BRITISH ELECTIONS 2017 A Corbyn win would deeply worry many Jews, and chill UK ties with Israel

Most Jews made up their minds about Corbyn long before the campaign began.

A long-time critic of Israel and pro-Palestinian activist who has had an unfortunate knack of consorting with a motley crew of Holocaust deniers and anti-Semites, the Labour leader is, perhaps, most famous in Jewish circles for having described Hamas and Hezbollah as "friends."

Unfortunately for his party, new revelations during the campaign will simply have reinforced many of these perceptions. Earlier this week, the Labour leader was forced to deny that he participated in a wreath-laying in 2014 at the grave of one of those involved with the Munich massacre. But Corbyn's excuse — that he simply participated in a wider event marking Israel's 1985 bombing of the PLO headquarters in Tunis, itself a response to the murder of 15 Israeli civilians in Palestinian terror attacks — rather demonstrated why so many Jews distrust him.

That story was swiftly followed by the release of a 2010 interview in which Corbyn described Hamas as "serious, hard-working and… not corrupt."

TOI