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It's Time to End the Quiet Toleration of Hatred and Extremism

(Jewish News-UK) Damien Egan MP - There is a quiet toleration of hatred and extremism which has gone on for far too long. Two weeks ago, anti-Israel demonstrators in London carried photographs of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, with the words "Choose the right side of history." Others chanted: "We Stand with Iran." Put to one side the fact that "standing with Iran" willfully ignores the huge dangers - not just to Israel, but to the UK and our other regional allies - posed by Tehran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, as well as its support for international terrorism and proxy armies which have brought bloodshed and chaos across the Middle East. Instead, we should ask: why would anybody think - as the Islamic Human Rights Commission which printed the banners appears to believe - that Iran's ageing regime is "on the right side of history"? The Iranian regime has presided over the wholesale and violent suppression of the human rights of the people of Iran for decades. Khamenei's regime violently put down peaceful protests in 2009, 2019-20 and 2022-3. It executes hundreds of people each year. It treats women as second-class citizens; persecutes ethnic and religious minorities, refugees and migrants; and murders gay people. The ever-rising tide of extremism within the anti-Israel movement must be called out and confronted. In 2021, the Commission on Countering Extremism warned of a "gaping chasm in the law that allows hateful extremists to operate with impunity." A noisy and fanatical minority have been allowed to poison and dominate debate, and abuse and intimidate their opponents. It's time to put an end to our collective indifference to extremism. Enough is enough. The writer is a Labour member of the British Parliament for Bristol North East.
2025-07-06 00:00:00
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