Francesca Albanese backs "Zionism is racism" policy by UK Green Party

"UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese has been condemned for supporting the Green Party's ‘antisemitic’ policy stating that ’Zionism is racism’.

Speaking to Israeli-British historian Avi Shlaim on Monday for a discussion event at St Antony’s College, Oxford, she commended Zack Polanski’s party for ‘doing something extremely human’ in adopting the policy.

Albanese, one of Israel’s most outspoken critics, said: ‘Frankly the Palestinians... have been the victims of Zionism for... years... if they [the Greens] want to say Zionism is racist, it is our responsibility to protect them.’

The Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories declared that Zionism was ‘racist’ but appeared to attempt to moderate her position, adding: ’I don’t think that it is completely fair to reduce Zionism to racism’...

In her discussion with Shlaim, Albanese added that she thought the Greens’ ‘Zionism is racism’ policy was ‘not the most strategic’ decision for the party because it will allow ‘the other side to amplify their movement’.

On the topic of rising Jew-hatred in the UK, Albanese said: ‘I do see the signs of antisemitism and... I see a manipulation of the response – an instrumentalisation of the antisemitism. ‘This is something that calls for immediate action.’...

Answering another question from the floor about the ban on the phrase ‘globalise the Intifada’, Albanese said it was ‘absurd’ and ‘a symptom of anti-Arab sentiment in most Western countries’.

As well as using her talk to condemn Israel for ‘destroying Palestine’, she said: ‘People need to overcome their trauma and look at what Israel is doing to Judaism once and for all, and then they will deal with their other issues, because I think there is deep-seated racism that was not born with Israel.

‘I think the anti-Arab sentiment is so deep and entrenched.’..."