Green party parliamentary candidate for Bethnal Green and Stepney faces antisemitism allegations
Elizabeth Waight, the Green Party candidate for Bethnal Green and Stepney, has received criticism for a video she re-posted on Instagram.
Three Green Party parliamentary candidates, including one running in an East End constituency, have allegedly shared antisemitic posts on social media, according to an article in the Jewish Chronicle.
The news emerged a week before Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced that the UK general election would be held on July 4.
Bethnal Green and Stepney candidate Elizabeth Waight, Chingford and Wood Green candidate Chris Brody and Bristol East candidate Naseem Talukdar were all reported to have shared ‘incendiary material’.
According to the Jewish Chronicle, Waight re-posted a video on Instagram in March in which a woman said: ‘What’s left for the Zionists [is] to eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Palestinians… I think this will happen soon.’
The paper also reported that Brody uploaded links to an article that suggested that the 9/11 and October 7 terror attacks were ‘false flag operations executed to open the path toward more slaughter and mayhem’.
Meanwhile, Talukdar reportedly shared comparisons between the Holocaust and the war in Gaza and liked a video clip in which anti-Israel activist David Miller said ‘we have to destroy Zionism’.
In a joint statement with Lord Mann, the government’s independent advisor on antisemitism, the Green Party said it’s taking active steps to remove antisemitism from its politics.
The party said it’ll continue to work with Lord Mann to ‘better educate Green representatives about anti-Jewish racism’.
The party has not confirmed whether Waight, the candidate for Bethnal Green and Stepney, will receive any disciplinary action following her post.
‘We will always take any allegations of antisemitism within the Green Party seriously and refer them to our internal disciplinary procedures, when necessary,’ a Green Party spokesperson said. ‘At this stage, it would be inappropriate for us to comment further.’
All three Green Party candidates were contacted for comment, but none responded.
Update: Elizabeth Waight stepped down on May 2 and Phoebe Gill is now the Green Party candidate for Bethnal Green and Stepney
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