Will Support for ‘Anti-Semitic’ UK Labour Party Harm Ocasio-Cortez’s Political Future?

Before Labour’s crushing defeat in the UK’s recent elections, the freshman congresswoman tweeted her support for party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who remains dogged by accusations of anti-Semitism.

By United with Israel Staff

Rep. Alexandrai Ocasio-Cortez was blasted on Thursday for tweeting that UK residents should vote for far-left Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn.

Corbyn, who referred to members of the Hamas terror group as “friends” and presided over a party deemed “institutionally anti-Semitic,” lost the election by a landslide to Conservative Party leader Boris Johnson.

Ocasio-Cortez shared a Labour Party video on her Twitter account that ended with, “Conservatives have been in power 10 years. We can’t survive another five.”

She wrote, “This video is about the UK, but it might as well have been produced about the United States. The hoarding of wealth by the few is coming at the cost of peoples’ lives. The only way we change is with a massive surge of *new* voters at the polls. UK, Vote!”

Following Ocasio-Cortez’s expression of support for Corbyn and Labour, Batya Ungar-Sargon, opinion editor for the Forward, tweeted, “For Jews who are worried about the Corbynization of the Democratic Party, Ocasio-Cortez officially endorsing Corbyn is going to look like confirmation of their worst fears.”

Foreign policy analyst Nile Gardiner tweeted, “Ocasio-Cortez backs far Left Marxist Jeremy Corbyn who hates America and Israel and has advanced an anti-Semitic agenda in the Labour Party. This says a lot about the liberal left in the US today.”

Israel’s Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein said about Johnson’s win that it was “a huge victory for Israel’s friend Boris Johnson in the UK. A glorious defeat to his anti-Semitic rival, Corbyn, and for Israel’s haters.”

Corbyn and Ocasio-Cortez have been building a relationship for some time. Following  Ocasio-Cortez’s swearing into office, both Ocasio-Cortez and Corbyn tweeted about the long conversation the two politicians shared.

Ocasio-Cortez posted on February 3, “It was an honor to share such a lovely and wide-reaching conversation with you, Jeremy Corbyn”

Corbyn wrote, “Great to speak to Ocasio-Cortez on the phone this evening and hear first hand how she’s challenging the status quo. Let’s build a movement across borders to take on the billionaires, polluters and migrant baiters, and support a happier, freer and cleaner planet.”

Recent poles showed that 87 percent of Jews living in the UK believed Corbyn was anti-Semitic, based on his statements about Jews, his connection with Palestinian terror group Hamas and his virulently anti-Israel positions.

Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis published an op-ed highlighting the “anxiety” felt by Jews in the UK about a potential Labour-dominated government, calling Corbyn’s  brand of politics “a new poison.” The UK’s Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby strongly backed the rabbi’s views following the article.

The next US election will reveal the true impact of Ocasio-Cortez’s support for Corbyn and a party plagued by anti-Semitism.