Starmer is always the wrong man at the wrong time

Since I last wrote, two Jewish men were stabbed in broad daylight. The news is sickening, another sign that the British Jewish community is now expected to accept fear as a fact of daily life. As David Frost has written in The Telegraph, “this has happened because we have let it happen”. The national terrorism threat level has now been raised to “severe” – indicating that the authorities believe an attack in Britain is “highly likely”. Telegraph Politics Annabel Deadman 01/05/26 In response to the stabbings, Starmer pledged more money for police patrols in Jewish areas and more barricades for synagogues, schools and community centres. There were the usual platitudes over tackling the “root causes”. By which you can be 100 per cent certain that he does not mean the presence in this country of thousands of people for whom hatred of Jews is quite literally a matter of faith.

The pattern is all too familiar; when West Midlands Police decided to ban Maccabi Tel Aviv fans from attending an Aston Villa game last October, the Prime Minister tweeted: “This is the wrong decision. We will not tolerate anti-Semitism on our streets.” As though he were not the head of the UK Government but rather a powerless bystander. This, perhaps, explains why he was heckled during a visit to Golders Green yesterday. Meeting leaders from the Shomrim security group and Hatzola, the Jewish medical charity whose ambulances were set on fire in an arson attack last month, Two-Tier was met by a group of protesters chanting “Keir Starmer, Jew Harmer”. It echoed the excruciating 19 seconds he spent laying flowers in Southport in July 2024, as members of the public shouted: “How many more children?” Moments like these crystallise a broader perception: that Starmer is always the wrong man at the wrong time. Nevertheless, others are managing worse. The backlash to Zack Polanski’s Golders Green response has forced the Green Party leader – who smears his opponents as “fascists”– into a quasi-apology. Polanski had nodded approval of a tweet criticising police officers for kicking a Tasered suspect following the terror attack – a move which was, at very best, staggeringly ill-judged and politically naive. Zack Polanski Zack Polanski shared a post on X criticising officers for kicking a Tasered suspect Let’s not forget that a number of Green Party candidates have been accused of anti-Semitism in the run-up to next week’s elections: one ludicrously claimed that 9/11 “was done by the Zionists with Dick Cheney as their executing authority”. Another once posted on Instagram a picture of the Earth entangled in a giant, fang-toothed serpent with the Star of David printed on its skin. The caption? “It’s time to cut the head off this snake.” Meanwhile, Mothin Ali, the party’s dodgy-seeming deputy leader, has encouraged some of the candidates suspended over allegations of anti-Semitism to take legal action – against the Greens. This murky stuff has wide resonance: this afternoon, Sharren Haskel, the deputy Israeli foreign minister, said Polanski was “endangering the Jewish community” through his party’s positions on anti-Semitism, pro-Gaza protests and the war in the Middle East. There will be many such slip-ups between now and the general election, each one energising a narrow core of Green support whilst potentially alienating the wider electorate. Those high polling figures will not last indefinitely. Questions remain over whether Shabana Mahmood could or should ban protests ahead of the anticipated clash between Nakba and Tommy Robinson demonstrations on May 16. The Home Secretary is currently awaiting the outcome of a review by Lord Ken Macdonald, the former director of public prosecutions, into whether granting police broader powers to ban protests is proportionate and necessary. Currently, decisions are made individually, according to the facts of each case. Starmer will want to look like he has a handle on this. The problem is, when he tried to be macho with Palestine Action (PA), it backfired. It wasn’t just that PA won the legal challenge, but that the victory will be considered by direct action headbangers from a variety of loony causes as tacit permission to push the boundaries of criminality even further. Starmer’s difficulties are mounting, despite his blatant attempt this afternoon to divert the flak onto Polanski (the PM posted a tweet describing his criticism of the police’s response as “disgraceful”). With just days to go before the local elections, it’s being reported that Streeting “has the numbers”. In the Commons, yes, but MPs don’t have the final say and haven’t since 1981. As for his main rival, the flame-haired frontrunner has not been advancing her reputation for calm, reflective leadership with her recent behaviour around Westminster. In other news, Tony Blair has called for the state pension to be abolished, warning it is “outdated, rigid and increasingly unaffordable”. Add to this his recent comments on net zero, which he described as “doomed to fail,” and you have to wonder where his head was whilst in office. His chancellor wrecked private pensions by abolishing advanced corporation tax relief, disincentivising people from saving for their own retirements.