There's been some reaction to my blog about the three directors of Labour Against Antisemitism. I respond!

Very nearly everyone has been helpful and supportive. One comment caught my eye. Essentially, it casts doubt on my main argument, which was that the attacks on me are political. 

Here's my original blog:

https://michaelrosenblog.blogspot.com/2025/08/two-facebook-articles-adapted-talking.html

So, in case I haven't proved the point, I'll tell this bit of the story. 

When I received my first 'letter before action' in the libel case brought by one of the directors of Labour Against Antisemitism,  identified me as a Corbyn supporter. 

This is at best a bit bizarre. It immediately signalled the political motive for suing me. Put it this way, a Claimant's best tack in their first letter before action is to be surgical about what they think that the person who they're suing (the 'Defendant') has done that is libellous and damaging. Ideally, a Claimant doesn't usually want to give away anything that might reveal any motive for suing other than there is a factual libel and 'serious harm' done as a result - something along the lines of:  'You said x, it was not true, my client has suffered loss of reputation. And here's the evidence for why we think this.'

Taking a sideswipe at what they might think of the person they're suing, is probably not a great move. Of interest to me, though here is that an allusion to me being  a supporter of Corbyn, it shouts out, 'We're doing this for political reasons, it's your politics that we dislike.'

OK, that's the letter before action. Now for the Particulars of Claim. This is the document a Claimant sends that details exactly what they're suing you for. It also signals that they're serious about taking this whole thing to court. It arrived some 7 months or so after that first 'letter before action'. 

You might think that after 7 months or so of what I'll call pointless correspondence, the people assembling this claim would have weeded out this giveaway of their motive for suing. You might think that the Particulars of Claim would be the surgical, analytic document that would deliver the telling blow. Anything to do with me being a supporter of Corbyn would surely have been junked? Not so. Right up the top of the PoC was a comment about me being an  'active supporter of Jeremy Corbyn'. 

Once again, the Claimant's team flagged up the Claimant's political motive. It certainly didn't help or progress the Claim. I'll say it again: the crucial thing to show in a Claim is that the person you're suing (the Defendant) has made a statement of fact that is untrue and that it has harmed the Claimant (the person suing). 

Later in this Particulars of Claim, there is a possible explanation as to why the Claim included that comment ('active supporter of Jeremy Corbyn'). The Claim goes in for a curious bit of mind-reading in which it tries to show that the reason why I had really objected to the 'Bear Hunt tweet' was because of what I thought of Corbyn. Here's what it says: 'The Defendant was angry that a book that he [that's me] had authored formed part of cartoon that ridiculed Jeremy Corbyn.'  

Again, it really isn't necessary for a Claimant to go in for mind-reading and indeed, by doing it, they revealed their motive for suing the Defendant (me). Apart from anything else, this bit of mind-reading is way off the mark. As I explained in the previous blog, what I was 'angry' about (and always said in public that I was angry about) was that sitting on the open pages of a book I had co-created, were the words 'The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion'. I was angry AND disgusted!  I'm not even sure it's the business of the Claimant to waste time and space discussing my motive for being 'angry', but if the Claimant does it, it's a good idea to a) get it right and, b) not reveal your real motive for bringing the Claim in the first place!

So there we are: we have the Corbyn supporter in the letter before claim; we have this stuff about me being an 'active supporter of Jeremy Corbyn'; and, thirdly,  a false and political comment about what had made me 'angry'. (Incidentally, in an earlier libel case brought against me in which the client was represented by the same solicitor, I was identified as a 'Corbynista'.) 

I don't think it's terribly controversial (is it?) for me to have the view that this episode might be an example of the law being used for political purposes. That's my honest opinion, not a statement of fact. Perhaps as you read this, you thought it's no such thing? If so, I'd be interested to know how you came to that different opinion. 

Here's the link to my original blog again:

https://michaelrosenblog.blogspot.com/2025/08/two-facebook-articles-adapted-talking.html

  

Poem or song about Gaza that I've just posted on X and Facebook

 

( I hear it in the style of early Bob Dylan/bluegrass style/guitar and banjo and/or fiddle, with Dylan-like emphasis long vowels.

Anyone wanna write it? Play it? Record it?

If not I'll record it on my phone with me reading it, in a minute!)

1/

What have you learned

from the diplomatic chatter?

I've learned the lesson

'Palestinians don't matter.'

CHORUS: (to be repeated between verses

as and when it's most effective)

What is it we ever learn?

Our leaders think

they can bomb

and burn.

2/

What have you learned

what the world can give?

I've learned Palestinians

don't deserve to live.

3/

What have you learned

of our leaders' sorrow?

They'll do what it takes

but not till tomorrow.

4/

What have you learned

of the rules that apply?

Our leaders never stop

the arms supply.

5/

What have you learned

of the genocide?

A genocide

is easily denied.

6/

What have you learned

of the land of Gaza?

There are plans in hand

for the Gaza Plaza.

7/

What have you learned

for you and me?

It was them that want

the River to the Sea.

8/

What have you learned

about what we can do?

It always comes down

to me and you.

The story of how 3 directors of Labour Against Antisemitism - and friends - have dealt with someone they object to (me) (adapted from Facebook posts)

 Facebook post one

Just to say that I have told my MP that following a post on X by the celebrated journalist Nicole Lampert, complaining that someone had graffiti'd the road surface with a pro-Palestinian slogan, the great Zionist Jonathan Glass, made a gag suggesting that I could have done it (fair enough) but then pointed out that the photo was of my road.

The reason why I have notified my MP about this is because the great Zionist Jonathan Glass and the celebrated journalist Nicole Lampert have previous on this. Nicole for example has drawn attention to the fact that I live near her (presumably this is of huge interest to Zionists. Is there a sub-text to do with the fact that neither of us live in Israel? Perhaps not. )And Nicole, I've been told, 'liked' a tweet which said (hysterically funny this one) that if I had been around in Amsterdam during the Second World War, I would have betrayed Anne Frank and her family. Nicole, as I say, is a celebrated journalist.)

Jonathan deserves to be more famous than he is but maybe his day will come now that Netanyahu is taking over Gaza. (That was a big surprise, wasn't it?). Jonathan started noticing me some years ago and made it part of his job to identify where I live (with my family), alleged that our house was largely empty, that he could pop round with some chicken soup (not at all threatening), and that when he saw me in the street, he 'booed' (grrrrrr!!!) and that if his wife hadn't been with him, he didn't know what he would have done. Are there awards for Zionists who say this sort of thing about anti-Zionists? Let's hope so.

Jonathan received a cease and desist letter from my lawyer, which he took as a bit of comedy and indicated that he wouldn't and couldn't hurt a fly. At the time, as my health had turned me into something less powerful than a fly, this wasn't very reassuring. Nevertheless, good Jonathan carried on, regularly talking about our house, and even suggested that when I was going to do a signing at the Muswell Hill Children's Bookshop ('children's', note) he could leaflet the signing. What with? Why? The good news from Israel, presumably?

So there are various ways of fighting for ones' beliefs. Good Jonathan has decided that one way is to keep up a stream of gags (?) about where I live and how he could get to know me better, as it were.

Let's see what my MP makes of it.

Facebook post 2 - slightly adapted

In my last post, I outlined the behaviour of the wise and talented Jonathan Glass with a cameo appearance from the celebrated journalist Nicole Lampert. What I failed to do was provide some context. Can I refer you to Labour Against Antisemitism (LAAS)?

Though I have never been in the Labour Party, my support for Jeremy Corbyn was good enough for LAAS to identify me as a danger to Jews. Several directors of LAAS got to work. One was appalled that I was on Radio 4 and urged the BBC to no platform the 'antisemitism-denier' and 'racist', Michael Rosen. That tweet seemed to me (my honest opinion) to be approved of by Mr Myerson KC (then QC) in his tweet saying that he thought I 'should be placed outside these conversations' [on the radio] on account of my political views (which he got slightly wrong.) Then up popped the great Jonathan Glass, also an LAAS director with the activity I’ve outlined in the previous post. Then this was followed up with a third LAAS director Pete Newbon, posting a photoshopped pic of Corbyn reading ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’ to some children, with the book changed to show it as if Corbyn was reading ‘The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion’ - a document that was legendarily horrific in my home when I was growing up, for being at the heart and origins of Nazism, so much so that Hitler mentions it in 'Mein Kampf'. I was disgusted and horrified to see it on the book that Helen Oxenbury and I created with Walker Books.

Accompanying this image was a version of some of the words from the book. I have discovered through Subject Access Request (a bit like FOI) and in the legal Claim made against me that the new words in the 'Bear Hunt tweet' was what Newbon himself described as a ‘parody’ a ‘pastiche’ a ‘corruption’ of my words but, more importantly that he said he had ‘echoed’ my words on account of the use I had made of my parody - namely for ‘political purposes’. In other words, I had once made a parody of my own words in support of Corbyn. Newbon objected politically to this. In other words, I was part of the target of the 'Bear Hunt tweet' as I call it. I'm saying this because 100s of people have claimed that I was not targeted in the tweet. Repeat: Mr Newbon makes clear in these documents that I was a target.

There are also screeds of stuff explaining (in this SAR document) what is wrong with my politics. In other words, the motive for doing the 'Bear Hunt tweet' is explained, and described. Rather absurdly, Mr Newbon thought that he could explain to a university hearing that he hadn't attacked Rosen but to do so, he needed to...er...attack Rosen - and attack Rosen at great length with what seems to have been a many-clause tirade aided by Professor David Hirsh. They both seemed to have missed the point that the hearing was over a breach in the university's social media policy but they thought that the best way to defend against that accusation was to repeat and enlarge an attack on me. Surprise: it failed. It failed because Mr Newbon was indeed in breach of the university's social media policy - for the third time, actually. The university had tried very nicely to tell him to stop tweeting stuff that was in ..er.. breach of the social media policy twice before. Of course, all he needed to have done is take the university's name off his profile, and then he wouldn't have been in breach. The huge punishment he got from the university, that Prof Hirsh has complained about was that Mr Newbon should just stop from being in...er...breach of the university's social media policy for one year. Obvs equivalent to a lifetime in the Scrubs, I'd say.

So, to sum this up: Prof Hirsh tried to help someone 'prove' that he wasn't attacking me, by helping to produce (so he says) ...er...many paragraphs that were...er...attacking me. In fact, this actually and surprisingly proved to be...er.... ineffectual.

Professor David Hirsh and I are colleagues at Goldsmiths University of London and Professor Hirsh is the CEO of the London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism. He has written two articles in honour of Mr Newbon in which several paragraphs describe what is wrong with my politics and how I 'mobilise my Jewishness' for what he thinks are wrong or even antisemitic reasons. In my view this is just a recycled version of the 'wrong kind of Jew' thesis, or the 'good Jew-bad Jew' thesis in which Professor Hirsh, Mr Newbon, LAAS are the good Jews and Rosen and some others (who are generally dismissed as 'cranks' or 'AsAJews' ) are the bad Jews. Prof Hirsh has also platformed a Rabbi on YouTube who, my lawyer tells me, implies in her lovely talk that I'm in part responsible for ('contributed to..') the death of Mr Newbon. I thought Rabbis didn't write that sort of thing and that they thought carefully about what the Samaritans say about such matters. I have written to the good Rabbi. She hasn't answered yet.

Mr Myerson KC has also written that my use of a children's book 'led to' 'tragedy'. Not 'caused', note, 'led to'. Well, the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs 'led to' me getting Covid. Everything is linked to everything else. The good Mr Myerson was of course not making any kind of allegation in that tweet and I admire him hugely.

(This is all for context.)

This brings us to the heart of the matter: this jolly, laughter-full stuff is political, channelled through the personal, to do with me being on the radio talking about language, living in a house (how dare I ?!) , doing children’s book signings and events - one of LAAS’s former consultants turned up to two of these children's events and heckled me or picketed me or both )- and with writing ‘Bear Hunt’ etc etc. [see link at bottom of this page to an earlier blog I did on the charade that has gone on about people accusing me of not being honest in how 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt' came to be written!]

What happened next is a long story involving me being sued, even as the person suing me was being sued himself for having libelled and endangered someone on account of that accusation about being a 'freak'. Also part of the activity of a director of LAAS, it would seem! Apparently it was OK to suggest (for political reasons!) that someone was a 'freak' and was inappropriately interested in children! Note, that case was won by the person described as a 'freak'. Interestingly, though the case received a lot of publicity in the lead-up, but when it was over, no press covered it. It's almost as if those on the LAAS side of things get good publicity when they're accusing but when they lost this one, no one was interested. Why? I don't know.

The person doing the suing and being sued took his own life. This was a tragedy for all concerned. Many folks who support LAAS leapt into action, ignored Samaritans' guidelines on such matters (as did the good Rabbi platformed by Professor Hirsh, as related above) , and said that the death was either ‘caused’ by me or by the person who was libelled and endangered, or that we 'contributed to' this tragedy.

Please note: the inquest said no such thing, so every comment that claims that Wilson or I were a 'cause' or even implying we are a 'cause' or partly a cause is telling a lie and it's defamatory, so my lawyer tells me. That's why people who say this kind of stuff on social media now, nearly always do it anonymously or from a foreign country! Neat. Safe.

Once again, the personal was used to further the political. People who claim to have high motives and high ideals seem to have no qualms about claiming that they know the nature of people’s personal lives to such a detailed extent that they can say that x caused y. But of course they don’t. And their story has been fatally undermined by facts that I won’t go into now because…they are personal (not mine, I hasten to add!), though they have been posted on social media and are in the public domain. And - but of course again - that’s not why they’re doing it! The purpose of pointing the finger of blame is political and that purpose was at one point to do anything to kick away the pillars of support for Corbyn, and right now to defend Israel’s genocide and land grab. It goes on.

PS. I'll leave you to imagine how much it cost me to defend an 'action' (being sued) over a 7 month period of pointless letters from the suers, which avoided the crucial matter that the person suing me had a) written an apology for having made the 'Bear Hunt tweet' and secondly b) aborted the mediation.

I'll also leave you to speculate what a court would likely make of someone suing another over a document (tweet) that they had already apologised for! The letter of apology would have come to the court for all to see. Also indeed, that the suer had aborted mediation! For reference, courts don't like it if someone sues, having walked away from mediation. (I had accepted that that person walked away, but they chose to sue instead.)

You might also want to have a think about who advised Mr Newbon to withdraw his apology (which would have ended the whole matter, as I made clear in mediation), and who followed that up with the idea of suing me? Why would someone do those things? What was the purpose of them? I'm going to suggest that the reason was political - that is, the priority at the time for LAAS directors was to harass (as with Jonathan Glass), shackle (as with the tweet trying to get me taken off the BBC) and to defeat people (as with suing me) who supported Corbyn.

But perhaps the intention never was for the case to come to court? Perhaps the intention was for me to give in and pay out? And it was only when we asked for 'evidence' for some of the claims made in the legal claim that it became clear that a) we were prepared to go to trial and b) that all the documents would reveal the apology, the aborted mediation, the political intention and motive for the Bear Hunt Tweet, the previous history of disciplinary action taken by the university, AND of course the 'freak' case which at that time was secret and was not a good case if what you have to go to court for is to defend your reputation! Not good for your reputation with it coming up in a trial that you said that someone had an inappropriate interest in children and that this was a lie. These would all have come to light in a trial. I only mention this because both the great Jonathan Glass and the expert on antisemitism Professor David Hirsh have both claimed that Mr Newbon would have won the case against me.

If we want to talk legal stuff, I'm happy to do it. After all, the legal was, it seems, being used for the political, was it not? Is it OK to use the legal system for political reasons? I dunno. But it looks at least a bit as if it's OK. Apparently.

And I haven't even begun to talk about the potential cost it would have been like for Mr Newbon to go to court twice, or lose twice or to imagine you might lose twice. Did he realise what this cost would be? Had he been told by his legal team? Had he shared the fact that he was involved in two cases with anyone, other than his legal team? If not, why would he be keeping it secret? What damage did he think might occur if people other than his legal team would know about these two cases? When my case first hit the press, there was no mention of the two cases running at the same time. Why not?

Just to cut this bit short: to take part in cases that you lose, costs 100s of thousands of pounds , even if your solicitor is acting on a 'no win no fee' basis or something similar. Hundreds of thousands of pounds! Even if you win, you can still come out of a case seriously out of pocket. Remember, one of those cases was a loser for Mr Newbon - the one about someone being a 'freak'. So that was a director of LAAS losing that one. I think I've given enough facts here to show that my case would have been a loser for that same director of LAAS too. And, what's more, we might have 'cross-claimed'! Namely that I was libelled in the first place. We might also have defended on the basis of what's called 'reply to attack'. But hey, all this legal stuff directed at me was in a good cause, apparently. The LAAS cause. It was, as I very boringly keep saying, political not personal.

[Here's the link to the side-story of how people tried to 'reveal the truth' (lols) about the 'true' origins of 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt' - also in the service of this great cause....(er...what cause?)

https://michaelrosenblog.blogspot.com/2024/04/the-true-story-of-making-of-book-of.html

Secret release of Starmer's speech later today

Good evening.
Believe it or not, I am your prime minister.
Israel. Yes. Israel.
Today, we've been hit by what can only be called a bombshell. Hah! Let's hope that wasn't said in bad taste.
However, let me proceed.
My friend and our ally, Benjamin Netanyahu who has striven (or is it 'strove?) more than anyone to build a just and fair place for all in Israel and...er....the other places that are...[checks notes] not, or...er...anyway, generally to do with Israel.
However - and this is a big however, as my Jewish teacher used to say because in a way I've always been Jewish. I do Friday nights, you know?
However, as I was saying, however, Bibi (as I like to call the old chap), has gone one step too far this time. Even some of my best friends are Jewish. I mean even some of my Jewish friends say that Bibi has gone too far this time.
They're saying 'How can we stick up for Israel if Israel is killing some children?'
'Not many, surely?' I say,
But even my best friends - who are Jewish - say that it's more than some.
So we've reached a cross roads. The time has come for me to say to my very good friend and ally Bibi, 'C'mon old Bibi, chum, ease up on Gaza.'
So David Lammy and I are going to go to the UN and make a speech as forceful as this one.
When it comes to a time when there will be peace and prosperity in Gaza and everyone can holiday there in peace and prosperity, the world will remember how David and I singlehandedly together (have I got that right?) saved the Middle East from Islamacist Jihadist Isis-ist, Daeshist, Hamas-ist, Palestine Actionist terrorist groups.
People will know how resolute we have been in ensuring that our RAF planes only took photos of waves breaking on the beautiful beach of Gaza. Vote Labour, good night.