Quote Originally Posted by cyril evans awaydays View Post
Thanks Jon. The bit I am missing is how it is damning on Starmer and his office. She put him in a position that he would be badged as "same old same old" if he had taken any other action than sacking her or he had the option of showing that he is his own man with a new broom. Tricky political choice.

The party recognised that the Prince across the water and the rest of the clan are not coming back soon after the election debacle and RBL reinforcing some of the points in the lessons learned report just makes her look too immature for the offices she aspires to. Why there are elements of the party that keep picking an open wound I don't know.

Is the Israel/Palestine conflict so important to parts of the Labour Party that they are willing to accept domestic political decline as a necessary price to pay to show their internationalist credentials?

What else could he have done that would not have been exploited by the ccfc_is_my_life or tell it like it is types if he still posted on here?
I am just going on the Guardian blog (the Guardian are certainly no friends of RLB or the Corbynites in Labour) which qouted then summarised her tweets like this:

Long-Bailey claims Sir Keir Starmer’s office originally approved the tweet she issued clarifying her original endorsement of the Maxine Peak interview. This is significant because it was in response to that clarification tweet that the Board of Deputies of British Jews suggested she should be sacked.

She suggests that Starmer’s office subsequently changed its mind, and demanded the withdrawal of the original tweet. She said she was not willing to do that without being allowed to issue a press statement explaining the clarification.

She says Starmer refused to discuss the matter with her in person before she was dismissed.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...ichard-desmond

On your other point, it is sad but for Starmer I think garnering domestic brownie points is certainly more important than international solidarity and defence of Palestinians. Anti-Israel policies (or apartheid constitution and state ideology) is now anti-semitism. Anti-Zionism is now anti-semitism (although Zionism used to be a minority view in the world Jewish population and is still opposed by many orthodox, reform and secular Jews, and there is even an Jewish anti-Zionist party represented in the Knesset). There are way more Christian Zionists in the world (mainly in the USA but some in Africa) than Jewish Zionists. Now anything that mildly irritates the Board of Deputies (now they have finished welcoming the appointment of Israel's new ultra-right wing, racist ambassador to the UK) is anti-semitism. All other Jewish voices are silenced or marginalised (or in the case of the Labour Party, often suspended or expelled).

That said I think RLB was naive - even if she was commenting on the earlier version of the Maxine Peake interview that had a quote from Amnesty - subsequently amended - that seemed to confirm the main allegation. I don't think she has covered herself in glory since she stood for the leadership. I went to her Sheffield election rally (and to Starmer's) and was unimpressed - by both!