MOMENTUM founder Jon Lansman made the case against the conflation of anti-semitism with support of Palestinian rights at the Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) conference yesterday.

In his speech at the event in north London, he condemned “the dreadful institutional racism experienced by Palestinian citizens of Israel” and supported the demand for “an end of the occupation, the end of the expropriation of Palestinian land.”

There is no contradiction between condemning the “racist nature of the [Israeli] nation-state law” and fighting anti-semitism experienced by Jewish members of Labour, he insisted.

Also in attendance were Labour MPs Luciana Berger, Louise Ellman, Margaret Hodge, Ruth Smeeth and Wes Streeting.

Labour Bassetlaw MP John Mann claimed that he had been forced to miss the conference because some members of his Constituency Labour Party were “participating in the Chris Williamson/Jackie Walker hatefest, where they will be targeting me.”

Derby North MP Mr Williamson held his Democracy Roadshow in Bassetlaw and Doncaster on Sunday.

In a letter to JLM, Mr Mann claimed: “[Attendees include] those who say that I am ‘loyal to a foreign power’ and ‘paid by the Jews.’

“I will be celebrating their attendance by referring them for expulsion.”

Mr Mann, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on anti-semitism, did not specify why he believed that he was being targeted by people attending the Democracy Roadshow.

He also reiterated his call for Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to have female Jewish Labour MPs Ms Berger, Ms Ellman, Ms Hodge and Ms Smeeth automatically reselected as candidates in the next election to prove that Labour is not “institutionally racist.”

Meanwhile, Momentum is set to announce today — ahead of the Labour conference this month — that it supports a more open and “inclusive” selection process for Labour’s parliamentary candidates.

The grassroots group argues that an “outdated rulebook” is “holding back” new members from being part of a “new generation of MPs,” so the selection procedure should be made more “democratic.”

The group points to the selection of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old New Yorker of Puerto Rican descent who has been selected as a Democratic candidate for Congress.

Momentum said that if she “had been subject to Labour’s restrictive, outdated rules, she would have been shut out.”