The Co-operative Group is the only major British retailer to boycott Israeli goods. It is the fifth-largest retail grocery chain in the UK, with thousands of Co-op minimarkets throughout the United Kingdom. The Co-operative Group (formerly known as the Co-operative Wholesale Society) is closely linked to — and a major funder of — the Co-operative Party, which has an electoral pact with the Labour Party, the UK’s official opposition. The Co-operative Party has, like the Labour Party itself, been infiltrated by a strong anti-Israel faction.

The Co-operative Group is the fifth-largest retail grocery chain in the UK, with thousands of Co-op minimarkets throughout the United Kingdom. Right: The Co-operative Group head office in Manchester. (Image source: Co-operative Group/Wikimedia commons)

The “co-operative movement” in England began in 1844 when a group of people in Rochdale, Lancashire decided that local stores were charging too much for food, and decided to set up a co-operative retail outlet. From there, the movement mushroomed until, at one time, it even had a flagship department store in London’s premier shopping street, Oxford Street, as well as farms, pharmacies and funeral services, to say nothing of the Co-operative Bank, its most lucrative enterprise.

The co-operative movement is also linked to the Co-operative Party, a political party with close links to the British Labour Party, a relationship that dates back to the Co-operative Congress held in 1917, which eventually led to an agreement between the Co-operative Party and the Labour Party to elect joint “Labour Co-operative” candidates. At the last general election in 2015, 21 members of parliament were elected on the Labour and Co-operative ticket.

In 2013, a scandal hit the Co-operative Bank, when it was discovered that there was a massive shortfall in funds due to corruption and mismanagement at the top. The Co-operative Group suffered a terrible financial blow, losing many millions of pounds. This resulted in an entire re-organization of the Co-operative Group, including the sale of the pharmacies and most of the Co-operative Bank (the Co-operative Group still has a 20% share but the bank has demutualized, meaning it is now mainly owned by a hedge fund and is no longer a mutual fund owned by the members).

The Co-operative Group is finally on the road to recovery thanks to new management and the policy of opening minimarkets throughout the United Kingdom, backed up by a massive TV advertising campaign. However, the boycott of Israeli produce remains.

A certain pressure group within the co-operative movement, formed in 2008, caused the Co-operative Group to boycott Israeli agricultural produce exported by the four major Israeli produce exporters. The Co-op Group has refused to stock products from Jewish communities on the West Bank since 2009, but in 2014 its board extended the boycott to the four main exporters of Israeli fresh produce — Agrexco, Arava Export Growers, Adafresh and Mehadrin — because they do not distinguish between produce from Israel within the 1949 armistice lines borders and (Arab- and Jewish-grown) produce from beyond it. This assumes that those advocating the boycott know exactly where the new borders between Israel and a future Palestinian state will be, despite that they are yet to be determined through negotiation. Ironically, most of the produce from Jewish settlements currently beyond the Green Line (the 1949 armistice lines between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria) is produced by kibbutzim that were there before 1948, when the West Bank was lost in Israel’s War of Independence.

One such area is the Etzion Bloc of four kibbutzim, for which the land was purchased from its previous owners long before the British withdrew from Palestine. The Etzion Bloc will, in fact, almost certainly become part of Israel after a final settlement.

A substantial proportion of the produce marketed by Israel’s four agricultural exporters is produced by Arab farmers, operating both inside and outside the pre-1967 borders, as Israel does not discriminate between them. According to The Guardian, in April 2012, the Co-Operative Group said in a statement that it had decided to stop buying products from companies known to source from Jewish “settlements.” The decision affects contracts valued at £350,000 (about $500,000) — a practice apparently begun in 2009. Presumably it had still been doing business with Israeli pharmaceutical products; if not, according to one Co-operative Group board member, “the shelves of the pharmacy would have been bare.” Unfortunately, the Co-operative pharmacies had to be sold when the Co-op Group faced virtual ruin due to the mismanagement of the Co-op Bank’s directors.

There is, of course, no proof that the Israeli companies with which the Co-op continues to do business do not source any products from Jewish “settlements” because many Israeli businesses in the West Bank are mainly involved in manufacturing. These enterprises employ many local Arab workers, whose livelihoods are endangered by the boycott.

Although the Co-operative Group also claims to reject exports from the Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara, also alleged to be an illegal occupation, in practice the boycott only affects Israel, because the Western Sahara boycott is applicable only to a few tins of sardines. The Co-op Group continues to refer to Israel’s “illegal settlements” as if these and those in the Western Sahara (included “for balance” no doubt) were the only disputed territories in the world. There is no boycott, of course, of major exporting countries with appalling human rights records, such as China (invasion of Tibet), Russia (invasion of the Ukraine) and other countries whose occupation of other areas is not recognized internationally, such as Nagorno-Karabakh or Northern Cyprus. It should be remembered that in none of the above cases were the occupying countries threatened; the aggression came purely from one side, the side that was victorious This is the exact opposite of what happened in the case of Israel, but with a bloc of 58 Muslim countries in the United Nations, supported by most of the members of the European Union, might proves to be right in this case.

To set the record straight, the so-called “occupation” of the West Bank by Israel is not an occupation at all, since the territory was taken from Mandate Palestine, after it had been abandoned by the British and was occupied by the Kingdom of Jordan (then known as Transjordan), in its attempt to destroy the new State of Israel in 1948-49. Between 1948 and 1967, the West Bank was occupied by Jordan, an occupation that could indeed be said to be illegal, being recognized only by the United Kingdom (which had colluded therein) and Pakistan. This former “no man’s land” was taken by Israel during the Six-Day War against it in 1967. The massive Muslim bloc in the United Nations has ruthlessly pursued the concept of an “occupation” to divert attention from the appalling human rights abuses that their dictatorships continue to maintain in their own countries.

By no means everyone running the Co-operative Group is in favour of the boycott in fact; ironically, some of the newer members of the Group’s management even seem to be unaware of it. A recent statement made by a new member of the Members’ Board at a members’ meeting in London implied that whether or not one bought Israeli goods (presumably from the Co-op) was a mere matter of preference. As usual, of all the countries in the world, Israel is being singled out. For the boycotters of the Co-op Group, Israel is the usual soft target.

Myra Carr is based in the United Kingdom.

The UK Labour Party, which once stood proudly in solidarity with the victims of terrorism, now, under the would-be leadership of Jeremy Corbyn, seems to have become a haven for anti-Semites, Islamists and their apologists.

It is hard to believe that the party once led by Prime Minister Tony Blair, who assisted President Bush in leading the war on terror and fighting expansionist Islamist movements, is now led by a man who voted against banning Al Qaeda as a terrorist organization months after more than 200 people were killed in the 1998 terrorist attacks on the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.

Jeremy Corbyn alleges that he stands on a platform where “There is no place for anti-semitism or any form of racism in the Labour Party, or anywhere in society.” He also says that Labour have taken “decisive action.”

Despite Corbyn’s protestations that he is an avowed anti-racist who condemns Islamism, and that he continually condemns anti-Semitism, this leadership has tolerated anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic dialogue and has drawn Islamists into the Labour Party. When Corbyn was asked to do more to tackle the rising climate of anti-Semitism, which has seen Labour MP Louise Ellman face anti-Semitic abuse, his brother, Piers Corbyn, tweeted: “ABSURD! All Corbyns are committed Anti Nazi. Zionists can’t cope with anyone supporting rights for Palestine.”

The remark suggests that anti-Semitism is just a recent prejudice, created only to aid Zionists, as response to the pro-Palestinian movement, rather than a movement of a people who have inhabited that area — a sizeable section of which is even called Judea — for nearly 3000 years. Until 1948, Palestinians did not even exist — except as the accepted name of those Christians Arabs and Jews who lived under the British Mandate (1923-1948), after the Ottoman Empire collapsed.

Corbyn’s followers, however, do not seem to be as keen as he claims them to be to condemn the rising culture of anti-Semitic mythology that tends to be propagated by many of his self-proclaimed acolytes.

The party that claims to be the epitome of anti-racism, has, in recent months has, rightly suffered at the hands of UK media exposés for its tolerance of racism — in this instance anti-Semitism. It is a view that often seems to go hand in hand with apologists for extremist Islam and radical Islamic terror.

Labour Party MP Naz Shah (left), was recently suspended from the party for composing and sharing anti-Semitic tropes. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn (right), has a tendency to hang around with Holocaust deniers, anti-Semitic hate-preachers and others of a similar ilk, and is a self-declared “friend” of the terror outfits Hamas and Hezbollah.

John Tummon, for one, repeatedly called, at the Left Unity 2014 Conference, for the restoration of a Caliphate comprising the entirety of the Middle East. He posited that a Caliphate, with the strict imposition of Islamic sharia law, would see that “diversity and autonomy are protected and nurtured and the mass of people can effectively control executive authority.”

What strict implementation of Islamic sharia law usually sees, however, are women’s personal, economic and political rights obliterated. The rights, in fact, of other religious minorities such as Yazidis, Alevis and Baha’i, as well as the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community and the Jews, would also suffer extreme persecution, as the latter already has, often with calls for annihilation, such as “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the Gas.”

The idea that a single totalitarian Caliphate would bring increased democracy and stability, let alone civil and political rights, to an increasingly factional, corrupt and unstable Middle East, appears more a childlike, logic-defying fantasy.

Tummon’s motion also condemns secular politics by disparaging notions — such as rights for the religious to worship free of persecution, and the separation of church and state — as a “Eurocentric brand of secularism” which, he claims, forces Middle Eastern people to abandon their religious faith.

Wait, isn’t it usually secular societies that protect the rights of religious minorities, including Muslims, to practice their faith? And that prevent religious extremists from dominating state politics and forcing their beliefs on others? Were the Christians in orange jump suits who had their throats slit by ISIS allowed to practice their faith? Was Asia Bibi, a Christian woman in Pakistan, on death row for having drunk water from the same well as Muslims and then refusing to convert to Islam, allowed to practice her faith?

Is it nations such as Saudi Arabia that Tummon apparently aspires to emulate: those with sharia law that do not allow a single place of worship for those outside Islam?

John Tummon has described the Islamic State (IS) — a terrorist organization trying to convert or wipe out Yezidis, Kurds, and Christians in Syria and Iraq — as an organisation with “progressive potential.”

“Progressive potential”? Why is Tummon not defending LGBT rights instead of defending an organization that throws gays off rooftops?

Why is Tummon not defending women’s rights instead of defending an organization that forces its sex slaves to take contraceptives so they can be raped without consequences? (In Islam, it is forbidden to rape a woman if she is pregnant.)

What sort of person would want to be associated with a party whose members have views such as these?

The headache for Labour does not simply end with Tummon’s support for a Caliphate; he has also said: “and I advocated critical support for the development [of] ISIL.” Is he arguing that that the UK should be providing military support for ISIL — an organization that commits genocide against the religious minorities Tummon claims a caliphate protects?

Consider also the case of Gerry Downing who, until March was a Labour member. In March, live on UK television, Downing refused to condemn the murderers of 2,996 people in the 9/11 attacks, and continued on to say that the 9/11 attacks “must never be condemned.” Does he therefore find some part of 9/11 supportable?

Downing was reinstated to Labour after his suspension, even after his comments on various blogs were known to the party. The Prime Minister, David Cameron, challenged Corbyn on Downing’s views in Parliament, Corbyn didn’t reply to the question.

Corbyn not only seems slow to react to issues of anti-Semitism; he also does not seem to stand in solidarity with the victims of terrorism. And that is supposed to be a qualification for a leader of the Labour Party? Was the association of Gerry Downing with the Labour Party desirable or even morally correct?

Another, member of the Labour Party, Vicki Kirby, was originally suspended in 2014 from the party for tweeting that “Hitler was a Zionist God,” and “We invented Israel when saving [the Jews] from Hitler.”

Kirby’s views provide a greater insight into her, and possibly other individuals joining Corbyn’s Labour Party, than into Israel or Jews.

Kirby seems to completely misunderstand the nature of Zionism, which is not to strip Arabs of their rights to land or form an expansionist Israeli state, but rather to protect Jews from being attacked and safeguard their rights. She also argued that “ISIS should attack Israel” — a sentiment less than neighbourly. She also didn’t fail to deploy the cliché that “Jews have big noses,” apparently failing to observe that many Italians, Arabs and other people do too.

By mid-March, it must have been apparent even to Corbyn that Kirby might be a liability. An “investigation” into her remarks is still pending. Kirby is still suspended.

And what is Corbyn’s answer to Beinazir Lasharie, who said that “Many people know about who was behind 9/11 and also who is behind ISIS. I’ve nothing against Jews… just sharing it!” Such remarks — which wrongly attribute Islamist terrorist attacks to Jews — seem intended to marginalize them in Britain; no wonder British Jews might feel at risk.

After being expelled from the Labour Party for her anti-Semitic views, Lasharie was quietly readmitted to the party in December .

Did I forget to mention Tony Greenstein, who, it is alleged, has claimed that Jews supported the Third Reich’s Nuremberg Laws, which restricted Jews in virtually every area — including political involvement, clothing, marriage, employment, and ultimately their existence. How then is it that there are many Arab members of Israel’s Knesset? Greenstein maintains he is not anti-Semitic.

Khadim Hussain, a Labour Councillor and the former Mayor of Bradford, seems another part of the same pattern. He posted an image claiming, “[The UK] school education system only tells you about Anne Frank and the six million Zionists that were killed.”

Not only is he falsely conflating Jews with Zionists; what is at least as worrying is that his remark indicates that the extermination of six million people is, or should be, forgettable. It also implies that the history of young Anne Frank, forced to hide, then herded into a concentration camp where she died for the “crime” of being a member of a religious and ethnic group — a circumstance she did not choose and which occurred in another European country — is not necessary to teach to children.

It is, and remains, absolutely necessary to teach children what people can do to each other when slaughter is officially sanctioned.

If these are the folks who make up Corbyn’s Labour Party — people who defend 9/11, support ISIS, marginalize Jews and liken Israel to Hitler — are we all really supposed to rush out and vote for them?

I used to be a member of the Labour Party, until it was Corbynized. I do not feel like celebrating Hitler, demeaning the Holocaust, spreading racial smears about the Jews — or anyone for that matter — or claiming that Islamism and sharia law are “progressive.”

I am not a Jew, and I have no links to Judaism. But if being a Jew offends anti-Semitic racists, then I am happy to call myself a Jew, and to stand up and be counted with the Jews as a minority facing increased persecution across Europe.

When I was growing up, my grandfather showed me a picture:

A now-famous photograph, in which a man identified as August Landmesser refuses to give the Nazi salute, was taken on 13 June 1936.

“Be like this guy,” he said,” no matter what the personal cost, because you should always do the right thing.” My grandfather was right. I want to be that “guy” in the photograph who is standing up against the anti-Semitism re-emerging then in Europe and saying that enough is enough. I only wish more people in UK Labour were half as impressive and had half his character.

Robbie Travers, a political commentator and consultant, is Executive Director of Agora, former media manager at the Human Security Centre, and a law student at the University of Edinburgh.