Berlin Jewish leader: European rabbis should ‘take action’ against EU breakup
BERLIN (JNS.org) — Chabad-Lubavitch movement Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, rabbi of the Jewish Community of Berlin, has called on European rabbis to “help save the European Union” after the United Kingdom voted to exit the 28-country bloc. Teichtal made his comments in a meeting with the parliamentary head of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), which is the second-largest political party in Germany.
Teichtal said he is calling on other European rabbis and Jewish leaders to “take action” against other member nations potentially choosing to leave the EU.
“I call upon the leaders of all Jewish communities around Europe to do whatever they can and execute all of their influence, in order to prevent any other countries from leaving the EU,” Teichtel said. “The possibility of dismantling the EU and reverting back to nation states should worry all Jewish people around Europe….A strong European union is a paramount interest to the Jewish people of Europe in general and to Jewish people of Germany in particular.”
Teichtal also expressed concern over “the strengthening of nationalism and of extreme right-wing parties and movements” in the U.K., and said that “the Jewish community in Berlin joins a great number of Jewish community leaders from all over Europe who expressed their sorrow over the UK’s decision,” The Jewish Press reported.
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Jeremy Corbyn faces fresh anti-Semitism row after no-confidence vote, Brexit
LONDON (JNS.org) — About a month after the British Labour party had been engulfed in a crisis that saw the suspension of at least 50 Labour members for anti-Semitic comments, party leader Jeremy Corbyn is receiving heavy criticism for a remark he made that seemingly compared Israel to the Islamic State terror group. Corbyn made the comment at an event presenting the party’s promised inquiry into anti-Semitism within its ranks.
“Our Jewish friends are no more responsible for the actions of Israel than our Muslim friends are for the self-styled Islamic State,” said Corbyn, whose Labour leadership was called into question on Wednesday after his party’s Members of Parliament gave him a no-confidence vote by a margin of 172-40. Just days earlier, almost all of Corbyn’s shadow cabinet resigned following the United Kingdom’s referendum decision to leave the European Union.
At the same event on Labour anti-Semitism, Jewish Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent North Ruth Smeeth was forced to leave the room in tears after being verbally attacked by pro-Corbyn activists. She later called for Corbyn’s resignation, describing the remarks she faced in the room as “traditional anti-Semitic slurs,” adding that one pro-Corbyn activist accused her of participating in a ‘”media conspiracy.”
“It is beyond belief that someone could come to the launch of a report on antisemitism in the Labour party and espouse such vile conspiracy theories about Jewish people,” she said, the Jerusalem Post reported.
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