This time last week there was near universal outrage on the left – and even from some Conservative MPs – after Israel barred two Labour MPs, Abtisam Mohammed and Yuan Yang, from entry. The Foreign Secretary, David Lammy, described the Israeli decision as ‘unacceptable, counterproductive, and deeply concerning…this is no way to treat British parliamentarians’.
The Middle East minister, Hamish Falconer, opened an 80-minute statement on the matter by summoning all the gravity he could muster and telling the Commons that this was ‘unacceptable and deeply concerning. It is no way to treat democratically elected representatives’. Later that day, dozens of Labour MPs gathered for a photograph with Mohammed and Yang to show their solidarity. Phone-in hosts and columnists opined. Israel had done a bad thing. My social media timeline was overwhelmed with posts attacking the Israelis.
Other than Lammy’s words, there has been none of the outrage that followed the Israeli decision
Yesterday, it emerged that the Lib Dem MP Wera Hobhouse has been refused entry to Hong Kong. On a planned visit to see her newborn grandson, Hobhouse was held at airport security, questioned and then deported on the first flight home five hours later.
Hobhouse is a member of the inter-parliamentary alliance on China, an international group of politicians that is critical of Beijing’s human rights record, and she is also a critic of restrictions on free speech in Hong Kong. These are all admirable positions to hold, but you can see why an authoritarian state like China might object to her presence. But the notable issue here is not China and it’s not Hobhouse.
You may well be unaware of this incident because it has had perfunctory coverage, other than in the paper which first revealed what happened. The Foreign Secretary has indeed commented, calling the incident ‘deeply concerning’: fair dos to him for some sort of consistency, although he has yet to explain why it is deeply concerning (as both he and Mr Falconer also described the Israelis’ decision) for Israel and Hong Kong to be able to refuse to allow people to enter their territory, yet is absolutely fine for us to make such determinations.
But other than Lammy’s words, there has been next to none of the outrage that followed the Israeli decision. Social media has barely touched the incident, and I have yet to see anything even approaching the fury and mass campaign of support from Hobhouse’s fellow MPs. I wonder why not.
I don’t wonder, of course. It is so transparent as to be blindingly obvious. There are no Israelis involved. Or, if we are being blunt, Jews. It is the same mentality that leads to anti-Israel marches through the streets of London and other cities, supposedly in protest at civilian casualties in Gaza, but which ignores casualties in every other conflict on the planet.
And it is the same mentality which demands that under its standing orders the UN Human Rights Council must debate a resolution against Israel at least once per session (the only country subject to such a standing order); which passes not a single resolution on any human rights abuses in Algeria, China, Cuba, Egypt or Gaza, Iraq, or Zimbabwe; and which sets up a permanent commission of inquiry into Israel, with a special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, and has no similar commissions or rapporteurs for any other nation.
David Baddiel wrote a wonderful book called Jews Don’t Count, which exposed the left’s blind spot over anti-Jewish racism. But sometimes Jews do count – or, rather, only Jews count. If it doesn’t involve Jews doing something that can be criticised, just ignore it.
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