Zack Polanski has reason to be pleased with his leadership of the Green Party so far.
Membership has tripled since he took over last September, and the party has made “great electoral strides”, said The Times. It is polling strongly and is forecast to “make gains in Labour’s London strongholds” in today’s local elections.
But “there is a darker side”. Polanski, himself Jewish, “appears intent on exploiting” anger on the left over Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. As he works to cultivate a new, populist base, he “seems not to recognise”, or is unwilling to confront, antisemitism within his party – although it is “staring him in the face”.
What did the commentators say?
Greens are “often lionised as nicer and kinder than other parties”, said The Telegraph. But how do voters square the party’s “‘anti-racist’ credentials” with “the revolting online behaviour of many” of its candidates?
Two standing in Lambeth, Sabine Mairey and Saiqa Ali, were arrested last week on suspicion of stirring up racial hatred online. One shared a post suggesting an attack on a synagogue “isn’t antisemitism” but “revenge” for Israel “murdering people”. Other candidates have defended the 7 October massacres, questioned whether “Zionism is a mental illness” and “implied that antisemitism is justified”.
Polanski provoked outrage when he suggested police tackling the armed suspect in the Golders Green terror attack had used excessive force. Antisemitism “appears to have become normalised on the left, a dog-whistle used to win votes”, said The Telegraph.
No one is suggesting that Polanski himself is “some frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Semite”, said Tom Slater in The Spectator. But the accusation that the party “has become a magnet for anti-Semites”, and “a key voice” in downplaying the growing threat” to Britain’s Jews, is “hardly unfounded”.
Polanski, when asked about the spate of arson attacks on synagogues and the torching of four Hatzola ambulances, came out with “the already-infamous lines”: “Now, there’s a conversation to be had about whether it’s a perception of unsafety or whether it’s actual unsafety, but neither are acceptable.”
But those comments to Haaretz have been widely “misrepresented”, said Owen Jones in The Guardian. What Polanski said was that he feels pro-Palestine marches “have been perceived as unsafe by some Jewish people and safe by others, including himself”. Other journalists have accused Polanski of using his Jewish identity as “a political shield”. How does their treatment of Polanski square with his party’s “repeated, explicit condemnations of antisemitism?” Yes, there have been “allegations of vile antisemitism” by party candidates, and “a small number of examples” from a party that has nearly quadrupled in size since September – but “to extrapolate from these” and “smear an entire party” is “cynical”.
Polanski has condemned any antisemitic remarks, saying this was “not an abstract idea” for him. “As a Jewish person, those comments disgust me,” he told the BBC on Sunday. But, he added, “I don’t believe we have a particular problem compared [with] wider society and other political parties”.
What next?
Polanski’s vocal support for Palestine and his “consistent condemnation of Israeli crimes and excesses undoubtedly contributed to the party’s surge in support”, said Tony Greenstein, from the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, on Al Jazeera.
But it has also triggered an antisemitism smear campaign “almost identical to the one that eventually saw Jeremy Corbyn and his leftist, pro-Palestine supporters ousted from the Labour Party”. How the Green leader responds “will determine not only the future of his party, but potentially the direction of British politics”.
In effect, Polanski “still has a real shot at carrying his party to power”, but he could lose it all “if he repeats Corbyn’s mistakes and tries to appease his bad-faith critics”.
The Green Party is “facing a test on antisemitism”, said Ailbhe Rea in The New Statesman. In a “quite extraordinary development”, the deputy leader Mothin Ali encouraged some of the suspended candidates to “take legal action against the party”.
Polanski said the main lesson he needs to learn from Corbyn is to “navigate antisemitism allegations better”. He is “absolutely correct”. But how and when he plans to do so have “not yet become clear”.
Zack Polanski is preparing for a successful day at the polls but questions over the party’s commitment to rooting out racism continue
