“It Was A Long Time COMING!” | 30 Green Party Councillors Probed Over Anti-Semitic Hate

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-06

[00:00:00]Chief political writer at Spiked online, Brendan O'Neal, a very good morning to you, Brendan.

[00:00:04]>> Hi, Julia. How's it going?

[00:00:05]>> Very well. Lots lots to talk about at home and abroad. I want to ask you though, our our first question we're asking our audience today is has Zack Palansky's Green Party bubble burst amid not just the anti-semitism claims, but also actually some light being shed on some of their rather unusual and radical policies. What do you think is is that happening? And would you welcome it?

[00:00:27]Well, I would definitely welcome it and I hope it's happening, but it's hard to tell at the moment. What's scaring me right now is if there are significant numbers of people in this country willing to vote for a party even with everything we know, even with all their crazy policies, the fact that Zach Palansky seems to be, you know, not particularly familiar with the truth and also not to mention the anti-semitism.

[00:00:49]This is a party that had candidates that referred to Jews as cockroaches, that said Jews are instructed by the Bible to kill children, that said that the Jews made up 7th of October just for financial gain. I mean, it is extraordinary the rancid levels of Nazi level anti-semitism in this party. So, I'm actually quite worried if they do do quite well, I'm going to think to myself, who's living on my streets?

[00:01:12]Who's living in my city? Who's voting for a party like this?

[00:01:15]>> Yeah. I mean, that's the thing there. It is fascinating how long Zach Plansky was able to be, you know, a party leader without getting any proper scrutiny. And again, he tweeted as if he's frankly a sort of a little sort of friendly little Labrador dog dancing on the laps of some of the interviewee interviewers. Uh now he's actually getting proper scrutiny.

[00:01:34]He's not doing too well. He was on radio 4 this morning. It's fact there was no push back from Nick Robinson on the fact that he claimed quite quite incorrectly on both counts there was an ongoing genocide in Gaza. I assume he thinks Hamas is committing genocide in Galsa at the current time. Um but there's no push back on that. Maybe that's BBC policy, isn't it? Just pretend there's a a genocide that doesn't actually exist because they don't do facts anymore. But um actually getting some push back on his claims that he worked as a spokesman for the British Red Cross, which he didn't. I mean, I I've never accidentally claimed to to to have had a job. I never had claimed to have been a member of the National Council for Hypnotherapist when he wasn't. uh of course this on top of when he worked as a hypnotherapist claiming that he could uh make a woman's breasts larger uh simply by you know hypnotizing her. I mean the litany of things that he has claimed which simply are not true is getting rather worrying and then also his absolute insistence that you know there isn't an anti-semitism problem in his party. It's about the fact his own party is currently investigating 30 council candidates. Let's not limit any candidates or any constituencies, but 30 council candidates for some of the most outrageous anti-semitic uh tropes and and slurs calling Jews rats, vermin, celebrating the October the 7th massacre when it was long after it was well known what had happened on that day. I mean, it's only now, it's only in the last, say, two weeks that there's actually been proper scrutiny of him.

[00:03:00]>> And you know what? All his supporters are saying, "Oh my god, the media is out to get him. the billionaires want to bring him down. I'm sorry guys, this is called democracy. We hold people to account, especially people who want to hold office of some sort. He's been held to account. As you say, it was a long time coming. But finally, the media are asking questions about this, I would say, a snake oil salesman, you know, the kind of dodgiest showman in British politics who says things about himself that don't seem to have been true about the Red Cross and the hypnotherapy council, uh, but also leads a party which is just rife with bigotry. You know, the Green Party and their lefty supporters for years have been saying that the real dodgy fascist party in Britain is reform sections of the Tory party. We now know that the Greens are the true nasty party of 21st century British politics. This is a party with a lot of racists in it with some crazy policies with bigots seemingly everywhere. There are huge question marks over this party and I really hope it does badly in the polls as a consequence of being held to account. I mean some the timing for them has not been good on that front. Look does appear that his own personal ratings absolutely plummeted. So I'm talking like by 14 points or something over his criticism of the Metropon police officers who were absolute heroes in tackling the suspected knife man uh in uh uh in Golden Green last week and yet kicking him in the head and as we've heard from Philip Ingram who's an expert in such things. Yeah. If you think someone's got a a explosive belt on and they're and they're they're an Islamist terrorist that's exactly what you should And again, if the armed response unit had been there, he'd already have been shot in the head and quite rightly.

[00:04:35]>> How out of touch do you have to be with ordinary Brits to complain about the fact that a man with a knife who had allegedly just stabbed two Jewish people was forcefully disarmed. You know, as you say, those police behaved heroically. In fact, I found it very inspiring that there are still young coppers who are willing to risk their own safety to disarm a dangerous person and to protect ordinary citizens. That was really heartening to see. the Community Security Trust guys who were absolute heroes. I mean, they don't even get have the tasers.

[00:05:04]>> Absolutely. But, you know, the other thing we got to talk about in relation to all of this, it's unquestionable now that politics, the kind of politics being promoted by the Greens and the Palestine lobby and the left more broadly, it seems to me unquestionable that it is endangering Jews in this country. Because [snorts] if you march through our streets every other weekend calling the Jewish state a Nazi state and showing the Star of David mixed up with a swash sticker and saying that everyone who supports Israel is a genocidal freak, which by the way includes most British Jews who identify as Zionists, then you are hanging a target sign around the necks of Britain's Jews. And that is just unquestionable. Now, we've got to really tone down this rabid anti- anti-ionism and anti-semitism. And and we're often told, well, you know, anti-semitism and these horrible things act happen as a result of horrible things done by the Israeli government. The evidence is very clear, actually. The spikes and anti-semitic attacks, whether it's in Britain, whether it's in France or Germany, whether it's in Australia, those spikes happen completely irrelevant to anything the Israeli government has done or not done. They happen after other anti-semitic attacks.

[00:06:05]So the more anti-mitting attacks there are, so whether it's Bondi Beach, whether it's October the 7th, whether it's the Heaton Park synagogue attack where two men died in Manchester last year. Um it is after those events that more anti-Semitic attacks are prompted.

[00:06:19]So let's stop that nonsense that these are people who care about babies in Gaza. That's a load of clap trap. They just want to hurt Jews. They should be a bit more honest about it. Say they're quiet allowed. Do you said he's interesting you talked about um Zack Plansky as a snake oil salesman? I think of him more as a useful idiot. I don't think he's clever enough to be a snake oil salesman.

[00:06:39]>> You could be right there. Actually, he is a bit he is a bit dim. Are we allowed to say that? He's not the brightest spot.

[00:06:45]>> Pretty sure >> in in the box. Um he Yeah, he he might be a bit too dim to be a snake all salesman. I I think he's a bit of an opportunist. I mean, this is a man who was a lib dem five minutes ago and who wanted to be an actor at one point and as you reminded us thought he could grow women's breasts through hypnosis.

[00:07:02]>> Works for me, Brendan. it works for me.

[00:07:04][laughter] >> He's floated through so many crazy policies and crazy acts and different professions. He looks like someone who loves the stage and loves the sound of his own voice. And the problem for us is that the rest of us don't really like the sound of his voice. So, we're in trouble.

[00:07:18]>> Absolutely. Um, someone else who perhaps has been exposed for what he really is and again did not get the proper scrutiny before he got the top job and that is the prime minister K Starmmer.

[00:07:27]We were told only a couple months ago by Anna Sawa, the Scottish Labour Party leader that Karma had to go. Now we've got uh Baroness Morgan of the Welsh Labour leader basically saying K star's name comes up on the doorsteps and he could cost uh Welsh Labour Party the the election tomorrow in the Senate and lose them control of the Senate. Ply Kumri very much looking like they could take it by you know just over the line reform doing very well there as well. Um do you think that's also the issue though?

[00:07:54]There simply wasn't enough proper scrutiny of both Kism and indeed you could say his chancellor Rachel Reeves given what's been exposed about her her her CV and the large holes in it and the big blatant open lies in it that would have got anyone else the rest of us would have all been sacked for those sort of lies in our CV from any job we had but she's still in the job. Do you think that actually Karma having been in the job only 22 months it may feel like 22 years but it is only 22 months that actually he has also been exposed and this is something we really need to do.

[00:08:22]We need to have proper scrutiny not just of politicians policies but of politicians themselves before they get the top job.

[00:08:30]>> Absolutely right. And it seemed to me that so much of the liberal media in particular just went on holiday when Star became PM. They thought, "Oh great, our work is done. We've got someone like us in Downing Street so we can relax. We don't have to hold his feet to the fire." They gave him such an easy ride.

[00:08:44]And in fact, so many of the columnists, the kind of big hitting columnists and reporters gushed over him. They were, "Oh, the adults are back in the room.

[00:08:52]Common sense has returned to British politics. Now we know that actually this has been in an incredibly chaotic government. It's lurgged from one scandal to another. It doesn't know what it's doing with the country. But you know, I think that the prospect this week that Labour will do very badly in Wales and potentially very badly in London. You know, in Wales, it might lose out to reform and to the Welsh nationalists. In London, it might lose out to the Greens. This is a a potential death blow for the Labor Party because the the the Welsh Heartlands is where the Labor Party was strong for se a century. You know, from the pit to the pulpit, it was all about Labor. And of course, in London amongst the middle classes and the public sector workers, Labor was the party. They even lose there. So, they've lost the Red Wall up north and in the Midlands. They could lose Wales. They could lose London. This is a party in absolute freeall and it doesn't have much of a future.

[00:09:40]>> No. Well, we shall we shall see what happens there. Do you think we are going to see a Labour uh party leadership challenge and how soon and who how do you rate the chances of you know Andy Burham getting back in Angela Raina's chances Wes Streeting Ed Milliban being our next chancellor whittle where what are the runners and riders doing in your view >> I mean what a mly crew there's no >> it's not encouraging is it >> no statesmen no statesmen none of those kind of great leaders of old which I don't just mean the obvious ones like Churchill and Thatcher I mean great labor leaders of old, you know, >> where's your healies? Yeah.

[00:10:15]>> Yeah. Even someone like Tony Ben and people will have had a million disagreements with him, but he was a great erator. He was a great leader. He had passion and vision. That's why lots of people lined up behind him. They wanted him to be leader of the Labour party at one point. You know, Barbara Castle, Peter Shaw, Michael Foot even.

[00:10:31]Everyone made fun of Michael Foot in the 80s, but looking back now, he's brilliant.

[00:10:35]>> Giant. [laughter] >> Yeah. And so there's no solid leaders.

[00:10:39]And what a sign of the times that is.

[00:10:41]And everyone says Andy Burnham, the king of the north, will sweep in and fix Labor. I'm not convinced by that either.

[00:10:46]It does seem that he's the most sensible of all the options. But I'm not convinced he's got the magic touch and he can rescue this party from the doldrums.

[00:10:53]>> Well, it's interesting. He's the most sensible one. We say, and yet uh he did also say a few months ago, you know, it doesn't matter what the bond markets think. I'm paraphrasing, but I have a horrible feeling the bond markets might be the ones who decide that. Brendon O'Neal, so much to talk about. I mean, we haven't even got ready to inform the race. Time is against us, but always good to get your thoughts on all of these things. Chief political spiked online. Brendan O'Neal there.