Is it 1939 in Britain yet?
Lord Janner in Parliament
Lord Granville Janner was President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, representing most British Jews for 6 years. He's the founder of the Commonwealth Jewish Council and Chairman of the Holocaust Educational Trust. In short he's the most prominent and senior openly Jewish politician in Britain whose Jewishness is a major part of his identity who has repeatedly spoken out on Jewish issues.
On the 27th Lord Janner got into an argument with Lord Brammall in one of the rooms adjoining the Lords chamber over Israel. Lord Brammall, who was the Chief of the Defense Staff during that heroic era in English history known as the Falklands War has never missed an opportunity to get in a rant about Israel, no matter what the topic might actually be.
To give you a sense of his style, on January 16th 2003, when the topic was Reform of the Palestinian Authority, Lord Brammal in the predictable style of terrorist advocates made this convoluted remark linking the War in Iraq to making the West Bank and Gaza Judenrein.
"My Lords, will the Minister go further? Does she agree that any invasion of Iraq that has not meanwhile ensured a withdrawal of those illegal settlements, or at least meaningful negotiations towards it, risks incurring intense odium throughout the Middle East, which could invalidate any benefit that military action may bring?"
When the topic was the terrorists killing Jews, Bramall returned to his same old bugbear claiming that Israel could stop the terrorists by making Gaza and the West Bank Judenrein again and by extension that it was Israel's fault that Israelis were being killed for not making concessions.
"My Lords very briefly, does the Minister agree that the only way to stop these appalling suicide bombers is for the Israeli Government to say that if the bombers do stop, they will start to dismantle the illegal settlements in Palestine? That will give the Palestinians some hope instead of absolutely none."
On that day however Lord Bramall went beyond more rhetoric as the argument escalated physically striking Lord Janner. British newspapers reported the story as 'War Hero Hits Fellow Peer in Lords' a headline which begins by praising the perpetrator. It's no surprise then that in the Lords whose members pride themselves on addressing each other as "My Noble Lord" no disciplinary action whatsoever was taken against Lord Bramall, anymore than George Galloway or the Mayor of London were ever held accountable for their noxious anti-Semitic behavior.
Is it 1939 in Britain yet?