UK's Labour suspends members active in 'antisemitic' Facebook group

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was once an active member of the group, although he left it in 2015.

By SHOSHANA KRANISH
A vote Labour sign is seen near the Gita Bhavan Hindu Temple in Whalley Range, Manchester, Britain April 20, 2017 (photo credit: REUTERS/ANDREW YATES)
A vote Labour sign is seen near the Gita Bhavan Hindu Temple in Whalley Range, Manchester, Britain April 20, 2017
(photo credit: REUTERS/ANDREW YATES)
The United Kingdom's Labour party has suspended several of its members who were active in a Facebook group that espoused antisemitic views.
The group, called Palestine Live, contained posts denying the Holocaust and conspiracy theories about Israeli involvement in 9/11 and the Rothschild family, among other topics.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was once a member of the closed group, although he left it in 2015. It is unknown whether he left before or after assuming his party's leadership.
Corbyn himself has been accused of antisemitism, in particular due to his ties to individuals involved with or supportive of Hamas and Hezbollah, his terming of the groups as "friends," and his links to Holocaust deniers.
In response to the suspensions, Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks called on Labour to "adopt a zero-tolerance approach to antisemitism." He added that the policy must be pursued "much more vigorously than it has done until now."
In January, the leader of the Jewish Labour Movement accused the party of not doing enough to deal with antisemitism in its ranks. Jeremy Newmark, who heads the group, said that JLM will be "closely monitoring the outcomes of a number of high-profile cases due to be determined by the national constitutional committee."
One such case wound up being the expulsion of a party activist who frequently used antisemitic language on his blog and Twitter account and referred to Jews as Nazis, despite being Jewish himself.