With a fast-expanding membership and electoral gains in sight, the Israel–Palestine debate is testing party unity
A Green party member for more than 30 years, Elise Benjamin admits to bittersweet feelings even as fellow activists anticipate a historic breakthrough in next week’s elections.
Benjamin was involved in drawing up the party’s guidance on antisemitism, which she describes as comprehensive. But the former Green councillor in Oxford now wonders whether further guidance is needed: “Now that we have such a large membership, I think there needs to be an urgent review of how to make our complaints process fit for purpose.”
On the brink of power in some councils, particularly in London, and with ambitions to eclipse Labour in the long term, the Greens have been wrestling for months with charges that antisemitism has taken root in their ranks.
The level of scrutiny of comments by candidates and activists has increased since Zack Polanski, who is Jewish, took over as leader of the Greens in England and Wales in September, with the party’s membership almost quadrupling since then. But this week, with the elections just days away, the stabbing of two Jewish men in Golders Green has brought the subject to new prominence.
