Members attending the British Labour party’s annual conference have passed a rule on how they will handle anti-Semitism complaints, JTA reported on Monday.
The change, passed on Sunday in Brighton, England, stipulates that complaints about anti-Semitism will be reviewed by an independent committee. During his years at the helm of the party, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was accused of allowing anti-Semitism to fester among some of the party’s left-wing supporters.
Current Labour leader Keir Starmer declared during following the approval of the change that the party had “closed the door this evening to anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.”
“We’ve turned our back on the dark chapter. Having closed that door, that door will never be opened again in our Labour Party to anti-Semitism,” he declared, according to JTA.
Jewish Labour supporters who spoke Sunday supported the change.
The party is “turning the page on the blight of anti-Semitism,” said Jewish former Labour lawmaker Ruth Smeeth, who was bombarded with antis-Semitic death threats in 2019.
“You failed,” she said to those behind the abuse. “We’re still here.”
When Corbyn was Labour leader, he faced ongoing accusations of anti-Semitism, both over his history of hostility towards Israel and support for anti-Israel terrorist groups, as well as the rise in anti-Jewish rhetoric within the party.
Dozens of Labour members have been suspended over their anti-Semitic statements in recent years, while the party has been criticized for its failure to deal with the anti-Semitism within it.
In the most recent British parliamentary election, Labour recorded its worst performance, in terms of seats, since 1935.
Corbyn eventually stepped down and was later suspended from Labour following the publication of a report which found numerous cases where the party leadership under Corbyn underplayed, belittled or ignored complaints by Jewish members, and sometimes actively interfered to support political allies.
He was reinstated to Labour after appearing to apologize for belittling the report.
(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Simchat Torah and Shmini Atzeret in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)