"Some have taken this episode as a cue to assert that no one knows more about racism than Jews, that no one has suffered more than we have. This is to play Abbott's game, to assert that there is a "hierarchy of racism", and that my pain trumps yours. But this is not a competition; and if it is, it's not one any of us would want to win. Instead, we should join hands with those who, like us, have endured racism and hatred for a long time. Jews, black Britons, Asian Britons, Muslims, Irish people, Travellers – we have one big, sad thing in common. Those who hate one of us tend to hate us all."
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The British member of parliament Diane Abbott was suspended from the Labour Party's parliamentary whip a few days earlier for comments in a letter sent to The Observer (of London) claiming "Irish, Jewish and Traveller people" suffer prejudice rather than racism. In a tweet, she later commented: "[I] wholly and unreservedly withdraw my remarks and dissassociate myself from them".
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Jonathan Freedland
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