Top Labour MP Imran Hussain Resigns as Gaza Conflict Highlights UK Left’s Antisemitism Divide

A pro-Palestinian protester holds up a sign outside the BBC accusing the Leader of the Opp
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Oliver JJ Lane

A senior left-wing lawmaker has resigned from his party’s frontbench over its stance on Israel, further undermining the Labour leaders’ bid to telegraph that the party has moved beyond its antisemitism-scandal era.

Imran Hussain, the Member of Parliament for Bradford East — according to Census data one of the most solidly Muslim areas in the United Kingdom — has resigned from the leadership team of Labour leader Sir Kier Starmer, citing their differences over the Israel-Gaza conflict. Hussain’s position would have meant that if the Labour Party won the next UK national elections, which polling suggests is likely, he would have been in line for a government minister post.

Hussain said in his letter to Starmer announcing his resignation that “it has become clear that my view on the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza differs substantially from the position you have adopted” and that he could not continue to serve the Starmer shadow government.

Labour leader Sir Keir has not backed calls for a ceasefire between Israel and Palestine, leading to demands for him to step down, and a series of elected officials and party activists resigning. London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan and 16 ‘frontbench’ senior Members of Parliament have called for a ceasefire, signalling a major split within the Labour Party. On Monday, the leader of Burney Council Afrasiab Anwar and 10 councillors quit Labour over its position on Gaza.

The Conservative-aligned Daily Telegraph says the drumbeat of resignations and criticisms of Labour’s official policy of not calling on Israel to stand down in the face of a massive terrorist attack against its people is evidence Starmer is facing “a mutiny”. This development seriously undermines one of the early achievements of Sir Kier’s leadership of Britain’s often fractious and faction-riven left-wing party, which was moving it from years of negative news cycles around antisemitism within its ranks.

While former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn always denied he led an antisemitic Labour Party, he faced persistent criticism that during his time at the top, the problem was at least allowed to fester. Corbyn was suspended from the party in 2020 after he rejected a report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission which found serious failures of leadership over antisemitism.

A review by the left-wing Guardian of Labour’s situation remarks, with some understatement, merely acknowledged that the party “has a complicated history” on Israel and that Starmer has a “tricky task” to keep his party together on the subject.

A Labour spokesman said Wednesday morning in response to Hussain’s resignation: “Everybody wants to see an end to the shocking images we are seeing in Gaza… But a ceasefire now will only freeze this conflict and would leave hostages in Gaza and Hamas with the infrastructure and capability to carry out the sort of attack we saw on October 7.” The party would not be shifting its position that Israel has a right to defend itself, they said.

Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson, an erstwhile frontbench colleague of Hussain’s, further said, reports the Telegraph, that: “I do recognise the strength of feeling across our party on it. What we all want to see is that aid, the essentials getting in, the upholding of international law and the release of hostages who are still being held.

“The events that we saw on the 7th of October were sickening acts of utter barbarity and brutality. But every day on our screens we also see the suffering of Palestinian children and it is right that everything possible is done to alleviate that plight.”

While bitter disagreements over Israel appear to predominantly strike at the left wing in UK domestic politics today, it is an issue that can cut across party lines. The governing Conservative Party saw the resignation of Sayeeda Warsi from the Foreign Office in 2014, calling UK government policy on Gaza “morally indefensible”. Free from the convention of collective responsibility which binds cabinet members to toe the party line, she immediately called on the British government to introduce an arms embargo on Israel.

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