Nick Cohen Nick Cohen

Farewell, George Galloway

It takes an achingly long time for the British to see a lickspittle of mass murderers for what he is. For years, you jump up and down shouting ‘look at what he’s done!’ All but a handful ignore you. But he’s a character, the rest cry. He’s not like those poll-driven, focus-group–tested on-message politicians, who speak in soundbites. He is passionate about his beliefs.

So he is, you reply, and that’s the problem. Since the marches against the Iraq war of 2003, I have written against George Galloway. He has supported Baathist regimes it is fair to describe as fascist: Saddam Hussein’s Sunni Arab dictatorship in Iraq after it had gassed the Kurdish ethnic minority, and Bashar al-AssadShia Arab dictatorship as his terror provoked revolution.

This is the leader of the British anti-war movement, is it? A man whose commitment to pacifism in no way inhibits him from endorsing the practitioners of genocide? This is the tribune British Muslims elected first in the East End of London and then in Bradford, is it? A man who has supported regimes that have murdered more Muslims than NATO and Israel have ever managed? This is the inspiration left-wing journalists lauded as the model for all their comrades to follow, is it? A man who must treat accusations of rape apology and Jew baiting as a habitual part of his political life.

Apparently so.

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