftermath of the UK elections, I posted a tweet on this account which resulted in a great deal of upset. I apologise sincerely for the hurt caused.”

Holland is notorious for her anti-Israel rhetoric. According to HonestReporting, in 2018 she was caught tweeting an old and previously discredited fake news story from a fringe media outlet in order to stir up anti-Israel hate.

In 2015, Holland was the recipient of “Most Bigoted Journalist” in HonestReporting’s Dishonest Reporting Awards for a Twitter exchange where HonestReporting raised a genuine issue which ended with Holland declaring that she was “Not interacting with Zionists anymore.”

Holland is not the only one to suggest that Corbyn’s loss was a victory for the Jews. On Thursday night, hours after the vote, former London Mayor and Labour MP Ken Livingstone appeared to blame "the Jewish vote" for contributing to the Labour party’s loss in the election.

"The Jewish vote wasn't very helpful. Jeremy should have tackled that issue far earlier than he did,” said Livingstone, who was himself ousted from Labour following anti-Semitism.

BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg noted Livingstone's choice of words about the "Jewish vote" and predicted it "may well cause some eyebrows to shoot up".