Labour leader Corbyn photographed laying wreath for Munich terrorists
In another photo, Corbyn is seen close to the grave of terrorist Atef Bseiso, intelligence chief of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Bseiso is also linked to the massacre.
By JEREMY SHARON, JERUSALEM POST STAFFUpdated: AUGUST 16, 2018 12:59Corbyn on wreath laying for Munich terrorists, August 13, 2018 (Reuters)
Photographs emerged over the weekend of British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn holding a wreath in 2014 as he stands near the grave of terrorists who massacred 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics.The Labour leader was said to be attending a service to commemorate Palestinian “martyrs” at a cemetery in Tunisia, the British tabloid The Sun reported.Corbyn insisted he was at the service in 2014 to commemorate 47 Palestinians killed in a 1985 Israeli air strike on a Tunisian PLO base. But pictures show him standing a meter from the grave of Black September members, who perpetrated the Munich atrocity.In another photo, Corbyn is seen close to the grave of terrorist Atef Bseiso, intelligence chief of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Bseiso is also linked to the massacre.Corbyn confirmed his visit in the daily Morning Star, saying: “I was in Tunisia at a Palestinian conference. I laid a wreath to all those that had died in the air attack that took place on Tunis, on the headquarters of the Palestinian organizations there. And I was accompanied by very many other people who were at a conference searching for peace.”However, the Daily Mail claims that the monument commemorating those victims is in a different part of the cemetery from where Corbyn was photographed standing. The images, posted on the Facebook page of the Palestinian embassy in Tunisia, show him standing under a red canopy with a corrugated steel roof. According to the Mail, that structure runs beside the graves of Black September members and a plaque honoring their founder, Salah Khalaf, his key aide Fakhri al-Omari, and Hayel Abdel-Hamid, PLO chief of security.Jennifer Gerber, director of Labour Friends of Israel, told the Mail: “It beggars belief that anyone would wish to honor the terrorists behind the brutal massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at Munich. However, it is sadly utterly unsurprising that Jeremy Corbyn appears to have done so. Others will rightly regard it is as totally sickening.”Corbyn was engulfed by yet more accusations of antisemitism when a video emerged of a speech he gave in 2013 where he ostensibly compared Israel’s control of the West Bank to the Nazi occupation of Europe during World War II.“The West Bank [is] under occupation of the very sort that is recognizable by many people in Europe who suffered occupation during the Second World War, with the endless roadblocks, imprisonment, irrational behavior by the military and the police,” said the Labour leader in a speech at the Palestinian Return Center.The definition of antisemitism formulated by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, which has been accepted by the UK government and another 30 countries, includes “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.”
The Labour Party and Corbyn have been at the center of a protracted row over the party’s failure to address antisemitism within its ranks and its recent decision to adopt an abridged version of the IHRA definitions, specifically omitting the clause regarding comparing Israeli policy to the Nazis.Last week, a separate video of Corbyn emerged of an interview he did with Iranian propaganda channel Press TV seemingly questioning Israel’s right to exist through comments criticizing the BBC for what he said was bias in favor of Israel.“I think there is a bias towards saying that Israel is a democracy in the Middle East. Israel has a right to exist. Israel has its security concerns,” Corbyn said during the 2011 interview.