UK Labour MP uses footage of Guatemalan troops to castigate IDF
Israeli army says Grahame Morris should apologize for accusations, based on misrepresented clip, that IDF soldiers beat Palestinian children for the fun of it
A British Labour MP on Monday accused Israeli troops of beating Palestinian children, while citing four-year-old footage of Guatemalan soldiers violently assaulting unarmed teenagers.
“Marvellous, absolutely marvellous the Israeli Army, the best financed, best trained, best equipped army in the world caught on camera beating up Palestinian children for the fun of it. May God forgive them. What would Jim Royle say on an Easter Monday,” tweeted Grahame Morris along with the video.
The clip he shared, however, dates back to a 2015 incident, in which five Guatemalan troops were caught on camera beating two teenagers, prompting an investigation.
Many of Morris’s followers, including the Israel Defense Forces, quickly caught on to his blunder.
The only marvelous thing here are your lies.
These are not IDF soldiers.
Apologies would be in order. https://t.co/ImIY9nD8lX— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) April 22, 2019
“The only marvelous thing here are your lies. These are not IDF soldiers. Apologies would be in order,” tweeted the IDF’s official account at Morris.
Despite being alerted to the mistake by hundreds of social media users, Morris had not removed the tweet or apologized as of Monday afternoon.
The incident came amid an ongoing controversy over alleged widespread anti-Semitism within Labour party ranks.
Thousands of cases of alleged hate speech against Jews have been recorded within Labour since 2015, when Jeremy Corbyn, a far-left politician, was elected to lead the party. The Board of Deputies of British Jews has accused Corbyn of encouraging anti-Semitic rhetoric and at times engaging in it, though he disputes the claim.
Following growing public scrutiny of the problem, Labour is facing the prospect of an official inquiry by the United Kingdom’s Equality and Human Right’s Commission, the main government anti-racism watchdog.
In March, British police arrested three people near London suspected of inciting anti-Semitic hatred in the Labour Party’s ranks.
The Times of Israel Community.