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.
So, in case I haven't proved the point, I'll tell this bit of the story.
'Corbyn supporter', 'Corbynista'
When I received my first 'letter before action' in the libel case brought by one of the directors of Labour Against Antisemitism (Pete Newbon), it identified me as a Corbyn supporter. This was in the letter.
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 of that libel - something along the lines of: 'You said x, it was not true, my client has suffered loss of reputation as a result. 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 as it might alert a judge to a dubious motive. Of interest to me though here is that there is 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'.
(Note: when people leap to blaming me for what tragically happened in this case (in other words, claiming that I am a cause or the cause of Dr Newbon's death, they always leave out this time lapse. A lot of things can happen - and most certainly did - in 7 months - most obviously the case Pete Newbon was keeping secret from his family and the press was ratcheting up in seriousness. Why do they leave this time gap out of their comments? Because they want to suggest that there were hundreds of antagonistic comments on Twitter and Dr Newbon took his life immediately after. Clearly, they think that if they mention the 7 month gap, it's harder to make it look as if the antagonistic comments 'caused' someone to take their own life. I believe this way of commenting to be dishonest and malicious. )
Back with the Particulars of Claim: you might think that after 7 months or so of what I'll call pointless correspondence between Pete Newbon and me, the people assembling this claim would have weeded out this giveaway of their motive for suing - that is their dislike of my politics.
Digression
[Please also note that it wasn't me prolonging what I'll call the 'Bear Hunt Tweet Affair'. If, as some have suggested, that the flak from Mr Newbon's Bear Hunt Tweet was difficult for him, then you might ask, 'Why prolong the difficulty? Why introduce the stress, time and expense of litigation (legal correspondence) when the whole thing had been on the verge of being solved with mediation? And why keep the whole thing secret from the person or people who would be directly affected by the loss of a huge sum of money? Why lie that you had dropped the case? And what kind of stress might it be that having lied about all this, you realised that the case was going to trial, also that this would entail huge expense and yet more: having to confess that you hadn't dropped the case?']
To return to the matter of the politics of these legal documents ('Corbyn supporter', 'Corbynista'):
You might think that the Particulars of Claim (PoC) would be the surgical, analytical 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 at the top of the PoC was a comment about me being an 'active supporter of Jeremy Corbyn'.
Once again, the Claimant's team (Pete Newbon and his solicitor) are flagging up here 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 (ie 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'). This is how: the Claim goes in for a curious bit of mind-reading in which it claims 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 [me] was angry that a book that he [me] had authored formed part of a 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 here, 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 above, 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 that 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!
My view of Corbyn in relation to this case of the Bear Hunt tweet
By the way, and for the record, my view of Corbyn at that particular moment was that if he thought he was unfairly attacked in the Bear Hunt tweet, he could look after himself. My concern - call it egotistical, if you like - was to look after me! So, to repeat: this comment about my motive got me completely wrong and in so doing, said more about the Claimant and his lawyer than it did about me, namely that they were extremely interested in Corbyn and Corbyn's supporters. So much so, they damaged their own case. It gave away a motive that was nothing to do with the precise legal matter in hand: defamation and loss of reputation.
So there we are:
we have me as 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'.) It all reveals a pattern, doesn't it?
I don't think it's terribly controversial (or is it?) for me to have the view that this episode might be an example of the law being used for political purposes.
And tragically, this whole matter (and its overlap with the disastrous 'freak' case) was secret and stressful for Mr Newbon.
I might also suggest that the politics (and/or his political friends, representatives and advisers) assisted him into making decisions that led him into self-inflicted difficulty. 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 again to the side-story of how people have 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?). In short, it's an ignorant and silly smear. Just paste this link into your browser.
https://michaelrosenblog.blogspot.com/2024/04/the-true-story-of-making-of-book-of.html ]
Added final thought
When I look at this whole story and I think across what are two serious legal cases - mine and the 'freak' case - I see some people using the law to pursue political ends. I see some people urging others on to do this. I see some people seriously damaged by the process. I see some people pointing the finger at me and the person accused of being a 'freak' as being the cause of the damage.
But again, when I look at this whole story, I ask myself, why did people try to use the law, why did people advise Pete Newbon to sue me, why did people advise Pete Newbon and the other two defendants in the 'freak' case to go on and on defending what was an impossible case?
The point is, neither of these courses of action were necessary or sensible. Both the claimant in the 'freak' case and I were more than willing to settle these matters through mediation or reasonable correspondence between solicitors.
Perhaps one day, it will be become known exactly who advised what to whom, when and why.
Before then, my view is simple: in both cases, the claim against me and the defence in the 'freak' case were disastrous courses of action. I think I've provided enough evidence above to be able to claim that central to these matters in my case was that I was deemed to be a 'Corbynista' (their words not mine) and so pursuing legal action against me (or pursuing a disastrous defence) was a means to an end (with the ends justifying the means) for a bigger, political matter.
I believe that when people do that sort of thing, the personal lives of individuals start to matter less than the 'project' and so people get damaged under the wheels of the ongoing juggernaut (or if you prefer, 'thrown under the bus')
Postscript 1 (July 13 2026)
[I suspect there'll be more}
Someone by the handle of 'TJAllon1' and 'Tim' has taken up the mantle and written tweets like these (July 13 2026)
1 A creature who campaigned to get a Jewish man (who subsequently killed himself) fired for antisemitism, for using a photoshopped image of Corbyn reading "Bear Hunt", adapted to "Jew Hunt". Rosen is a malevolently, viciously bad-faith actor, esp. wrt antisemitism.
2 Rosen copied in Pete Newbon's employer, which subsequently received thousands of complaints. Corbyn himself got involved. Rosen later claimed not to know Pete was Jewish despite it being evident from his Twitter profile.
3 His allegation that an accusation of antisemitism against Corbyn was an antisemitic attack on himself was an absurd and bad-faith inversion and as untrue as his denial that he intended the disciplinary process he initiated.
That is what happened, and Rosen knows it.
I'll deal with some of these tweets.
'creature' is me, apparently, and is of course just dehumanising abuse.
Notice that Pete Newbon is described as 'Jewish' but I am not (see above for that pattern being repeated.)
'subsequently killed himself' - using the word 'subsequently' is the disengenuous way of saying that something I did was a cause but doesn't actually say so.
'claimed not to know Pete was Jewish' - indeed, I had no idea, that Pete was (or claimed to be/self-identified as) Jewish. (I repeat from above: his lineage was one Jewish paternal grandmother and no observance, no participation in Jewish activities apart from being active in campaigns against antisemitism. I repeat from above, I don't make a fuss about these things, but people who accuse leftist Jews of not being Jewish enough, often do.)
'claimed not to know Pete was Jewish despite it being evident from his Twitter profile'
On Pete Newbon's profile at the moment (June 16 2026) there's a Star of David. I believe that when the Bear Hunt tweet was published on Twitter on May 19 2021, there was no Star of David on Pete Newbon's profile. I have no recollection of seeing it there. No one that I know of mentioned it at the time and that includes Pete Newbon's legal team. I claimed at the time that I didn't know that Pete Newbon was Jewish. I still claim that. And as far as defining Jewish is concerned, I would express it as saying that he self-identified as Jewish. In lineage terms, he was as Jewish as the American actor Helen Hunt or Bob Geldof
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Hunt).
Pete Newbon expressed his Jewishness (or lack of it) here:
https://www.thejc.com/family-and-education/lets-be-fair-to-fathers-gz0mpqct
'copied in Pete Newbon's employer' - yes, I did. His employer (ie his university) was on his profile. I've explained above, that I approached the university in order to precipitate action for eg mediation. I explained several times at the time that I didn't ever seek to have Pete Newbon sacked. This was acknowledged in the 'Jewish Chronicle' at the time. As for mediation, that is exactly what happened. I don't believe that this would have happened, had I approached the university privately. I am acutely aware right now (on account of issues with my own university) how universities can sideline and delay dealing with awkward stuff.
As part of this very welcome mediation process, Pete Newbon wrote an apology, but then withdrew it, and then sued me, a process taking some 7 months. The word 'subsequently' leaves out this sequence of actions and that's why it is both disingenuous and false.
'His allegation that an accusation of antisemitism against Corbyn was an attack against himself...'
I've shown above that Pete Newbon made clear in his hearings with Northumbria University and in the Particulars of Claim issued against me that the Bear Hunt tweet was an attack on me (as well as on Corbyn). This is because Pete Newbon used the words 'parody', 'pastiche' and 'corruption' in regards of the words from 'Bear Hunt' and then, more significantly, that he, in his own words, 'echoed' the use that I had made of the words from 'Bear Hunt' for 'political purposes'. In other words, Pete Newbon thought he was writing a parody of my parody and therefore the Bear Hunt tweet was, in part, directed at me.
As to whether it was 'antisemitic' of him to have done so, that's a matter of opinion. Pete Newbon knew I was Jewish, regarded me as the wrong kind of Jew - and explained at great length in his university hearing why and how I was the wrong kind of Jew. Therefore appending 'The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion' to a book I co-created in a tweet, in part, directed at me, does indeed still strike me as being 'an antisemitic thing to do', bearing in mind that 'The Protocols' was one of the most antisemitic documents ever produced.
'disciplinary process he [me] initiated' - this is untrue. Pete Newbon had already been brought before the university's disciplinary processes at least twice before. It's possible that one of these was on account of tweeting at someone that he was a 'freak who takes photos of kids'. (This resulted in Pete Newbon being sued, along with two others. The person doing the suing (the 'Claimant') won. Pete Newbon died before that case was resolved but the issue remained the same in court, ie the tweet was defamatory and the Claimant won damages and costs. )
Again, when TJAllon used the word 'subsequently', they've overlooked this serious sequence of events too.
Pete Newbon's Bear Hunt tweet attracted a lot of attention before it was brought to my notice. A lot of people wrote to the university before I knew about it. Given that the university had objected to Pete Newbon's social media activity twice before (at the level of 'hearings'), then this amount of push-back and publicity would have been quite enough for this to have caused the university to 'initiate' a process ie before I got involved myself. It is untrue to say that I 'initiated' the 'disciplinary process' - not that I would have had the power to do so, if I had wanted to. That was the choice that the university made, especially given that they had called Pete Newbon to hearings twice before anyway. In other words, unbeknownst to me, they were monitoring his social media output.
Postscript 2 (July 26/27 2026)
Someone by the handle 'Steve Nage' ( a pseudonym according to their profile) claimed that I'm 'always trying to start a pile-on, with tragic outcome in one famous case.'
(July 26 or 27 2026 on X)
I've long known that one method of doing social media battle is to say of oneself that all one is trying to do is get a message across (eg through having more than a 100k followers, or through reposting tweets, or through posting the same message on multiple platforms etc), while some other person (in this case 'Steve Nage' is referring to me) is 'trying to start a pile-on'.
[The matter at hand was that someone with 141k followers, who 'Steve Nage' was replying to, had alleged that 80 MPs and peers, including the Kindertransport survivor Lord Alf Dubs were 'antisemites'. I was contesting that description of Alf Dubs.]
But then 'Steve Nage' goes on to make a half-concealed allegation that there was a 'tragic outcome in one famous case'.
I'll simply note that of course 'Steve Nage' is anonymous. I ask the question, would 'Steve Nage' make such an allegation, in writing and signed with a traceable name?
If the allegation is referring to what was indeed the tragic end of Pete Newbon's life, then I can also say that there is no evidence from the Inquest that implicates or refers to me. I would suggest therefore, that legally speaking, what 'Steve Nage' is saying is probably/possibly defamatory.
I would refer 'Steve Nage' to Professor David Hirsh's measured and thoughtful comment that the causes of suicide are 'multiple, complex and unknowable'. Alternatively, there is advice on the Samaritans' website concerning media approaches to such events.
Again, as I've said above: very few of us are experts in trauma and making anonymous allegations about supposed, simple cause and effect relations ('A caused B') in such complex matters is ill-advised.
What of Labour Against Antisemitism now (August 2026)?
At Company House, LAAS is listed as having four directors, Emma Feltham, Jonathan Simon Glass, Alexander Hearn, Denny Anthony Taylor.
If you've read everything that comes before, you'll be familiar with Jonathan Glass. On July 31, 2026, an anonymous X account under the name of 'nadsat11' reported Jonathan Glass as posting a message on Facebook as follows: 'We need to go on the attack. And I really mean on the attack. Physically. Disruptively. Do to them what they've done to us. Make them feel fear. '
According to 'nadsat11', this was a Facebook post in reponse to some Hackney councillors' stated intention to de-twin Hackney from Haifa, Israel, so I'm not clear what Mr Glass meant by 'what they've done to us.'
That comment by Mr Glass seems to me to be not entirely peaceful in intent. It seems to me to be suggesting to another, that it's time to get violent and hurt people. I may be wrong and maybe it's another of Mr Glass's jolly jokes. If it is meant seriously, then surely some of Mr Glass's co-directors would want to detach themselves from these comments? Surely they wouldn't want their entirely respectable organisation tainted with such comments? Director Alexander Hearn (usually called Alex) presents himself on radio and TV as an entirely respectable and reasonable person. Quite right. So surely, he, for one, would want to say in public, something along the lines of 'I want to disassociate myself from my co-director's comments here'...or some such? No?
But there's more. 'nadsat11' reported a further conversation (apparently on Facebook, but perhaps somewhere else). Someone called Katie Rose wrote 'Jews are, on the whole, too middle class, too afraid, too invested in the status quo to actually fight.'
Mr Glass replied: '[...]But it only needs 20-30 people. There are many fit and healthy and strong Jews of all generations.'
This seems to me to be a very 'helpful' comment from Mr Glass. He comes over as willing to help with Katie Rose's suggestion that Jews need 'to actually fight'. However, it is possible that those officers who keep the peace (known as 'police') might wonder if Mr Glass is doing the right thing here, especially as one such officer has already called round to see Mr Glass to ask him to refrain from talking about where I live and/or write threatening tweets about me.
Again, Mr Alex Hearn seems to have chosen to be silent in public about Mr Glass's comments cited here. Why?
Alex Hearn
Not that Mr Hearn is usually reticent about speaking out. For some news outlets he's quite the go-to guy to come on air and explain things to do with antisemitism. In fact, Mr Hearn seems to be the main spokesperson for LAAS now.
Not to say that it's a one-man-band but it doesn't seem to be quite the same multi-pronged group that it was in the days that three different LAAS directors came gunning for me in three separate tweets as described above (one tweeting in an effort to get me taken off air of the BBC; another talking about my family home, and how when he saw me in the street, he didn't know what he would have done, if his wife hadn't been with him; and third, posting the Bear Hunt tweet, which as I've established above was partly directed at me.)
I must declare an interest here...
I must declare an interest here. Mr Hearn has at times felt it necessary to explain to his readers why I am an objectionable person. On July 27 2022 he wrote in the Jewish Chronicle,
'For the celebration of the 75th anniversary of Anne Frank’s memoirs, the Anne Frank Trust saw fit to commission Michael Rosen, a long-term friend and staunch defender of Jeremy Corbyn, who led the Labour Party into institutional antisemitism. Mr Rosen downplayed the issue.'
One or two points need explaining here: Mr Hearn seems to have implied that I was not a fit person to have been 'commissioned' by the Anne Frank Trust. This overlooks the fact that I had already worked with the Anne Frank Trust several times before, speaking on a panel with Anne Frank's cousin 'Buddy' Elias and making a 30 minute BBC Radio 4 programme about Anne Frank and the memorial trees the Trust sponsored.
He describes me as a 'long-term friend' of Jeremy Corbyn. Jeremy and I have known each other for 40 or 50 years. Almost the only way we have met is on the occasions we've shared a political platform. We've never socialised, and I've never been a member of the Labour Party. Of course, Mr Hearn wasn't really intending to celebrate a long-standing friendship by saying this. I would suggest that his comments were in order to convey something more sinister and conspiratorial. No such relationship exists.
Now for the fib: it comes in this phrase '...who led the party into institutional antisemitism'. Put it this way, if the EHRC investigation into the Labour Party had found that the Labour Party was institutionally antisemitic, it would have said so. It didn't.
So what the good Mr Hearn has done here is pull me and my allegedly longterm friendship and staunch support for Corbyn into being part of the Labour Party's institutional antisemitism (which it wasn't found guilty of in the first place).
'Downplaying antisemitism'?
Then to top it, Mr Hearn explains to his readers that I 'downplayed' the alleged institutional antisemitism. Well, one reason I may have said that the Labour Party was not guilty of institutional antisemitism is because the EHRC didn't find it to be guilty of it. So on that count, it wasn't me downplaying it. If it was anyone at the time, then by Hearn's judgement, it would have been the EHRC.
