Andrew Barr

Historian. In the prophetic tradition. Founder of @Jews4JusticeUK, the only group to stand against technocratic tyranny on Jewish principles.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

A SWITCH-OFF SABBATH.

The smartphone IS the New World Order. It’s impossible to implement the latter without the former.

You can resist the spread of totalitarian technocracy by switching off your ‘phone every Sabbath.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@RabbiPoupko A resurrection story: the Germans destroyed the synagogue; the Soviets built a school on top of the remains in order to prevent the memorialisation of a Jewish site; the school has now been demolished in order to allow for the restoration and memorialisation of the Jewish site.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@antisemitism The standard narrative is that Clinton Davis was rejected in 1983 because the Bennites wanted to punish him for supporting Healey in 1981, so his daughter’s recollection of his Zionism having been the issue (presumably based on what he told her) rewrites the history books.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

The Corbyn era was different, in that antisemitism was weaponised to bring down a hard-Left leadership, but it's likely that pro-Zionist Jewish Labour MPs Luciana Berger and Louise Ellman would have been deselected had they not pre-empted the issue by leaving the party instead.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

Nothing new under the sun. 'Purity tests,' 1980s-style. Hackney Central MP Stanley Clinton Davis (my grandfather's neighbour) was denied selection by his local party in 1983. His daughter says that they asked him only about his views on Israel, not about his constituency work.

[Campaign Against Antisemitism @antisemitism]

Hackney Council has voted to commence the dissolution of its 58-year-old twinning arrangement with Haifa, Israel’s third-largest city.

So, we sat down with the daughter of Lord Stanley Clinton Davis – the man who created the Hackney-Haifa link.

This is what she had to say.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

The most notorious example of the deselection of a sitting MP by the hard Left because he failed a 'purity test' of his views on Israel was that of the former housing minister Reg Freeson who was replaced in Brent East in 1985 by Ken Livingstone. https://t.co/KNePFJ18VG

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@stevethesmiths @TomLondon6 @jwomencount2 The point is that Tom London (and his supporters) can’t have it both ways. Either one defines antisemitism broadly, in which case one cannot logically reject the IHRA definition that anti-Zionism = antisemitism, or one defines it narrowly as Jew-hate and nothing else.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

While I have no doubt that the permanent state - with the assistance of compliant Jewish organisations - weaponised antisemitism against Diane Abbott to discredit the hard Left, they couldn't have done so if she hadn't given them something to weaponise. https://t.co/M0xTUhMx9q

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@stevethesmiths @TomLondon6 @jwomencount2 The problem for anti-Zionists with such a broad definition of antisemitism (‘collective blame’) is that it crosses over into IHRA territory with all that entails (‘anti-Zionism = antisemitism’). I much prefer a neater, narrower definition (‘antisemitism = Jew-hate’).

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

The Lipstick Case was a major factor in the Battle of Ridley Road between anti-Fascists and Fascists who were laying the ground for the return of Oswald Mosley in a by-election that would have been held if my grandfather's conviction had been upheld (it was overturned on appeal).

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

What really gets my goat about Diane Abbott is that her predecessor in her parliamentary seat was my grandfather David Weitzman, who was all too well aware of antisemitic racism among the British public - he even ended up serving time in prison because of it. (Link in next post.)

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

Here's a link to my article about the notorious 1947 Lipstick Case in which my grandfather was imprisoned for alleged wartime black-market offences at a time when (like today) British Jews were scapegoated for the actions of Zionists in the Middle East: https://t.co/RlSck6DaMx

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

A new Stamford Hill to Golders Green 310 bus route was introduced in 2024 because of the abuse (both verbal and physical) to which ultra-Orthodox Jews were being subjected when changing buses at Finsbury Park - thus addressing the symptoms rather than the cause of the problem.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

When Diane Abbott made her original remarks about Jews not suffering from racism because they didn't have to sit at the back of the bus, it was pointed out that ultra-Orthodox Jews in her own constituency are regularly prevented from boarding buses today. https://t.co/iCn1cV55SB

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@JLC_uk A fundamental problem with Abbott's argument that Jews don't experience racism in the same way as black people is that this denies the very ideology to which she and her fellow travellers are wedded - that race is a purely social construct. Apparently that doesn't apply to Jews!

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@BoardofDeputies @PhilR_R A fundamental problem with Abbott's argument that Jews don't experience racism in the same way as black people is that this denies the very ideology to which she and her fellow travellers are wedded - that race is a purely social construct. Apparently that doesn't apply to Jews!

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@toadmeister @profnfenton I’ll get my local (and very woke) branch of Waterstone’s to order it in: that’ll annoy them.

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

A fundamental problem with Abbott's argument that Jews don't experience racism in the same way as black people is that this denies the very ideology to which she and her fellow travellers are wedded - that race is a purely social construct. Apparently that doesn't apply to Jews!

[The Jewish Chronicle @JewishChron]

Diane Abbott ‘about to be welcomed back to Labour’ say party sources

https://t.co/tWB8QgIhFc

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

One could argue that @BoyGeorge makes the mistake of conflating Israel with the Jewish people when he sings 'I stand with the Jews' but his opponents make that conflation and maybe he's just pushing back against the rise in antisemitism. A pop song doesn't have room for nuance.

[Boy George @BoyGeorge]

#Shalom

[Andrew Barr @andrewbarr2020]

@nicolelampert The scale of the main wave of Jewish immigration in the three decades before 1914 bears no comparison with modern Muslim immigration - 120-150,000 Jews (a further 50-75,000 were rejected on grounds of poverty) compared with an estimated 1.5-2 million Muslims since 2000.