Marie Lynam, Hampstead & Kilburn CLP
I have a friend who did not wish to sign the Rebecca Long-Bailey (RLB) petition due to what my friend saw as RLB having rather fallen on her sword.
But I think the instinct of all those who signed the petition is good. The 10,000 signatures in 2 days make a Big Noise at this Right Time.
Very useful also to note that, in sacking RLB, Keir Starmer has put firmly his right-wing cards on the table.
Unlike what Starmer is pretexting, no conspiracy theory is involved. It is now publicly documented that at least 12 US police forces have been trained, both in the US and in Israel, by Israeli law enforcement officials; and that the latter use the choke-hold method ‘with the knee’, as demonstrated this very month of June by the three Israeli guards who pounced upon Arab Bedouin Ishmael Khaldi at Jerusalem Central Bus Station because he was filming their antics.
This matter is opening a debate (blocked up to now) in all in the CLPs – a debate that K Starmer and the Labour right wanted to keep shut.
I am quite sure that the sacking of RBL is going to be a boomerang for Starmer. Not that RLB will have anything much to add, perhaps, but that Israel and the Jewish people are increasingly perceived as distinct entities, and not to be confused with each other.
My CLP has had 2 informal Zoom gatherings (the secretary cleverly asked Tulip and the NEC – and these were granted).
Before the last Zoom, someone was insistent in having an item on the Agenda demanding to know why our CLP never discussed their resolution about the lack of space for Jewish people in our Party. As the Zoom meeting drew closer, the insistence waned. Things worked as if a big event had turned this thing around. I am quite sure that the big event is Black Lives Matter. Suddenly, there were forces in our CLP demanding to know why our CLP never had space for the Black and BAME comrades.
Owen Jones likes to fish in confused waters to make a name for himself. But he did say that RLB should not have been sacked, or something approaching this. Had the political wind been blowing from the right, he would have gone along with the sacking. And so I say, the sacking has not stopped the political wind blowing from the left in the Labour Party.
Jones and Lansman are weather vanes that show you where the wind blows from. To my mind, it is still blowing from the left, and stronger, because all sorts of centrists have taken RLB’s defence instead of keeping silent. On the Labour right, they should be screaming ‘conspiracy theory!’ over the rooftops, but they don’t. They must be worried about Starmer holding up their fake-cards in the face of the world – cards that they had only created for the private use of Labour’s disciplinary.
John McDonald says he stands “in solidarity” with RLB. Surely J Corbyn agrees with this. This goes quite a long way. John would not say this if he had swallowed the conspiracy theory. I hope these two comrades return to give a hand to help draw rallying conclusions.
Two immediate conclusions come to my mind:
One is: to unite the British working class of all colours behind social equality and human justice. The working class, Black and White, is the one that “cannot breathe”. It wants equality and justice: equality against the 1% obscenity, and human justice in society.
But let me tell you: None of these two things are in the power of capitalism!
The other conclusion is: Why are the police forces of our settler colonial countries (i.e. the Western capitalist countries we live in, as well as Australia, Canada, NZ, etc) – why are their polices (and their armies to be sure) becoming counter-insurgency forces?
Marie Lynam, individual initiative – 26.6.2020
Camden Labour Left 