The anti-Semitism smear that destroyed Corbyn’s Labor is now targeting the Greens Thoughts

Until recently, the Green Party was on the fringes of British politics. Between 2010 and 2024, it had only one candidate. In the July 2024 general election, which brought the Conservatives and Labor to power under Keir Starmer, they managed to get only four seats in parliament.

But the party’s fortunes began to change rapidly under Starmer. With the Conservatives and the Labor Government now reduced to middle to upper class youth in the polls, the economy on its knees, and anti-establishment sentiment growing across the political spectrum, the Greens are beginning to emerge as a political group that can challenge Nigel Farage’s Reforms at the next election. They are now polling at around 17 per cent, equal to the Conservatives and one point ahead of the ruling Labor party. They also won their first parliamentary elections in Gorton and Denton, taking 40.6 per cent of the vote. Membership has increased from 65,000 in July 2025 to approximately 220,000 today.

This change is not least because the party has not been forgiven by the Palestinians. Indeed, many leftists and progressives who are disappointed with the support of the Labor Party and the cleansing of Israel’s crimes in Gaza and the rest of the Palestinians who live with them said that they support the Green Party after Zack Polanski, a non-Zionist Jew who bluntly described Israel’s actions in Gaza as “genocide”, was elected leader in October 202.

Polanski’s vocal support for Palestine and his constant opposition to Israeli terrorism and excesses have undoubtedly contributed to the party’s support. But it has also sparked an anti-Semitism campaign similar to that which saw Jeremy Corbyn and his left-wing, pro-Palestinian supporters expelled from the Labor Party. How the Green leader responds will not only determine the future of his party, but also the direction of British politics.

The anti-Semitic campaign against the Greens quickly began the party’s victory in Gorton and Denton, where 30 percent of the population is Muslim and the Greens put Gaza at the forefront of their campaign. The victory shocked the British establishment and forced many to admit that the Greens had become a real enemy of power.

As a result, as with Corbyn’s Labor, Polanski’s Greens were immediately accused of “heresy” and promoting anti-Semitism in order to gain votes.

The anti-Semitic protests reached a climax after an attempt was made at the Spring party conference to pass a resolution declaring “Zionism is apartheid,” which failed due to a film by the Jewish Greens.

Meanwhile, the media began to push the line that those who had been dismissed for perceived “anti-Semitism” during the Corbyn years had joined the Greens and transferred their “hateful” politics there.

As the first Jewish person to be called “anti-Semite” and kicked out of the Labor Party in 2018, and as a new member of the Green Party from March 1, I personally aimed to advance this debate.

On March 28, Jewish History wrote an article about me joining the Green Party, pointing out that my involvement with the Greens “has created fears that the party is becoming a magnet for those expelled from Labor during the anti-Semitic crisis”. A similar story appeared in The Telegraph two weeks later. Since then, the so-called “anti-Semitism crisis” in the Green Party has become the most acceptable issue in the British press, and Zack Polanski stood where Corbyn stood in 2018.

Polanski still has a real threat to carry his party to power, but he could lose everything if he repeats Corbyn’s mistakes and tries to appease his worst critics.

Indeed, during the so-called “Labour anti-Semitism crisis”, Corbyn never doubted the good faith of his Zionist opponents. Instead, he acted as their messenger, apologized repeatedly, promised to do better, and threw friends under the bus, finally repeating the story of his enemies. In August 2018, he said that anyone who denies the “problem” of anti-Semitism in Labor is “helping with the problem”.

Corbyn’s approach to entertainment, as we all know, was a disaster. His enemies just wanted him to forgive him. Eventually, Corbyn became the victim of a witch hunt he agreed to take part in, and he was also expelled from the party.

Unfortunately, the leadership of the Green Party seems to have decided to use Corbyn’s failed strategy of self-indulgence in an effort to survive the “crisis of anti-Semitism”.

On April 16, my membership in the Green Party was suspended without any explanation other than 11 words: “Documented history of anti-Semitism, including court decisions and recent cases of terrorism”. Since then, about 22 people who want to compete in the council have been suspended for similar cases.

On April 29, two Jewish people were stabbed in Golders Green in North London by a mentally ill man. He had previously stabbed a fellow Muslim, although this was largely ignored by the media. The police announced that the incident was dangerous, and Starmer quickly linked the attack, without evidence, to the Palestinian solidarity protests against the Israeli massacres that have been taking place in the city for more than two years.

After Polanski posted an X-pic criticizing the police for “repeatedly and brutally kicking a man with a head injury” after a failed Taser, the Green leader found himself vulnerable to anti-Semitic behavior.

After the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police wrote an open letter to Polanski reprimanding him for the retweet, a “senior Green Party source” told ITV News that “the test is what the leadership does when it comes to those who make anti-Semitic comments.”

The Conservatives then stepped up their campaign to smear Polanski, with The Telegraph publishing the front-page headline “Polanski is proud, says Israel” on May 1. Meanwhile, The Times carried a caricature showing the Green leader with an increasingly crooked nose kicking a policeman on Golders Green. On May 2, the Daily Mail ran the headline “Polanski’s Greens Are a Party of Poison,” implying that the Green leader was “hard pressed to contain” the anti-Semitic poison that had fueled the Green Party.

Since then, social media posts by a minority of Green Party candidates regarding Israel, which they consider anti-Semitic and establishment, have played a major role in the “Green Party anti-Semitism crisis”. Although he immediately denounced the offending positions, Polanski was accused, particularly by Starmer’s Labour, of being too slow to stop or remove the wrongdoers.

Speaking to the BBC on Sunday, Mr Polanski condemned any anti-Semitic comments, saying it was “not an unreasonable thought” for him. He said: “As a Jew, these words disgust me because it is important that we allow the punishment to happen and that is what we have,” he said. He rejected the idea that anti-Semitism was widespread in the Green Party: “I don’t believe we have any problem compared to the majority of people and other political parties.”

Polanski appears to be following Corbyn’s playbook which failed to address the issue. If he doesn’t change, a bad campaign will eat him, just as it ate Corbyn. What Mr. Polanski needs to make clear is that most of these crimes are not about people hating Jews because they are Jews, which is what anti-Semitism really is. Rather, it is a public phenomenon, often with difficulty, to develop opposition to Israel into an anti-Semitic environment after decades of Zionist insistence on alienating the state of Israel and the Jewish people as a whole.

Of course, his confirmation seemed to have no effect, because the so-called anti-Semitism of the Green Party remained a major topic of discussion in the run-up to the May 7 election.

In tomorrow’s election, the Greens are expected to gain more than 500 seats, four times the number they have today, while Labor is expected to lose up to 75 percent of the 2,557 seats.

The Greens are campaigning to tax the rich, bring utilities into the hands of the people, stop new oil drilling, and support the Palestinian people. The party, with its progressive platform, has never been closer to political power in Britain. Whether or not this can continue will depend on whether Polanski continues the path of fun, or whether he chooses to oppose what he and his supporters see as political propaganda designed to destroy Palestinian politics.

Polanski should know better than to appease his critics. Earlier, he admitted he had been “lost” in the “media” surrounding Corbyn and his anti-Semitic behavior in the Labor Party, and later apologized to him.

If the Green Party continues to whitewash its anti-Zionist rhetoric in order to appease the opposition, it could undermine the movement that fueled its rise, turning itself into another establishment party, albeit one with a green tinge.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect Al Jazeera’s influence.