SOCIALIST group Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL) has hit out at the charities watchdog for not responding to its formal complaint over the conduct of the Campaign Against Anti-semitism (CAA).

JVL sent a letter to the Charity Commission almost a year ago calling for CAA to be stripped of its charity status.

Its request was on the grounds that the CAA “is a highly partisan organisation whose central objectives are political, and whose methods are disreputable and in breach of charities law.”

JVL had complained in the letter about the CAA “publicly denouncing Labour Party activists as ‘anti-semites’ with little or no evidence, and leaving its targets to attempt to answer the charges and restore their reputations once the damage was done.”

The letter, dated April 29 2020, said personal conduct of CAA officers, in JVL’s view, “bordered on harassment and intimidation.”

The group also complained of sustained and deeply personal attacks against former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn after Sir Keir Starmer was elected his successor in April last year, as well as against Anglo-Palestinian academic Dr Ghada Karmi for an article she had written for Middle East Eye in praise of Mr Corbyn’s leadership.

The Charity Commission had told JVL that an officer had been assigned to the case and that a formal investigation was under way, but JVL says it has received no further communications from the watchdog.

Two incidents have prompted another complaint to the commission, JVL said today.

The first was CAA’s criticism of Channel 4 News for running a news feature in December 2020 in which a group of British young adults of Palestinian heritage talked about the adverse impact that the IHRA’s Working Definition of Antisemitism was having on their freedom to discuss and debate the Israel-Palestine conflict.

The second incident was CAA publishing on its website earlier this month an “extraordinary attack,” JVL said, on the decision of St Paul’s School in London to invite Baroness Shami Chakrabarti to address a group of students on International Women’s Day.

CAA had written to the boys’ school to say that her inquiry and report into allegations of anti-semitism in Labour had been a whitewash.

In its latest letter to the commission, JVL said that it was the “most malicious and groundless attack against a public figure ever to emanate from a UK charity” and “justifies the immediate removal of CAA from the register of charities.”

The Charity Commission said: "We are aware of these concerns. As with any concerns received by the Commission, we will assess in line with our risk framework to inform our next steps. We cannot comment further at this stage."