Exposing George Galloway. Introducing the Honourable Member for Rafah Central (Underground District)

by Daniel Clarke-Serret - 2 Mar 2024 - It is always a risky business writing about George Galloway. He likes to take his detractors to court. But I’m going to fearlessly enter the fray, exposing the lazy idea that he is representing the Asian Muslim community and their “anger” about Gaza. The context is as follows. In the just contested by-election (or special mid-term election) to the Westminister Parliament, Mr Galloway won the previously safe Labour seat of Rochdale. The seat is predominantly white working class with a significant Asian Muslim minority of 30%. Labour had disowned its candidate for comments on Israel judged antisemitic by the leadership and so effectively the party was not competing in the race. The Conservatives are meanwhile in a state of electoral freefall nationwide. And thus the field was left open to anti-establishment and independent candidates.

Enter controversial George Galloway, candidate for Rochdale, and head of his latest vehicle “The Workers Party of Great Britain”. A former Labour MP, removed from the party for his views on the Iraq war and one of the most charismatic populists to ever grace - or haunt - the English-speaking world, the result was never in doubt. In the context of the continual Israel-Gaza War and with a remarkable history of upending Labour majorities in seats with large Muslim populations, he took the Rochdale crown to nobody’s surprise. But how does he do it?

Ocho Rios to Rochdale

First let’s talk Rochdale. It may sound like an obscure town in Northern England. But it has an important place in world social history. As the home of the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers, founded in 1844, the town has a proud reputation for birthing was to become the co-operative movement. At the sharp end of the Industrial Revolution, Rochdale found itself in the midst of social decline and a wave of poverty, brought on by the mechanication of the age. Skilled workers were unable to find employment and entangled in a seemingly hopeless future of misery. 28 men came together to act cooperatively with the modest aim of opening a store for basic provisions and clothing. As time past the ambitions of the organisation grew and today it boasts a successful supermarket brand, a funeral service and even a banking service. Its chain of academy schools includes Burnt Mill Academy, Essex, where I taught between 2010 and 2014.

Rochdale may have a proud history - and be named in a hit title track by Greater Manchester band 10cc - but it is still mired in poverty, just as in the days of the Equitable Pioneers. Its working class inhabitants are once more being pushed out of work by technological advances. And in the midst of the latest AI revolution, the pound in the Rochdale pocket is worth less and less. Wages are stagnating. Growth is flatlining. And the woke-ish values of the time - being promoted from New York to London - are increasingly out of touch with the town’s social conservatism. A metropolitan Labour Party - staffed by just-out-of-university liberals - struggles to connect with the left behind of Northern England, who voiced their discontent in the Brexit Referendum, an event looked upon aghast by those residing in ivory towers and on top Primrose Hills. A charismatic socialist candidate able to brandish his Britishness was likely to appeal to such a constituency. And unsurprisingly enough, George did. As an old-school, far left-wing, socially conservative, pro-British, anti-EU Scot, he ticked all of the boxes with the white working class that make up the majority of the town.

George’s favourite demographic

[Image: George's campaign placards in the Rafah…sorry Rochdale election.]

But though George Galloway may have had a wide appeal, his calling card was Gaza. A typically reliable George topic. And a definite advantage in this strongly Muslim-minority town. Previous greatest hits include Kashmir, Iraq and basically anything to do with Palestine. His ability to take sectarian Middle Eastern and Indian subcontinental topics and mix them with spicy, divisive, angry rhetoric is legendary. With one wave of the hypnotic wand, he can unfailingly beckon his target Muslim audience to the ballot box. Nuance, it’s fair to say, is absent. Muslims are the victims. Muslims are blameless the world over. And the Israeli-Indian coalition are the ever-present bad guys,

This recipe for success can fall into difficulty sometimes. Take Syria. Galloway’s effective pro-Assad, pro-Russia line didn’t go down well with those on the other side of the Syrian sectarian divide. And in a Middle East where Muslim regularly murders Muslim in the name of their religious sect, a white Westerner taking the simplistic “I agree with the Muslims” line doesn’t always hit the mark with the target audience. However Gaza is an easy banker. Muslims from Syria to Sudan may slaughter each other with abandon in the name of Holy War, but they can all agree on one thing: Israel is bad. So cometh the Gazan hour, cometh the Dundee man.

Upon claiming victory late last Thursday night, Galloway immediately forgot who he was sent to Westminster to represent: The people of Rochdale. He said with little concealed joy “This is for Gaza”. Or more fully, “Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza: You will pay a high price for the role that you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe presently going on in occupied Gaza, in the Gaza Strip.” As ever, “Gorgeous George” will likely ignore his poverty-battered constituents and indulge his main interest of representing the varied extremists of the Middle East. As the member for Bradford West, a similarly Muslim-heavy constituency, he deigned to speak for his electorate a mere 16 times in the House of Commons. In three years in that role, he had other matters on his mind. Once more we will see the MP for Rochdale morph seamlessly into the member for Rafah Central (underground district). Of that I have little doubt.

George’s relationship with human rights

As is all too common with “fighters for Palestinian Rights”, George has an uncomfortable relationship with human rights. Though he is quick to pick up the Jewish State and its American ally on every indiscretion - whether real or imagined - he takes a far more leisurely line on the world’s most evil tyrannies. He even works for them, as we will see below. On a day trip to his constituency office in Baghdad Central circa 1994, he famously told the detestable Saddam Hussein “I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability.” His indefatigability in murdering Kurds, the Shia and internal enemies no doubt. He has also been an enthusiastic campaigner for Hugo Chávez, whose Bolivarian regime is famous for respecting the human rights of only those that support it. In its most modern incarnation, the Venezuelan regime is even considering invading neighbouring Guyana. Now Galloway is a big opponent of foreign invasions of course, so I look forward to him taking to the streets in the event of any cross-territorial aggression.

Russia, as we know, is a world leader in respecting human rights and international borders. But funnily enough George Galloway managed to forget all his anti-Iraq War campaigning when it came to Russia’s invasion of sovereign Ukraine. Because whilst George Bush and Tony Blair were “wolves”, Putin is merely a cuddly bear. On Talk Radio, Galloway cast doubt on the Russian poisoning of the Skripals in Salisbury against all the evidence of his country’s intelligence services. But no-one should be surprised as he works for Putin’s propaganda machines. His radio programme “The Mother of all Talk Shows” has been broadcast on the Russian state-owned Sputnik service and he has made programming for the famously impartial Russia Today (as well as al-Mayadeen TV). He has also addressed conferences organised by the Chinese Communist Party on democracy where he has taken a political line more consistent with that of President Xi than President Biden. Galloway - a man who has benefited more than most from an open political system and the well-established right of freedom of speech - seems happy to associate himself with those that would deny these rights to others. I wonder if the people of Rochdale would approve?

“Angry” Muslims and British foreign policy

But it is not George Galloway’s record and positions that irk me the most. It is the proposition that he represents the views of British Muslims, “angry” at Gaza.

In the first place, most Muslims face exactly the same challenges as the rest of the people of Rochdale. The ability to put food on the table, to clothe their families and to live with hope in challenging times. The idea that a foreign war is their top priority is …unlikely. Especially a foreign war in a land far from their ancestral homes in Pakistan and Bangladesh. It’s definitely an assertion in need of evidence in any case. I would counter-assert that the economy, rent prices, schooling, hospitals and other social issues - not to mention anti-woke/anti-LGBT hyper social conservatism - are far higher on their collective agendas. My theory also needs research to back it up - or otherwise reject it. But either way, we cannot take the “Gaza is all I care about” theory seriously without proof.

And in the unlikely event that foreign affairs are the main concern of British Asian Muslims, I am willing to wager that it is Kashmir that most stirs their blood. After all it is the Indian Subcontinent - and not the Middle East - that is their ancestral homeland. A region with very few Jews. And in this respect the UK is quite different from France where Jews and Muslims hail from exactly the same place: North Africa.

Now none of this is to say that British Muslims don’t back Palestine over Israel. But, with the exception of the Islamist extremists and a minimal number of university-educated Muslim liberals, this support is very superficial. Skin-deep on a “Which football team do you support?” level. Of course if one asks a British Muslim who knows very little about the specificities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “are you pro-(Muslim) Palestine or pro-(Jewish) Israel?” they will back the home team. The one most closely aligned with their religious identity. It’s like asking Latin Americans for their position on the Falklands dispute. Or asking an evangelical US Christian about Israel. But it isn’t a deep evidence-backed position. In fact it reminds me of Brexit. Brits always put the EU well down on their list of priorities. Down in 8th position behind all the normal bread and butter issues. But when confronted with having to make a binary choice, they chose. And British Muslims are the same on Israel-Palestine. But that doesn’t mean that they are Israel-obsessed and it is all they care about.

It is the Islamists, the fanatics and the far-left who are obsessed about Israel. It is they who are threatening British Democracy. And it is they whose actions are threatening the safety of Jews and the peaceful, democratic majority of Britain’s Muslim citizens.

But let us imagine an untruth. That all Muslims in Britain care about is Gaza. And they are all collectively “angry”. That doesn’t mean that we should grace it with a change in British foreign policy. Because when Muslims vote in Britain in British elections they should be voting for the British national interest as they see it. Not as a sectarian segment of the population. Do we take a position on Syria or Ethiopia because a section of the citizenry is “angry”? And what happens when different sections of the electorate are angry in opposite directions? Do we listen to the angry Indians or the angry Pakistanis over Kashmir? Do we prefer the angry Shia or the angry Sunni in Iraq? And when I was “really angry” about the repulsive Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe - a feeling shared by many Brits I’d wager - the government did not feel compelled to take action simply due to my emotions. And let’s not mention the greatest humanitarian issue of our time: Sudan. Don’t think that’s going to tip a by-election result! The British government will act in the British national interest - or even in the interests of morality if it’s feeling ill - but what it won’t do is change its views due to vulgar, sectarian electoral concerns. Gaza isn’t different from any other heated foreign policy issue. And the Muslim community isn’t on an exalted plane of importance compared to Jews, Hindus and Sikhs.

Why Galloway won

George Galloway didn’t win in Rochdale because the Muslim community is angry. Or obsessed with Gaza. Or has no economic issues on its mind. Indeed to say there is one monolithic Muslim community is in itself an inaccuracy. He won because of the reason he always wins. Because he elevated a local democratic event into a referendum on a divisive foreign policy issue. Faced with a pro- or anti-Palestine vote, Muslims voted with their tribe. But it was Galloway who created the referendum-like nature of the event. It was Galloway who exploited the divisions. And it was Galloway who has identified the diverse Muslim community as a vote bank for his own personal ambitions. The Muslim citizens of Rochdale want exactly what their forebears of 1844-fame wanted. Work. Dignity. And a future for their children. And because of the victory of this exploitative lover of tyrants the world-over, they are even less likely to achieve these goals in the coming year.

The Rochdale co-operative movement has survived over 170 years to fight for ordinary, working people. They braved the British capitalist Victorian elite and the era of Stalinist tyranny to continue onwards into the 21st Century. Which is an indefatigability that both George Galloway and his favourite Middle Eastern dictators would be proud of. If they ever cared to improve the lot of their suffering peoples instead of supporting all that is evil in this most difficult of worlds.

Source (including images):

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/mar/01/george-galloway-constituency-hopping-campaigner-who-is-rarely-far-from-controversy

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