A left-wing British legislator has been suspended after arguing in a public letter that Jews cannot be victims of “racism”.
Diane Abbott was suspended as Labor’s whip on Sunday after widespread backlash.
She posted a press release on Twitter apologizing for her Sunday remarks and expressed her desire to “disassociate herself from them”.
Britain’s progressive Labor Party has long faced accusations of anti-Semitism, and its leaders quickly condemned Abbott’s words and removed her from the party leadership this weekend.
Abbott sent a letter to The Guardian responding to an article that questioned whether only people of color could experience racism.
Her response argued that while Jews and a few white people may experience “prejudice”, they don’t experience “racism”.
“They’re undoubtedly prejudiced,” she wrote of Jews and white people. “It’s just like racism, and the 2 words are sometimes used as in the event that they are interchangeable.”
“It’s true that many varieties of white individuals with different viewpoints, corresponding to redheads, can experience this bias. But they usually are not subjected to racism all their lives. In pre-civil rights America, Irish, Jews, and travelers did not have to take a seat behind the bus. Under apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the peak of slavery, there have been no white-looking people on slave ships,” she concluded her letter.
Abbott issued a press release on Sunday after a fast response, saying she would really like to apologize for “the remarks and any distress attributable to them.”
“I would like to completely and unreservedly retract my comments and disassociate myself from them,” Abbott wrote, blaming an early version of the published letter for the issue. “But there is no such thing as a excuse and I would like to apologize for any anguish I actually have caused.”
“Racism takes many forms, and it is totally undeniable that Jews have suffered its horrific effects, as have the Irish, Travelers and plenty of others,” she wrote.
Abbott’s suspension will last until an investigation into the matter is accomplished, a Labor Party spokesman told the BBC.