Starmer Faces Gaza Labour Revolt - Exclusive Interview With Ex-Labour Rebels
The Owen Jones Podcast
Owen Jones
4.4 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 20 October 2023
⏱️ 15 minutes
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Summary
Keir Starmer's public support for war crimes - endorsing Israel cutting off water and energy from Gaza's civilian population - caused outrage. Across the country, Labour councillors and members have been resigning.
Two of the courageous councillors to resign - Cllr. Shaista Aziz (https://twitter.com/shaistaAziz) and Cllr Amna Abdullatif - speak to me about why they quit, what has to happen now - and what they've gone through.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Labour Party's support for war crimes being committed by Israel has caused a massive, |
| 0:05.4 | massive backlash, not just within broader society but within the Labour Party as well, |
| 0:10.2 | and a number of councillors have resigned across the country as well as other figures within |
| 0:15.6 | the Labour Party in protest at Labour's support for pretty hideous war crimes to say the least |
| 0:22.0 | now being committed with the support of the British Government, a state obviously heavily armed |
| 0:26.9 | by Britain and its allies, and I'm really honoured to be joined by two of those councillors, |
| 0:32.1 | Chester Aziz from Oxford, a councillor in Oxford, who I've worked with over the years, for example, |
| 0:38.0 | organising demonstrations against Donald Trump, and Amna Adelatef from my home city, sort of, |
| 0:44.6 | of Manchester. First say, welcome, quite a week for you both to say the least. Why did you resign, |
| 0:52.4 | Chester? Hi, Owen, thanks for having us on. So, I'll be honest with you, I had no choice, |
| 0:58.3 | there was no choice, there was an option of resigning, and that was it. I, someone who really believed |
| 1:05.9 | in the values of the Labour Party, I became a councillor in my home city, I was a great honour for |
| 1:10.6 | me to be representing my communities in the city that I grew up in, and then when I heard |
| 1:16.6 | Keir Starmer's horrific comments, irresponsible, provocative, and dehumanising comments about |
| 1:23.6 | Israel having the right to cut off electricity, water and gas, and food to the besieged population |
| 1:29.6 | of Gaza, I was stunned. I still gave myself another 24 hours to try and process that, and then the |
| 1:37.2 | same horror was repeated by Emily Thornbury on Newsnight, and that broke me further. In the meantime, |
| 1:43.8 | I, and along with another councillor in Oxford, talked to Owen Latif, we wrote to our local and |
| 1:50.3 | national representatives of the Labour Party here in our city to ask if they could confirm this |
| 1:56.0 | was the front bench line, because if it was, then we had a serious problem with it, and we received |
| 2:01.1 | nothing, only 48 hours. When Dr Owen Latif wrote back to say, my position now is untenable, |
| 2:08.1 | and I need to know, I need to hear from you, we've got a copy and paste response about Hamas. |
... |
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