Labour's Corbyn Apologizes for Speaking at Event Comparing Israel to Nazis

Britain’s Labour Party has struggled with accusations of entrenched anti-Semitism ever since Jeremy Corbyn took over as party leader in 2015.

Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said he was sorry for speaking at a public event where Israel’s actions in Gaza were compared to what Nazi Germany did  during WWII, The Guardian wrote.

While admitting that he had appeared with people “whose views I completely reject” when attending a Holocaust Memorial Day event as a backbencher in 2010, Corbyn apologized for the “concerns and anxiety” it had caused.

Hajo Meyer, a Jewish survivor of the Auschwitz death camp, who was the keynote speaker at that event, repeatedly compared Israeli action in Gaza to the mass killing of Jews in the Holocaust.

“The main speaker at this Holocaust Memorial Day meeting was a Jewish Auschwitz survivor. Views were expressed at the meeting which I do not accept or condone,” Corbyn said.

While describing Corbyn’s participation in the 2010 event as “extraordinary,” his fellow Labour lawmaker, John Mann, told BBC Radio 4’s Today program that he was “pleased he apologized.”

The Campaign Against Anti-Semitism (CAA) had earlier issued a fresh complaint to the Labour Party about its leader’s participation in the 2010 event and also about the comments he made when appearing on Iran’s Press TV in 2012 where he alleged that Israel might have had a hand in the 2017 killing of 16 Egyptian police officers in a shootout with militants in Egypt’s Western Desert.

“The evidence shows beyond all doubt that Jeremy Corbyn is an anti-Semite and the Labour Party has become institutionally anti-Semitic. The problem is not one man but an entire movement which has hijacked the anti-racist Labour Party of old and corrupted it with a racist rot,” the CAA’s chairman, Gideon Falter, said.

A Labour party spokesman has lashed out against what he described as “false and partisan attacks” which “undermine the fight against anti-Semitism.”

“Labour is committed to rooting out anti-Semitism from our party and society,” he emphasized

The Labour Party has long been dogged by accusations of anti-Semitism.

MPs Naz Shah and Ken Livingstone have both been suspended from Labour over anti-Semitism allegations.

In 2016, Shah stepped down as an aide to the shadow chancellor in a Facebook post that called for the relocation of Israel to America, but she later said she had been “ignorant.”

READ MORE: Only 10% of Labour Voters Think Corbyn is Anti-Semitic Amid Accusations — Poll

Ken Livingstone, the former Mayor of London, suggested that Adolf Hitler supported Zionism.

In March, Jeremy Corbyn promised a “zero tolerance” approach to anti-Semitism and vowed to tackle the issue.