From Judas to Shylock, Jews have been blamed for the evils of profit and capitalism. To some leftists, that story still appeals
I’m reluctant to add to the workload of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which this week announced the first step towards a statutory inquiry into Labour and antisemitism. If it goes ahead, it will be only the second time the commission has seen fit to investigate a British political party for racism – the first related to the BNP – and, given the number of complaints that have been reported, it’ll have its work cut out. Nevertheless, I have a research trip to suggest.
First, though, a word of context. An oft-heard defence of Labour is that a party of its now vastly increased size is bound to reflect the wider population; since that population includes some antisemites, then, sadly but inevitably, so will Labour. But that swerves around a gloomier possibility: that anti-Jewish racism might exert a particular appeal to some on the left – even, paradoxically enough, those who might otherwise proudly regard themselves as anti-racists.
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