Corbyn to respond to Herzog’s letter ‘very soon’ after criticism

Jeremy Corbyn’s office yesterday said they would respond to a letter from the leader of Israel’s Labor Party “very soon” after he was condemned by some MPs for failing to do so.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was attacked by his some of his own MPs again this week, after he failed to respond to a letter from his left-wing equivalent in Israel.

Opposition leader Isaac Herzog, who heads the Zionist Union group comprising Israel’s Labor Party, wrote to Corbyn last week saying he was “appalled and outraged” by reports of anti-Semitism in the UK’s Labour Party.

Herzog, who last month tried to join Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition government, also invited Corbyn to Jerusalem and Israel’s national Holocaust museum Yad Vashem, to which Corbyn is yet to respond.

Labour parliamentarians Wes Streeting and Ian Austin, who are both members of Labour Friends of Israel, expressed dismay at the lack of response.

“It should be a matter of common courtesy to reply to a letter from the leader of one of our sister parties, particularly on an issue as important as tackling anti-Semitism,” said Streeting. “But this is fairly typical of the flat-footed and lackadaisical attitude that we’ve seen from the outset. It is simply unacceptable.”