Anas Sarwar: Labour must adopt in full IHRA antisemitism definition

Jeremy Corbyn has come under pressure from a senior Scottish Labour figure to adopt in full the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism.

Anas Sarwar, a former deputy leader of the Scottish party, said Labour should adopt the full IHRA definition “without delay and caveats” as Corbyn began his four-day visit to Scotland.

Labour has been under intensifying pressure to accept the full IHRA wording, and is thought to be close doing so if it can also add protections to allow legitimate criticism of Israel.

On the first day of his Scottish tour, Corbyn was forced to repudiate remarks made on social media by Jim Sheridan, a suspended Labour councillor in Renfrewshire and former MP, who said he had lost respect and empathy for the Jewish community for “colluding with Blairite plotters” to undermine the Labour leader.

Corbyn told BBC Scotland those remarks were “completely wrong” and that Sheridan had been suspended and was now under investigation. Last month, another Labour councillor, Mary Lockhart in Fife, suggested the attacks on Corbyn were the work of the Israeli secret service.

Sarwar, who is coordinating a campaign to tackle Islamophobia in Scottish society and politics, including challenging Labour members, said there was no contradiction between accepting the IHRA definition and criticising Israeli government policy.

Describing himself as a critic of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians, Sarwar told the Daily Record the controversy had not been handled well by Corbyn’s team. It had been a “rather unfortunate and sad episode for the Labour party”, he said. Sarwar stood last year against a Corbynite candidate, Richard Leonard, to be Scottish Labour leader but lost.

“The Jewish community should rightfully be taking the lead on defining what antisemitism is. It is for the Jewish community to lead and shape what the definition of antisemitism is because they are the ones who experience it,” he said. “I think the Labour party, without delay, should adopt the the IHRA definition of antisemitism immediately and without delay and without caveats.”

Corbyn told the BBC the party had adopted many of the IHRA’s definitions and examples, but said: “I are very concerned, however, to make sure there can be open and proper debate about Israel and its foreign policy, and about the future for Palestinian people. Hence there has to be that space for debate, you cannot shut that down. But it can never, ever be conducted in an antisemitic way.”

Corbyn is addressing a group of prospective Labour Westminster candidates at New Lanark, the model town built by the social reformer and industrialist Robert Owen in the early 1800s, later on Tuesday in readiness, he said, for another snap general election.