Proscription of Hezbollah

Debate between Graham Stringer and Joan Ryan

Thursday 25th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Joan Ryan]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman and thank him for that intervention. He is completely right to say that there is no distinction and we need to be clear about that.

Hezbollah’s actions are driven by a deep-seated, intractable and vicious hatred of Jews. The House does not need to take my word for it; Hezbollah’s leaders have proudly boasted of their anti-Semitism:

“If they all gather in Israel,”

declared Nasrallah,

“it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.”

Nor is Nasrallah a lone voice. Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s deputy leader, has said that

“the history of Jews has proven that, regardless of the Zionist proposal, they are people who are evil in their ideas”.

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend is making a powerful case. Does she agree that, as well as being anti-Semitic, Hezbollah has assassinated and murdered Christians? As the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) has said, any distinction between a military part and a political part of Hezbollah is entirely without meaning.

[Joan Ryan]

I have no difficulty agreeing with my hon. Friend on that point. Hezbollah has killed probably more Muslims than anybody else, as well as Christians, Jews and others.

Hezbollah’s leaders and its media peddle classic anti-Semitic tropes and lies. They refer to Jews in the basest of terms, labelling them “apes and pigs”, and suggesting that

“you will find no one more miserly or greedy than they are”.

Hezbollah’s leaders and media make spurious claims about Jewish conspiracies and world domination, and they deny the Holocaust, suggesting that

“the Jews invented the legend of the Nazi atrocities”.

Hezbollah’s hatred of Jews is a noxious mix, which, in the words of one writer, fuses

“Arab nationalist-based anti-Zionism, anti-Jewish rhetoric from the Koran, and, most disturbingly, the antique anti-Semitic beliefs and conspiracy theories of European fascism”.