Israel shows Polanski the door

So the Greens have gone and done it, and Israel has responded in kind. Zack Polanski now finds himself barred from the country after his party’s autumn conference in Brighton passed a motion declaring Zionism a form of racism. One can almost hear the collective sigh from those who warned this would end badly.

The Israeli foreign ministry did not mince words. It called the resolution shocking, accused the Greens of giving legitimacy to terrorism and of backing the elimination of the State of Israel through armed struggle. A spokesman noted that the party had adopted not only the green of Hamas but its ideology too, complete with the call for a Palestinian state from the river to the sea. That, they said, means the destruction of Israel, and labelling the Jewish people’s aspiration for self-determination as racist goes far beyond legitimate debate.

Delegates voted 1,022 in favour and 813 against, despite opposition from several senior figures. Polanski himself was absent, having slipped away to campaign in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election. Convenient timing, some might observe. The policy treats Zionism as racist and presses for the abolition of Israel, a stance Jerusalem insists stains the history of the United Kingdom for as long as it stands.

Israel has now called on every British political party, first and foremost the governing Labour Party, to reject the motion outright. BBC Politics reported the ban on Polanski as the direct consequence. Whether the Greens expected their leader to be persona non grata is another matter. For now the door is shut, and the sarcastic aside writes itself: when you invite the comparison, do not feign surprise at the reply.