Credit where credit is due to the SNP under the Yousaf leadership - I don't know how much influence Fiona Robertson and her ilk still have within the party, but it at least appears to have its limits. Back during the Grouse Beater and Neale Hanvey controversies, which both took place when Robertson was strutting around as if being Equalities Convener meant she owned the place, she sent out the absolutist/absurdist stricture that any minority group gets to define entirely for itself what constitutes bigotry towards it. If that was still the SNP's approach as far as the question of antisemitism is concerned, they would currently be tying themselves up in knots in exactly the manner Starmer and co are, and refusing to condemn a far-right Israeli government for mass-killing Palestinian civilians on the grounds that all meaningful criticisms of Israel are a form of antisemitism.
Instead, they're taking the correct stance on Gaza from both a moral and strategic perspective. By forcing a Commons vote on a ceasefire in November, they caused carnage within Labour due to a number of frontbenchers defying Starmer's instruction to abstain, and then inevitably resigning or being sacked. By forcing another vote now, the SNP will flush Starmer out - have the horrors of recent weeks really made no difference to his refusal to unconditionally back an immediate ceasefire?
And if the answer to that question turns out to be "yes", the SNP will probably also be able to expose the sham autonomy of the Scottish Labour party. The two Scottish Labour MPs, Ian Murray and Michael Shanks, both slavishly followed the London Labour whip in November and did not vote for a ceasefire. If they do the same thing this time, the political consequences will be more severe, because they will not only be defying public opinion in Scotland, but also the express will of the Scottish Labour conference, which has just voted in favour of an immediate ceasefire. There could hardly be a more vivid demonstration that Scottish Labour MPs will always be Starmer's men and women in Scotland, rather than Scotland's voices (or even Scottish Labour's voices for that matter) within a Labour government.
You made me look. Apparently Fiona Robertson lost her position in 2021:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/19761661.former-snp-equalities-chief-claims-years-worth-complaints-still-unaddressed/
Since then, another powerful figure by the name of Political Expediency has thankfully taken over her rôle!
Yes, but losing her position the first time around didn't stop her carrying on as if nothing had changed.
DeleteGovernments across the world including Westminster should be ashamed to say they are supporting Israel .I would like to see those in government who publicly support what Israel are doing in Gaza , prosecuted.We see one way traffic worldwide with so called antisemitism accusations every time Israels muderous behaviour is criticised its time to fight back against this propaganda and its time to examine the the influence Israel has in those governments across the world that are supporting Israels actions against the will of those who elected them.Its corruption of the worst kind.
ReplyDeleteWe see Palestinians celebrating every time Israelis are killed, as they did on Oct 7th. Laughing and handing out sweets. 72% support Hamas, according to an Arab poll taken in Gaza and the West Bank. I would like to see some Arab condemnation for the attack which has brought justifiable retribution to Gaza.
Delete" justifiable retribution" - aye in the mind of a monster.
DeleteIt doesn't matter what Sarwar says or doesn't say though, he's only the Labour lackey in Scotland, the country where no one can hear us scream
ReplyDeleteMaybe Starmer disnae want to get on the wrong side of his wife. Domestic harmony is important if you want to be in 10 Downing st, you know. What's thousands of Palestinian lives when compared to that. They are preparing the Sinai desert to be a refugee home for millions of Palestinians. Starmer's domestic harmony is obviously more important than ethnic cleansing.
ReplyDeleteIt wisnae that long ago the SNP would be throwing accusations of anti Semite against people who said things like Yousaf is saying. Again like UK and US governments it isnae just what is being said but who is saying it in the SNP.
Not what is being said but who is saying it. Indeed, it’s all reached fever pitch now.
DeleteThe west needs Palestine destroyed and Israel in place, that's the reason for all the equivocation amongst all the western politicians
DeleteThe Arab world is Russia's world, and Israel is the west's satellite in that area in prevention of that happening
The west's politicians will definitely make their minds up to totally condemn Israel when Israel tells them the job's done
Nothing wrong with a pointless call for a ceasefire wherever, but I do get the feeling that it is political gesture dictated by TicToc. I very much doubt they will be putting forward motions calling for ceasefires in Sudan, Yemen or Ukraine (if anyone gives a shit, pretty much no-one?), the death-toll in Yemen is estimated at ~400,000 and counting , probably mostly from starvation). In the meantime I suggest people peruse the Times of Israel, the Jerusalem Post (and Haaretz if you want some sanity).
ReplyDeleteOh aye, what’s going on in Gaza is very, very normal and nothing worth criticising or frankly noticing at all. Got it.
DeleteMost of the population of Gaza is at risk of starvation, and that's considerably more than 400,000 people. Gentle hint: it's still genocide if you deliberately let an ethnic group slowly starve to death. Even if the Times of Israel and the Jerusalem Post (apparently the apex of global journalism in your view) look the other way.
DeleteIf Humza displayed as much passion about Scottish Independence as he does about Gaza, I'd be a lot more convinced it's not just a deliberate distraction to cover for the SNP's many failings.
DeleteSquirrels!
DeleteExatctly. Gaza features heavily on TicTok, Yemen doesn't. Hence, there will be no comments about Yemen.
DeletePurely an "instinct".... but as an ex Labour member with some inside party knowledge, I believe the diametrically opposing views over the Middle East within the Labour Party will degenerate into an absolute bloodbath. The rumblings have only started and the bandwagon is on the roll.
ReplyDeleteBlair kept the tin lid on so much and nipped many, many things in the bud at the "tip of the iceberg" stage...(and remember, TV and papers era, social media hadn't even been heard of then!), so it was much easier to control the party. Completely different era now, and, regardless of the massive social media influence nowadays....
In terms of simple capability in terms of party management and managing the left, Starmer is no Tony Blair. Of that, I can absolutely assure you.
I can quite believe it.
DeleteIt'll still take an absolute catastrophe for them—within the next few months—for them to fail to win this election, though. The English public turned away from the Tories in 2022 on a similar scale to what they did on Major. There's an enormous gulf between them in the polls.
And if the Tories did limp across the line to a nightmare win, Scotland would surely wake up in horror. London Rule? Zombie Rule!
Isn't an end to Palestine what the western worlds politicians really want, so they're all just humming and hawing until Israel does the job for them then they'll clutch their pearls afterwards and say how terrible it all was, oh dear it must never happen again ?
ReplyDeleteTony Starmer is just toeing the British political line on this and trying not to lose votes from either side at the same time
Terry callachan Dundee here , the eradication of arabs from Palestine by Israel with of course the help of USA and UK who stand on the sidelines with their mass weaponry at the ready in case anyone with a heart decides to intervene , is more than just Gaza , this is the final act of attrition against the arab world as a whole thats why so many arab countries are eager to intervene but dare not knowing their own annihilation would result , South Africa and China and a few other countries have been outspoken damning the USA and UK for agreeing to be Israels bully boys planting their warships in the mediterranean sea giving Israel protection and cover to do their dirty deeds , from here on all arab countries will be at the beck and call of Israel .I expect more war , countries are taking sides you are either on the side of USA UK AUS and EU or you are on the side of China Russia India South Africa and South America
DeleteOnce Trump is back, the US changes sides to be with his best bud Putin. "Land for peace" in Ukraine—the same thing we always ask of Israel—and squeaky bums time for all of Europe, including Scotland, however we emerge in it.
DeleteAgree with Anonymous at 11.13. It's a North-South thing, a white-black thing, a European culture-all the rest of the world's submerged cultures thing. You just have to wonder why: why do those waging this war (which doesn't include all members of the privileged categories, as witness Scottish opinion and massive protest worldwide) feel so threatened by the existence of others? You'd think they'd see that diversity makes life more interesting.
Delete@KP. Arguably they did, until those planes on 9/11. It's impossible to overstate what a shock that was to the American people and their politics. It was the most transformative event in generations. And its result was to give them an existential fear of Others who are out to destroy them. Muslims, Russians, Mexicans, whatever the case of the day may be.
DeleteHas it ever occurred to the Israelis that mass-murdering Palestinians is, every single time they do it, a "transformative event" that gains Hamas ever more recruits?
DeleteWhat made 9/11 so transformative was the shock. The same was true for Israel in October. Neither of them ever expected mass murder.
DeletePalestinians however don’t have that luxury.
We are again getting the british media spreading hate about Putin but two things to remember
Delete1) if France or Belgium or Ireland or any other county next door to UK ever invited China or Russia or any other country in the world to join an organisation similar to NATO which in turn would allow those countries to then locate nuclear weapons on the coast of France or Belgium or Ireland facing the UK you can be assured UK would be decidedly unhappy and would without doubt declare war on France or Belgium or Ireland for making such an agreement .
2) Navalny has geen in the news a lot rhos week because he died in prison in Russia but remember his past he joined extreme right wing political groups groups that hated immigrants and minorities he embezzled funds from various local government organisations and was found guilty , he was in and out of prison over many years for it.He spent some time studying at Yale university in USA and his daughter is currently studying there , Yale is a uni that has churned out many Presidents CIA and FBI chiefs too so just consider who he was being financed and if t was possible he had been turned whilst there, a reasonable conclusion , check out how much USA contribution there is to his wiki page.
Our british media and that of usa and now the eu too hate Russia and they hate China both Russia and China compete with USA for world trade and have a habit of helping countries that have been devastated by USA one way or another.
Russia and China are both imperialists, along with the USA, yes. All of them are out for themselves, first and foremost, and make strange bedfellows.
DeleteWhen is the vote on the motion coming?
ReplyDeleteWednesday.
DeleteWhat is happening in Israel/Palestine is colonialism and it has been this way for a very long time.
ReplyDeleteIs Israel the US's colony, in your view?
DeleteJust one generation ago, back in the 1980s, American public opinion was solidly against Israel's war in Lebanon. Conservatives and Liberals both opposed it. How times have changed since.
I’m not defending Israel's hideous acts against the Palestinian people at all. I do, however, find Israel to be a curious creation that seems to have more in common with the Crusades than Empire.
It sometimes feels more like the US is Israel's colony.
DeleteThe nation which should have given land to the Zionist cause immediately after the war was clearly Germany. It wasn't the Arabs who committed the Holocaust, yet they're the ones who must keep on paying for it.
DeleteThe SNP's position on Gaza shows they care about people and want fairness worldwide. They want peaceful solutions and strongly reject violence. They support Palestinian rights and work hard for a fair end to the conflict. This proves their commitment to human rights and making the region stable.
ReplyDeleteFeels like their goal domestically is to run a stable _region_ here, as well. A region of the UK, headed nowhere.
DeleteEvery time I've voted for the Scottish National Party, I have done so for the nation of Scotland. If they want me back, they know the cause they were founded for.
Ah the get out clause of the fake independence supporter, demand SNP politicians make all other people change their minds or I'll vote for somebody else who still can't get what I'm demanding but don't actually do anything about it except criticize
DeletePathetic
And once more in English?
DeletePoints at Gaza. Looks away from Scotland.
DeletePerhaps English is not your first language so simply put, Alba cannot deliver one single MP or MSP that doesn't steal SNP votes because Alex Salmond is more toxic in Scotland now than George bloody Galloway, so listening to him is helping Westminster, that's the only reason Alba exists and he's laughing up his sleeve at the lot of you for helping him help Westminster towards the same result he achieved in 2014
DeleteThe near miss, Oh dear how sad never mind and well done Alistair Darling and Alex Salmond we'll get you into the house of lords yet son, keep co operating with the union Alex
People say things like "he is more toxic than George Galloway", but I'd be interested to see some proof of that and I doubt if any exists. In the recent True North poll, although his net ratings were worse than any of the other leaders asked about, they were only slightly worse than Sunak's, and they weren't quite as bad as some of the figures he was getting in 2021. There was certainly plenty of scope for Galloway's to be worse, if Galloway had actually been asked about, which he wasn't.
DeleteOh, and the idea that 2014 was some kind of 'bad result'...come on. You just make yourself look ridiculous saying that.
DeleteAnon ( Dr Jim) at 10.56pm - I see your nurse has let you escape from your normal WGD home. Salmond is low in polls because of the number Sturgeon's gang did on him. Hey Jimbo stop lying about the missing money being SNP money - it ain't and you know it but you lie just like the Britnats you complain about lying.
DeleteTinkering. The unionist establishment will remain in charge. SNP, Alba and Greens remain happy to take part in the Westminster farce.
ReplyDeleteIsn’t Holyrood a tool of the establishment as well? Isn’t the only purity abstentionism from everything and total ineffectiveness, too?
DeleteWinning independence takes getting dirty hands. Mind, it takes actual TRYING, in addition, which is where our politicians fail us now.
Holyrood with this rotten SNP SG is a bigger farce than Westminster.
Delete" Holyrood with this rotten SNP SG is a bigger farce than Westminster"
DeleteWhoever said this at 4:46PM ,
sorry but that is just nonsense , Scottish government gets pocket money each year from Westminster whilst Westminster keeps all Scotlands money and resources
Westminster then has the audacity to tell Scottish government what its allowed to spend its pocket money on and what its not allowed to spend its pocket money on.
Westminster then bans Scottish government from borrowing whilst Westminster spends whenever whatever it wants
Westminster is the bigger farce by a long long way
With the imposition of such restraints that Scottish government endures it s surprising that it hasnt gone insane
Can governments go insane ?
When bullied and harrassed the wat Scottish government is by Westminster yes it can but we endure , because we are Scottish , we fight back , the english have always hated that we fight back
bullies hate it when you fight back because they get hurt and bullies dont like getting hurt
You could have mentioned any one of the last few Tory PMs to prove the point. Or austerity or NHS underfunding and creeping privatisation.
DeleteI've been a SNP member for far longer than devolution, and most of us original members did not want devolution because we knew what it meant, up to our knees in swamp, and we still are
DeleteIt was people like Salmond and his Labour ilk who wanted this and we didn't want him in the party either, and we're still knee deep in swamp
Winnie despised him and called him slippery Salmond, and he still is
Winnie also reconvened the Scottish Parliament in 1999. So she certainly embraced devolution as a path to independence. She literally chaired the first sitting.
DeleteNot enough Scots support it being independent and because of the entrenching of views and demographic changes probably it never will. Unless there is a paradigm shift and we start seeing clear and obvious pushes for change I'm not getting worked up about it anymore. I'll support it to my dying day but if we can't see past the parochial disagreements and vote for the party everyone already knows in theory already supports independence, is known by outsiders as supporting independence and has the status of delivering a referendum if given sufficient votes, our people have no right to moan. If Ireland were given a vote on sovereignty today, it would be 90% yes. If we did we can't muster 55. That says something. Hitchens was right, it's not worth bothering about because they don't have the balls collectively to take it.
ReplyDeleteI don't think we can forecast in that way. Let's all keep on with the arguments for independence as the SNP are doing and let us use all lawful and democratic means at our disposal. Now is not the time for negative thoughts.
Delete"Scots will never vote for independence"
Delete"Vote SNP even if you hate them because you'll never get independence otherwise"
Oh go away. Total contradiction. If you really believe Scots will never vote for independence (which is nonsense by the way) the logical thing to do would be to vote for whichever party is best and forget about tactics. You can't have it both ways.
God Save _Your_ King, KC.
DeleteEverybody’s king. Rule Britannia.
Delete*Everybody's*? Like, the whole world?
DeleteEverybody’s like every one in the UK of course.
DeleteAh, that'll be "everybody" in the same sense that "international socialism" ends at Dover.
DeleteDo Amin
DeleteThanks iPhone. 🙄. Let’s try again.
DeleteIdi Amin was the last king of Scotland. We can all agree. Settling into the rôle. Etc.
DeleteMaybe I'm being negative or maybe realistic. We've had a rubbish decision on brexit, a popular and competent leaders, Salmond and Sturgeon, and still couldn't make the leap. I'll push for it forever but I've inured myself to it.
DeleteAnon at 5.06pm: Your comment has been deleted. I have no problem with people putting the pro-Israel perspective, so probably 80% of your comment would have been fine, but towards the end you started using genocidal language yourself. Genocide by means of nuclear destruction is still genocide. Even if you hadn't done that, though, I would still have had to delete your comment due to your attempt to smuggle in a claim that it is somehow "antisemitic" to accurately summarise the ICJ ruling against Israel. If you want to try to get away with that sort of debating tactic, the Keir Starmer fan club is >>>> thattaway.
ReplyDeleteBut please do have a fabulous evening.