Freedom of speech
Italian Philosopher Prosecuted for Criticizing Politician’s Views
Donatella Di Cesare, a professor of philosophy at Sapienza University (Rome), has been charged with “criminal defamation” for describing a politician’s views as “neo-Hitlerite.”
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According to Times Higher Education:
The charges against Professor Di Cesare stem from April 2023, when the agriculture minister Francesco Lollobrigida, the brother-in-law of [Prime Minister Giorgia] Meloni and a staunch political ally, said in a public speech on migration, “We cannot surrender to the idea of ethnic replacement.” The phrase “ethnic replacement” is strongly associated with the “great replacement theory”, a racist conspiracy that white Europeans are being deliberately “replaced” by migrants of colour, often from Muslim-majority countries, in a plot led by Jewish people…
Professor Di Cesare, who has published extensively on antisemitism, racism and conspiracy theories, was subsequently asked about the comments during an appearance on the talk show DiMartedì. She described the concept of “ethnic replacement” as a “conspiracist myth” and “the heart of Hitlerism”, noting its presence in Nazi ideology that led to the Holocaust.
“I believe that the minister’s words cannot be taken as a gaffe, because he spoke like a Gauleiter, like a neo-Hitlerite governor,” she added.
Professor Di Cesare was indicted earlier this month, telling Times Higher Education that Mr Lollobrigida accused her of wanting to “defame both the Italian government and his family”. The first hearing will take place on 15 May.
Further details here.
The post Italian Philosopher Prosecuted for Criticizing Politician’s Views first appeared on Daily Nous.
Video: thousands gather for Gaza at Columbia as professor condemns uni’s ‘day of shame’
History professor Christopher Brown describes scandal of university president setting riot police on peaceful anti-genocide demo and condemns craven congressional testimony
Thousands have again gathered on the lawns of Columbia University in New York, despite the attempted repression of the university’s management and the New York police – where they heard speeches from faculty members as well as students against Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the authorities’ attempts to silence them:
Despite the state’s aggression, which has included the use of riot police and state troops in various locations – and the shameful demonisation of peace protesters by politicians and pro-Israel lobby groups willing to collude in Israel’s war crimes, mirroring the tactics used in the UK – the protest movement is growing and the US public is increasingly aware and condemning of Israel’s mass murder of Palestinian civilians, mostly women and children.
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US refuses to say it won’t kill Assange
Wikileaks journalist remains imprisoned as US continues to pursue discredited extradition case – and refusal to give binding guarantee would result in his immediate release if UK justice system was fit for purpose
The US has refused to give a specific, binding guarantee to a UK court that it will not execute journalist and Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Assange has been held for years in solitary confinement in Belmarsh prison while he fights the US government’s attempt to extradite him so it can imprison him for years beyond his lifespan, after Assange exposed war crimes in Iraq by the US military.
The case should have been laughed out of court three years ago, when the main US witness admitted he had been lying all along in his claim that Assange induced him to hack US systems. Instead, Assange has been submitted to what former UN Special Rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer described as sustained psychological torture – and still faces the likelihood of imprisonment for more than a century.
His recent appeal was adjourned to give the US time to affirm properly that it would not kill him if he was extradited, a sick joke when there has been longstanding evidence of US plans to murder him outside the US.
Incredibly, the High Court has refused to admit fresh evidence of CIA plots to kidnap or kill Julian Assange.
The judges say the rationale for kidnapping or killing Assange would be removed if he is extradited, and the evidence is thus not worth consideration.
Read that again. pic.twitter.com/PqwJIg4yAn— Declassified UK (@declassifiedUK) March 26, 2024
The judges even refused to admit fresh evidence of the US’s plans to assassinate Assange, instead offering the US another opportunity to have him in their hands if they would promise not to put him to death. The US.
But Assange’s wife Stella has revealed that the US has refused to say that it will not kill him and has offered only a boilerplate statement about the death penalty, while denying Assange the free speech protections it would offer to any US citizen:
The United States has issued a non-assurance in relation to the First Amendment, and a standard assurance in relation to the death penalty.
It makes no undertaking to withdraw the prosecution’s previous assertion that Julian has no First Amendment rights because he is not a U.S citizen. Instead, the US has limited itself to blatant weasel words claiming that Julian can “seek to raise” the First Amendment if extradited.
The diplomatic note does nothing to relieve our family’s extreme distress about his future – his grim expectation of spending the rest of his life in isolation in US prison for publishing award-winning journalism.
The Biden Administration must drop this dangerous prosecution before it is too late.
The US statement says the death penalty will be ‘neither sought nor imposed’, but this is non-binding and meaningless given its previous attempts to kill him. The refusal to guarantee there will be no death penalty in Assange’s specific case should mean under UK and European human rights laws that the extradition is immediately refused by the UK court and Assange should already be free. Even if the assurances had been given, the likelihood that the US’s treatment of Assange would lead to his death should be enough to quash the bid.
The fact that he is not yet free of the threat of extradition, let alone walking around in the freedom he should have, is a damning indictment of the state of UK justice and democracy.
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A timeline of Wilson’s victorious case over ‘antisemitism campaigner’ smearers
How the case developed that ended with uni lecturer James Wilson’s hard-fought win in court after smears put him and his family in danger – and saw LAAS director Newbon commit suicide
Last week, university lecturer James Wilson won £30,000 in damages from two defendants, James Mendelsohn and Edward Cantor, who had contributed to a smear against Wilson by a third ‘antisemitism campaigner’, Peter Newbon, that put the lives of Wilson and his family at risk. Newbon, a director of the right-wing pressure group ‘Labour against Antisemitism’ (LAAS), was a defendant in the case but died by suicide, after a row with his wife, before the case was concluded. The judgement in the Wilson case revealed that Newbon had ‘concealed’ the case from his wife
The case never involved much-loved Jewish author Michael Rosen. However, Newbon’s fellow ‘campaigners’ have tried hard to associate Newbon’s death with Rosen because Rosen dared to complain about the antisemitic doctoring of his famous children’s book, Bear Hunt, in a social media post by Newbon used to attack former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. The coroner presiding at the inquest into Newbon’s death made no such connection, nor even mentioned Rosen throughout the proceedings, but this has not stopped the trolls’ efforts.
For readers unfamiliar with the Wilson vs Mendelsohn et al case, below is a timeline showing the chronology of the smears and the subsequent legal victory:
- Nineteen months before August 2020: a confrontation takes place at Wilson’s children’s school with ‘Mrs A’. The trial judge has ruled that Wilson was blameless, but A posts a picture and libellous claim to Facebook
- August 2020: Wilson disputes with Newbon on Twitter about the so-called ‘IHRA definition’ of antisemitism – a definition that has been heavily criticised, not least because it doesn’t define, is used to suppress criticism of Israel and enables false accusations of antisemitism – by Jewish legal experts in the UK and even by its original author, Kenneth Stern
- August 2020: in a manoeuvre typical of so-called ‘antisemitism campaigners’, Newbon resorts quickly to ad hominem personal attacks and responds with libellous claim that Wilson is a ‘freak who takes photos of kids’
- August 2020 onwards: Wilson tries to negotiate with Newbon to remove the libel and warns that he will sue if it is not taken down
- Around August 2020: Newbon’s university employers warn Newbon that he is in breach of the university’s social media code
- November 2020 Newbon gets into dispute with another person on social media – and receives a second warning from university
- Around the same time, Newbon also becomes involved with the so-called ‘University Antisemitism Map’ which targets academics who criticise Israel or dispute the right-wing claim of ‘Labour antisemitism’, labelling them antisemitic and identifying their place of work so collaborators can target their employment. Newbon contacts one institution with an allegation about an employee – the employee is exonerated by institution
- May 2021: Newbon posts a doctored screenshot of a famous ‘tweet’ that originally showed Jeremy Corbyn reading ‘Bear Hunt’ to a group of children. The book held by Corbyn has been photoshopped to make it appear that Corbyn is reading from a notorious antisemitic text, ‘The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion’. The image is accompanied by a parody of the words from the Bear Hunt book
- May 2021: numerous Twitter users object and write to Newbon’s university, whose name is displayed on his Twitter profile. Rosen is informed of the tweet and comments publicly that the doctoring was an antisemitic thing to do. The university says it will take action
- May 2021: As revealed during the subsequent Wilson case, Newbon prepares an apology to be issued to Rosen, then withdraws the apology and starts legal proceedings, presumably having been advised by lawyers that he has a case against Rosen
- December 2021: Newbon escalates by issuing a ‘Particulars of Claim’, the formal opening of a libel case, in which he accepts that Rosen is ‘in’ the tweet but claims Rosen is not the target, as the target is Corbyn who is reading Rosen’s book to children in the image. Rosen prepares defence
- January 2022: Newbon ends his own life after a row with his wife
- January 2022 onwards: Rosen is blamed for Newbon’s death by various parties either by implication or actual accusations. In articles at the time, another case (ie Wilson’s) is mentioned, but not by name. Some people note that Newbon was running two cases at the same time, defending against Wilson, claiming against Rosen
- March 2022: Wilson and Newbon’s wife settle Newbon’s involvement in Wilson’s case against Newbon, Mendelsohn and Cantor
- February 2023: a High Court judge rejects an attempt by Mendelsohn and Cantor to have the case against them thrown out. The pair had attempted to claim that Wilson could and should have minimised the damage they did to him by backing out earlier from the online conversation in which he was smeared. The judge described the attempt as ‘not very attractive’
- April 2023: The inquest into Newbon’s death takes place. The coroner makes no mention of either the Wilson or Rosen legal cases. The coroner does mentioned that Newbon had a ‘disagreement’ with his wife and that he left the house in a ‘fragile state’.
- December 2023: the Wilson v Mendelsohn, Newbon (deceased) and Cantor case leads to a four-day trial.
- April 2024: the judge’s findings are published. The judge finds against Cantor and Mendelsohn, dismissing the claims of a string of their witnesses and awarding a total of £30,000 in damages to James Wilson. In the judgment narrative, the late Newbon is described as a bully
The case, which involved the disclosure by Newbon’s widow of his personal communications, also revealed interesting aspects of his conduct toward Michael Rosen and the behaviour of the trolls who have tried to exploit his death to attack Rosen. Analysis to follow.
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Vid: Mason’s deranged Corbyn smear – ‘He’s disarming Ukraine and tolerating antisemitism’
Corbyn apparently travelling the length and breadth of Europe to stop the neo-Nazi Ukrainians from ‘fighting fascism’…
Paul Mason was caught last month in a full-blown meltdown of deranged accusations, at a woman who dared to challenge Israel’s mass slaughter of innocent civilians and the unhealthy influence of pro-Israel lobby groups in British politics – and also caught misrepresenting what she had said, when a recording of her comments and his diatribe was revealed.
And he was caught on the same evening in another deranged rant, when he accused Jeremy Corbyn of ‘touring’ Europe ‘tolerating antisemitism’ and ‘disarming the Ukrainian people in their struggle against fascism’:
Audio capture by @UrbanDandyLDN, subtitles by Skwawkbox
As ‘Urban Dandy’, who recorded Mason’s ramblings, commented:
Mason’s suggestion that Jeremy Corbyn tolerates antisemitism is false, just as the widespread, mainstream claims that there was a serious antisemitism problem in Labour under Corbyn’s leadership were false, and have been debunked repeatedly. The MP for Islington North is taking legal action against Nigel Farage for similar defamatory statements, while another political commentator favoured in the mainstream media recently had to make a humiliating public apology for his baseless allegations against Corbyn.
Screengrab from X / johnmcternan
Disarming the Ukrainians
Paul Mason’s second allegation against Corbyn, that the MP has been on a European tour aimed at disarming the Ukrainian people, is also false. Corbyn has never called for the disarming of Ukraine. The anti-war veteran who fronts the Peace & Justice Project has spoken in many European cities since Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, mainly at events organised by peace campaigners. Corbyn has called for diplomacy instead of escalation, and expressed skepticism about the relentless arms sales by western companies.
Mason’s claim that the left wants to somehow stop Ukrainians ‘fighting fascism’ is also bizarre enough to verge on the delusional. Ukraine is well known, despite the best efforts of the UK media to rewrite history, to be rife with actual nazis, some of whom are in influential positions in the Zelenskiy regime. Zelenskiy himself has seized control of Ukraine’s media, stripped workers of their rights and shut down opposition groups, all key identifiers of fascism.
Mason’s reputation, already falling apart because of his support for Keir Starmer, was shredded in 2022 when The Grayzone revealed his emails plotting with security-state figures to take down left-wing news outlets, accompanied by a notorious, sprawling chart showing the links he imagined among left groups Russia and China – and boasting of ‘cauteris[ing] Corbyn and Stop the War’ so that ‘no MP will touch them:
Mason’s support for Starmer despite the so-called ‘Labour leader’s backing for Israel’s genocide in Gaza has left him a risible figure, yet he keeps spouting his nonsense despite the inevitable backfiring and mockery.
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The Free Speech Union’s Key Role in Developing Government Legislation
Toby Young resigned from the board of higher education regulator the Office for Students (OfS) in 2018 after controversy over a string of offensive tweets directed at women as well as comments about working-class students and eugenics.
In 2020, Young launched the Free Speech Union (FSU), and in 2023 Professor Arif Ahmed, a former Advisory Council member of the FSU was appointed to be the OfS’s new “free speech czar” tasked with protecting academics and students who make controversial comments due to legislation the FSU lobbied for, advised on, and amended.
From being forced to resign, Young now leads an organisation which is involved in developing Government legislation such as the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act and has begun working with councils to “to enshrine free speech in its policies, procedures, code of conduct and constitution.”
Miriam Cates MP speaking at the Northern Research Group conference in Doncaster in 2023.
Photo: Danny Lawson/PA Images/Alamy
When Miriam Cates MP was contacted by Byline Times to offer a right of reply for another article, the response came not from her office but from the account of Samuel Armstrong.
Armstrong’s role as a freelance political consultant for individual MPs, groups of MPs and political campaigns, demonstrates how the FSU works closely with elements of the Conservative Party to shape legislation.
His current anchor clients are the FSU, where he is Legislative Affairs Director, and the New Conservatives grouping of MPs, for which Cates is a director, and which received a £50,000 donation in December from the Dubai-based Legatum Institute Foundation, the investment fund behind GB News.
Armstrong's role for the FSU entails working with the FSU’s Legal Advisory Council to draft and propose amendments to bills that are frequently either taken up or proposed in a different format by the government.
His LinkedIn profile says “Unlike all too many, we really get into the nitty-gritty of the legislative process and use all the levers of Parliamentary procedure to win.”
Major recent campaigns have included the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act, changes to the Online Safety Bill, the Workers Protection Bill being dropped, and Payment Services Regulations.
Think Tanking Academia
FSU member Professor Abhishek Saha explained the organisation's role in producing the Higher Education Bill in an article for the US-based Heterodox Academy in February 2024, providing insight into how legislation is being created through the input of think tanks and the FSU.
In February 2021, the UK Government issued a policy paper setting out proposals to strengthen protections for free speech in response to reports published by the think tanks Cieo, Policy Exchange, and Civitas. All three reports faced criticism.
As reported by openDemocracy, Civitas’ report was produced by compiling often misleading media reports and looking at university websites, marking down universities if they had anti-racism training or procedures to anonymously report harassment, concluding that “universities have adopted, wholesale, a mutation and splicing of past radicalisms that include Marxism, postmodernism, feminism, Freudianism, and Maoism”. Research by the BBC’s Reality Check team contradicted this.
Initially lobbying for the bill when the Government was weighing up its merits, the FSU then advised the Government on what to include in the legislation and worked on its amendments.
On 7 December 2022, the House of Lords voted to remove the Bill’s statutory tort clause completely. The tort mechanism allows civil claims to be brought in the County Court against higher education providers and student unions if they breach their new free speech obligations.
Saha explains in the Heterodox Academy article that he then met with Claire Coutinho MP in February 2023, and says the FSU convinced the Government to amend Clause Four, not to address concerns, but to further expand the tort mechanism so that financial losses from legal action included subtler forms of loss, for example, humiliation, loss of reputation, or restriction of access to research data.
Another amendment added in the Commons was an expansion of the bill’s academic freedom protections to beyond an individual’s “field of expertise”.
The Commons voted 283 to 161 to reinstate the tort in full and it was passed in the Lords on 10 May 2023 after it was agreed that a complainant would need to have exhausted the free speech complaints scheme before going to court unless bringing civil proceedings for an injunction only.
Setting the Boundaries of Debate
The legislation’s complaints system will be overseen by the OfS’s new Director for Free Speech and Academic Freedom, Professor Arif Ahmed. Appointed to the position in August 2023, he left the post of Commissioner to the Equality and Human Rights Commission which he’d been appointed to in late 2022 by Kemi Badenoch MP.
Ahmed was previously a member of the FSU’s Advisory Council and was part of the group of academics focused around Cambridge University that developed into the FSU.
Despite its stance against cancel culture, the FSU website “celebrated” the “critical role” played by Ahmed after his campaign at Cambridge forced plans to allow anonymous reporting of microaggressions to be dropped, and resulted in the resignation of Stephen Toope, Vice-Chancellor of the University in 2021.
Details of the new complaints system have yet to be released, however on 25 March, when Ahmed was interviewed on the Today Programme regarding what would be considered a breach of free speech, he was unable to provide examples, stating that each case would be judged on individual merit.
Subsequently, the OfS announced a consultation period, lasting until 24 May, on proposed new guidance for higher education providers and students’ unions on fulfilling “new free speech duties which are expected to be from August this year”.
Ahmed will have considerable influence in setting the boundaries of debate in higher education. Critics have raised concerns that the threat of large financial sanctions could create a climate of fear where individuals feel unable to challenge abusive or derogatory comments.
This March, Bromley Council in London has passed a proposal to “enshrine free speech” above “HR-style inquisition and political snitching” after councillors worked for many months with the FSU to write the policy. The policy will protect strongly held beliefs and allow councillors to “challenge, without repercussions.” The FSU is hoping other councils will follow Bromley.
Breaking Biden says US may drop Assange case
A genuine indication of sense from US president – or more mind games?
US president Joe Biden has said that the US is ‘considering’ abandoning the country’s attempt to extradite persecuted Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, in response to a request from the Australian government. Assange has been held in Belmarsh prison for years while his legal team attempts to fight a case that should have been thrown out when the main US witness admitted he had been lying when he said that Assange arranged the hacking of US systems.
Last month, the High Court kept Assange in prison when it ruled that the US could have more time to provide assurances that it would not impose a death penalty on the Australian journalist, even though it admitted that the US was attacking his right to free speech in a way it would not do to one of its own citizens.
Before his imprisonment, Assange was effectively kept captive for years in the Ecuadorian embassy when the UK refused to stop trying to extradite him to Sweden, which Assange’s supporters feared was an indirect route to handing him to the US, despite Sweden dropping discredited rape allegations. The US has pursued Assange in vengeance for Wikileaks exposing war crimes by US military.
Last month, the US leaked hints that it might accept a ‘plea deal’ and drop the extradition in return for Assange accepting a lesser conviction – still an outright attack on journalistic freedom and the public’s right to know what their governments are doing. Biden’s latest comment may be more mind games and those who support Assange and the importance of press freedom to a functioning democracy should not let up on their pressure until the case is formally dropped and Assange is free, as he should have been all along.
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Unite 4 Gaza slams Graham’s ‘extraordinary’ attack on anti-genocide campaigners
Letter from ‘war monger’ attempting to justify her conduct and silence continues to backfire as anti-genocide group condemns betrayal of Palestinian civilians and of workers and movement
Unite members who have formed a group to campaign against Israel’s genocide in Gaza have written a response to the union’s general secretary Sharon Graham’s letter last week attempting to justify her lack of action to support Palestinians:
Response to the Statement by Sharon Graham on Palestine
On 26 March Sharon Graham, the General Secretary of Unite, and Andy Green, Chair of the Executive, issued an extraordinary statement attacking Palestine solidarity supporters. In particular it attempted to justify the leadership’s refusal to give any support to the Palestinians or Unite members campaigning to end Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
When Israel launched its attack on Gaza Unite issued a statement on 16 October which ‘unreservedly’ condemned and expressed its ‘revulsion’ over Israeli deaths on October 7 whilst merely ‘deploring’ the mass murder of women and children in Gaza.
It was only after concerted protests by Unite activists that after 4 weeks Unite issued a second statement on 3 November calling for an ‘immediate unconditional ceasefire by all parties in Israel and Gaza.’ There was no mention of Israel’s genocidal attack on Gaza.
Since then there has been radio silence. There has been no publicity about the national demonstrations and no support for members wanting to take solidarity action. Despite repeated protests and petitions by members Sharon Graham has failed to attend or speak at the national demonstrations. Graham even tried to persuade Peter Kavanagh of London & Eastern Region not to speak.
Unite did absolutely nothing until a letter was sent on 25 March to the Palestinian trade union PGFTU, whose offices in Gaza had been bombed more than two weeks previously on 7 March. The timing of this letter was no coincidence. It was sent one day before her statement.
The letter offered nothing but empty words. Graham and Green are explicit in their opposition to an arms embargo on Israel or persuading workers to refuse to handle arms intended for genocide.
Graham’s letter referred to Unite’s ‘longstanding policy’ but fails to mention that Unite policy includes ‘full support for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions’. This policy does not even appear on Unite’s website. For that you have to go to the United Left site.
Graham boasts that ‘Unite was the first major union to publicly and unambiguously call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.’ This is not true. UNISON called for an immediate ceasefire on 26 October and on 18 October condemned Israel’s attack on the Al Ahli hospital killing nearly 500 people.
Graham has remained silent about the attacks on Gaza’s hospitals, ambulances and health care system and now its execution of children at Al Shifa Hospital.
The remainder of Sharon Graham’s letter represents a disgraceful defence of the arms industry and an attack on those who seek to ‘to undermine the defence industry or demand the disbandment of NATO and AUKUS.’ It is an industry whose purpose includes enabling genocide in Gaza and a possible nuclear war with China and Russia.
Sharon Graham has openly come out as a war monger who hides her aims behind the need to preserve jobs at any cost. We reject the argument that Unite must support war because our members’ jobs depend on it. A society where an increasing proportion of national wealth is geared to the manufacture of armaments is to the detriment of all our members.
When imperialism wages war it is workers who lose their lives. Yes there is a contradiction between representing members in the war industry and opposing imperialist wars. That is why we support the diversification of arms production into making useful goods that benefit humanity.
The idea that we must defend every job, even when it involves the murder of thousands of children is one we reject. Trade unions have historically fought for peace not war, against fascism, imperialism and racism.
Sharon Graham spits on the memory of the Rolls Royce workers in East Kilbride who, in 1973, refused to work on the engines of Chilean aircraft which had taken an active part in Pinochet’s fascist coup. A strong trade union organisation ensured that the Chilean airforce was all but grounded. Eventually it fell to Israel and South Africa to service these aircraft.
International solidarity is in the interests of all workers. Without solidarity the capitalist class can play divide and rule. Rather than building solidarity across national borders Sharon Graham prefers to play the role of a British nationalist wedded to Zionism.
Arms production is highly capital intensive. Britain’s ‘defence’ budget has steadily increased at the same time as cuts to the NHS and social services budgets. UNITE also has workers in the NHS, local government and social services. Unite members also use the NHS and are being forced to wait longer for treatment because of the cuts that enable increased military expenditure.
UNITE and its predecessor unions have a proud tradition of international solidarity. Former General Secretary of the TGWU, Jack Jones, fought in Spain against the fascists. At the time of Apartheid in South Africa we supported the struggle for liberation. An injury to one is an injury to all. We live in a society in which war is in the interests of capitalism not the working class.
Sharon Graham’s statement is an open declaration of war against those who support BDS and the liberation of the Palestinian people. The liberation of the Palestinians from Israeli Apartheid and an end to imperialist war is in the interests of all members of Unite.
Sharon Graham asserts that we are a trade union not a political party. Trade unions have historically recognised that strikes alone are not enough. We cannot achieve our economic aims without a political struggle for socialism. The NHS would never have been created if Graham’s miserable, short-sighted, dog eat dog vision had been adopted.
Today the Labour Party has abandoned the working class and embraced the neo-liberal advocates of free market capitalism. About this Graham has nothing to say.
Implicit in Graham’s statement is a threat to the affiliation to Stop the War Coalition and Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Already the affiliation to StWC has been suspended.
We call on Unite to break from Keir Starmer’s support for genocide, his embrace of NATO and neo-liberal economics and to fight for a socialist society which is free from the fear of war. We salute those who have campaigned to close Israel’s arms factories in Britain and we particularly welcome the closure of Elbit’s factory in Tamworth as a result of Palestine Action’s campaign.
See also Labour CND statement: why Unite the Union is wrong to attack groups picketing weapons manufacturing companies.
Unite 4 Palestine
1st April 2024
Unite was contacted for comment and given a copy of the statement, but did not respond.
In addition to the issues raised by Unite 4 Gaza, Sharon Graham has been alleged by insiders to have:
- banned Unite officials and national banners from pro-Gaza protests
- banned and smeared films and books exposing the ‘Labour antisemitism’ scam
- placed an official under investigation who refused to cancel a Palestine solidarity fringe event at Labour’s 2023 annual conference
- told her chief of staff to threaten a soon-to-retire official with the loss of a pension bonus if he did not soften his support for Palestinians
Her supporters also prevented debate and votes on Gaza at a meeting of the union’s elected executive earlier this month.
According to human rights group Euro Med Monitor, since 7 October last year Israel has killed over 40,000 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded more than double that number, overwhelmingly women and children and many of them with life-changing injuries, while Gaza’s health and school systems have been bombed into collapse, often using US- and UK-made weapons and systems. More than a million people have been forcibly displaced and Gaza is in famine because of Israel’s blockade of food and vital supplies. Israel is formally on trial for genocide before the International Court of Justice and ordered to stop its slaughter – and has been found by UN human rights investigators to be committing genocide.
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Assange: justice denied again as court declines to admit new evidence of US murder plots
Wikileaks founder will remain in Belmarsh prison while judges seek further meaningless ‘assurances’ from US
The High Court has this morning again denied justice to persecuted Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Despite admitting that the US is denying Assange’s rights to free speech and is pursuing him in a way that it would not pursue one of its own citizens, judges have decided to keep Assange in Belmarsh prison while it asks for further ‘assurances’ that the US will not kill him – even though there has been longstanding evidence of US plans to murder him outside the US.
Shamefully, the court has also declined to admit fresh evidence of US plots to assassinate him, claiming that the evidence is irrelevant because the US’s incentive to murder Assange would not apply if it had him in custody, as Declassified UK has pointed out:
Incredibly, the High Court has refused to admit fresh evidence of CIA plots to kidnap or kill Julian Assange.
The judges say the rationale for kidnapping or killing Assange would be removed if he is extradited, and the evidence is thus not worth consideration.
Read that again. pic.twitter.com/PqwJIg4yAn— Declassified UK (@declassifiedUK) March 26, 2024
The extradition case should have been laughed out of court three years ago, when the main US witness admitted he had been lying all along in his claim that Assange induced him to hack US systems. Instead, Assange has been submitted to what former UN Special Rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer described as sustained psychological torture – and still faces the likelihood of imprisonment for more than a century in US retaliation for Wikileaks exposing its war crimes in Iraq and as a deterrent to other journalists who might expose its crimes in future.
Shame on the UK and its travesty of justice and democracy. Free Julian Assange. Protect real journalism.
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Exclusive: Unite membership ‘falls by 210,000+’ under Graham
Huge membership fall since last official figure in late 2020, say insiders – but management hasn’t reported official membership despite requirement to do so every year – and continues to donate millions to anti-worker Labour party
Yesterday, Skwawkbox reported the collapse in the Unite union’s strike fund – the fund members rely on to pay their bills and feed their families when they are on strike – from £35m when current general secretary Sharon Graham took office to just £11m now. Some insiders say the fund was increased to £50m just before previous general secretary Len McCluskey retired, though Skwawkbox has not yet been able to confirm this.
£11m is only enough for about eight months, based on spending in each of the last two years.
Senior union figures have also complained that the union management is not being transparent about the union’s membership and has not signed off financial accounts since Ms Graham took over in 2021 Unions are required to report membership annually, but Unite has not done so – and risks severe sanction from the Certification Officer. One senior official of another union told Skwawkbox:
Unions have to declare membership every year to the Certification Officer. Unite doesn’t appear to have done so for several years and the CO could effectively decide to shut them down if she chooses.
But well-placed Unite insiders have now told Skwawkbox that the latest internal estimates show a catastrophic fall. Unite’s membership in late 2020, the last official figure, was 1.081m:
- Automotive Industries 72,453
- Aerospace & Shipbuilding 63,238
- Chemicals, Pharmaceuticals, Process and Textiles 43,134
- Civil Air Transport 65,892
- Community Youth workers and not for profit 42,985
- Docks, Rail, Ferries & Waterways 17,228
- Education 17,335
- Energy and Utilities 32,485
- Engineering, Manufacturing and Steel 57,753
- Finance and Legal 61,559
- Food Drink and Agriculture63,589
- Government, Defence, Prisons & Contractors 10,751
- Graphical Paper and Media & Information Technology 36,810
- Health 88,770 Local Authorities 61,783
- Passenger Transport 76,861
- Road Transport Commercial, Logistics and Retail Distribution 62,619
- Service Industries 50,564
- Construction, Allied Trades and Technicians 68,083
- Community 14,971
- Unknown 6,668
- Retired 65,503
Total 1,081,034
According to internal estimates, it is now around 870,000 – a fall of a fifth (19.5%) from the 2020 figure Graham inherited – and is still falling. By a different measurement, sources say that the 2020 figure was 1.28m, which would mean a fall of almost 400,000 in two and a half years.
Against that backdrop, according to the Electoral Commission the union under Graham has donated around £4m since the winter of 2021 to Keir Starmer’s Labour, despite Starmer’s assault on democracy, betrayal of and contempt for striking workers, blocking of union candidates in parliamentary seats and his support for ‘spycops’ and anti-protest laws.
Sharon Graham’s failure to speak out on Gaza and behind the scenes attempts to quell free speech on the issue since Israel’s genocide there began last October has outraged many members and others. She
Graham has been publicly silent about the slaughter, but has:
- been criticised for banning Unite officials and national banners from pro-Gaza protests
- banned and smeared films and books exposing the ‘Labour antisemitism’ scam, placed an official under investigation who refused to cancel a Palestine solidarity fringe event at Labour’s 2023 annual conference
- allegedly told her chief of staff to threaten a soon-to-retire official with the loss of a pension bonus if he did not soften his support for Palestinians
Her supporters also prevented debate and votes on Gaza at last week’s meeting of the union’s elected executive.
Ms Graham’s tenure as Unite boss has also been marked by a string of other allegations – which neither she nor the union has denied – including alleged destruction of evidence against her husband in threat, misogyny and bullying complaints brought by union employees. She is also embroiled in both an employment tribunal for discrimination and a defamation lawsuit brought by Irish union legend Brendan Ogle for the union’s treatment of him and comments made about him by Graham and her close ally Tony Woodhouse – a situation that has caused outrage among Unite members and politicians in Ireland.
Unite has been contacted for comment.
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