Here’s a funny thing. An estimated (I tried to count, but they kept moving around) 70,000 people attended the march yesterday. Including Richard Tice, obviously, Michael Gove, for the Tories, and from the government… errrrr… well, unless you count one parliamentary researcher for a back bencher specialising in the environment, no-one. Which is a little disgraceful for a government who’s alleged mission was to ‘stop the antisemitism’, this could be seen as a pretty good way to strengthen that message. They were busy. All of them. Trying to shore up their party’s failing credibility. Not necessarily successfully, but there ya go.

Odder still was that there was absolutely no mention of the march on the BBC news last night. Not even a snippet on the London News. Nuffink. Didn’t happen. Not important. We should have sat around claiming allegiance to the IRA or North Korea, maybe smash a few windows or burn a couple of cars, otherwise the march was of no interest to ‘the nation’ whatsoever. The BBC is ‘impartial’ according to its charter and agreement with the government who allow it to enforce the ‘license’. So they’ll discuss Huw Edwards or Gary Lineker ‘impartially’ and in the third person, but 70,000 Jews banging on their own front door calling them shameful is not newsworthy or relevant. Even most of the daily newspapers carried scant or no mention.

We didn’t march for glory. We marched for fame. And money. And the wonderful photo opportunities it presented. Like today’s pic.

But before you get exited about how Reform might be our saviours, this was an interesting snippet from the recent poll on antisemitism:

Among party voters, 10% of Reform voters do not believe Jewish people are just as loyal to Britain as other British people, and 24% of them – almost a quarter – believe that Jewish people chase money more than other people do. These are higher figures than for voters of any other major party.

Thus the old tropes exist within a party which, for all Nigel Farage’s good-blokiness and for all Richard Tice’s undoubted charm, has its roots, and a lot of its followers, in the hard right of our political spectrum. Yes, they have a big ‘thing’ about Muslims, but they haven’t forgotten their ‘first love’. Not completely.

Kier Starmer has finally condescended to meet with the Israeli president this evening, after days of deliberation. According to a lot of his party, the art of diplomacy, of trying to achieve peaceful ends by talking to all sides, doesn’t apply to Israel. They’d willingly enter discourse with Hamas, but not with an Israeli!!! To even enter into a chat over coffee is unforgivable.

Happy Monday

A xxxx