Jeremy Corbyn is facing resignations from the Shadow Cabinet if his ally Ken Livingstone is not expelled from the Labour party, senior figures have warned. The threat came as after a major donor called for Mr Corbyn to step down over his handling of the antisemitism row. This has created the greatest challenge for the Labour leader since he took up the post. It has been further revealed that the Labour party has secretly suspended 50 of its members over anti-Semitic and racist comments as officials struggle to cope with the crisis engulfing the party.
There is growing pressure on the Labour leader ahead of the local elections on Thursday, in which his party is forecast to lose more than 100 seats. Senior figures are now so concerned about the row that they are openly discussing the possibility of an attempted coup following the EU referendum.
MPs are allegedly said to be plotting a coup to remove Mr Corbyn after the election if things go badly, with shadow chancellor John McDonnell poised to take over.
On Monday night Mr Corbyn appeared to acknowledge there was a problem for the first time, while insisting it was "not huge". He told the Daily Mirror: "What there is a very small number of people that have said things that they should not have done. We have therefore said they will be suspended and investigated."
On the other hand, Bradford West MP Naz Shah has been suspended by the Labour Party pending an investigation into anti-Semitic social media posts, including one on Facebook suggesting Israel should be moved to the United States.
Jeremy Corbyn told her that her comments were “offensive and unacceptable” but that he believed she no longer held such views.
Besides Naz, Labour has also suspended three other councillors on Monday, as the row over antisemitism threatened to inflict serious damage on the party. This includes names like Ilyas Aziz, a Nottingham Councillor, Salim Mulla, a councillor in Blackburn and Shah Hussain of Burnley council.
The high profile suspensions led Mr Corbyn to set up an independent quiry, to be overseen by Shami Chakrabarti, a former director of the human rights group Liberty.
Ms Naz, in a Commons statement, offered a “profound apology” for the posts, which were made before she became a Member of Parliament.
Apologising in the House of Commons, Ms Shah said: “Anti-Semitism is racism, full stop. As an MP I will do everything in my power to build relationships between Muslims, Jews and people of different faiths and none.”
According to SkyNews, another post made before Ms Shah was an MP used the hashtag #IsraelApartheid above a quote saying “Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal”.
Prime Minister David Cameron had called for her suspension. On last Wednesday afternoon the Labour Party confirmed she had been suspended.
With the London Mayoral election just around the corner, the Labour leader has also managed to offend Britain's Hindu and Indian community.
Sadiq Khan the Mayoral candidate had nominated Mr Corbyn as a Labour leadership candidate. Though Khan has tried to disassociate himself from Corbyn during his Mayoral campaign to win the moderate votes, Mr Corbyn's leadership has left behind a bitter after-taste among Britain's Hindu community.
The community and many of UK's 1.2mn Indians are great supporters of the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. During Mr Modi's historical visit, Corbyn's attitude could not be ignored- especially as it came to light that he had signed an Early Day Motion 479 in September 2013- asking to ban Modi from entering Britain ever, given his alleged role in the 2002 communal violence in India that claimed the lives of hundreds of Muslims, including British nationals. What Mr Corbyn missed to realise is that almost equal number of Hindus had died in the same riot, and the Supreme Court of India had found the Indian PM, 'not-guilty'.
A letter sent to the Labour party on behalf of Modi supporters by former Lib Dem Councillor Chuni Chavda writes, “Facts are now before Jeremy Corbyn and others. This is the time for Jeremy Corbyn to correct his mistake. He should disassociate himself from EDM 479, and publicly and unreservedly apologise to Narendra Modi. If he does not then one has to assume that Jeremy Corbyn is a practising racist, anti-Hindu and anti-India. And Indians and Hindus should consider their relationship with the Labour party. In this respect Indians and Hindus should take a lesson or two from the Jewish community following Naz Shah’s and Ken Livingstone’s recent episode.”
On the other hand, Zac Goldsmith (of Jewish descendants)- with vast wealth and place in the society has reportedly attacked Khan for his manifesto and family's association with alleged extremists. While he has tried to 'woo over' London's Indian population with a unique manifesto, it's ironical that he has pointed at Khan's faith over of his credibility, with Jemima Khan, the famous Pakistani politician Imran Khan's ex-wife and his sister as his confidant. It is well known that one of Imran and Jemima's teenage son is driving the youth campaign for Goldsmith's Mayoral election and it is believed Imran has also lent his expertise to win this election for his former brother-in-law.
