Jewish leader of the Green Party Zack Polanski has had to jump in yet again to call out the cynical weaponisation of antisemitism accusations. This time, they came from notorious pro-Israel agitator John Mann (who is not Jewish).
Mann’s intervention comes as establishment politicians and journalists have once again sought to conflate antisemitism with opposition to Israel’s genocidal war crimes and those who defend them. In this case, a school stopped a vice-chair of the “opaquely funded” lobby group Labour Friends of Israel from spreading his propaganda there because parents and teachers peacefully protested his attendance.
Polanski had already called out the nonsense. But when Mann piped up, the Green leader wasn’t going to let it slide. So he challenged the absurdity of a non-Jewish voice in an unelected position chiming in about antisemitism:
An unelected Lord, appointed “antisemitism adviser”, now feels entitled or even qualified to explain antisemitism to a Jewish national party leader.
To add to all this – he’s not Jewish.
Truly rabbit hole stuff. https://t.co/X9RgsRhq4n
— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) January 15, 2026
Others felt the same way:
It really gets to me when non-Jewish politicians feel they are qualified to adjudicate on what is antisemitism. As an anti-Zionist Jew I want to say to him ‘wind your neck in and mind your own business.’ https://t.co/OEsEWDpDM0
— Ian Sharp (@gablid) January 15, 2026
Only the government’s non-Jewish “antisemitism tsar” (my ancestors from the Pale of Settlement would have laughed themselves to death at the idea of an antisemitism tsar, let alone a goyish one) accusing a Jewish man of antisemitism for refusing the conflation of Jews & Zionists. https://t.co/3sms8UD53M
— Rivkah Brown (@rivkahbrown) January 15, 2026
Mann and White: an Israel lobby story
Former Labour right-winger John Mann has a long history of cynically weaponising antisemitism allegations. And the Tories rewarded him for his efforts in smearing left-wing opponents of Israeli war crimes by putting him in the House of Lords and making him an ‘antisemitism tsar’.
Mann has received tens of thousands of pounds from pro-Israel lobby groups over the years. This has included many visits to Israel, one of which the Israeli government paid for itself. Pro-Israel lobbyists Trevor Chinn and Trevor Pears, meanwhile, donated generously when he was MP for Bassetlaw.
More recently, Mann has registered ‘financial support‘ from pro-Israel group the Community Security Trust. And it appears his wife Jo White has now taken over the championing of Israeli interests in the House of Commons.
White isn’t Jewish either (though she found out later in life she’d had a Jewish great-grandmother). She has also proven to be anti-Palestinian, gaining the honour of becoming vice-chair of Labour Friends of Israel. People like Chinn and Pears have also backed her, as have other pro-Israel lobbyists.
The biggest donation for White, however, actually links in well to the education system. Because she got around £18,000 from Palace Yard Events Ltd, which the government has put in charge of its “Tackling Antisemitism in Education Programme (2025-2028)”, to the tune of over a million pounds.
The director of the Palace Yard lobby group is Natascha Engel. Engel previously worked for pro-Israel lobbyist Stuart Polak’s consultancy firm TWC Associates, one of whose clients included Israeli arms firm Elbit Systems.
Zack Polanski — Stop conflating Israel and Judaism!
Zack Polanski has insisted once again in light of this new offensive from pro-Israel agitators that:
Conflating Antisemitism with criticism of the Israeli government is dangerous.
Indeed, as late Jewish professor David Graeber wrote in 2019:
the apparently endless campaign by politicians… to weaponize antisemitism accusations… [is] so cynical and irresponsible that I genuinely believe it to be a form of antisemitism in itself. And it is a clear and present danger to Jewish people.
A particularly absurd part of this, he said, is that many leading these cynical charges for political reasons are:
people who are not themselves Jewish
That includes Mann and White.
We should all be glad that Polanski is speaking out about this. Because this must stop. And the only way it will is when we raise our voices and refuse to play these dangerously manipulative games.
Featured image via the Canary
By Ed Sykes
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