The Gaza shadow: Despite landslide win, Labour Party loses four seats in the UK parliamentary polls
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: Despite its significant victory in the just-concluded mid-term elections to the House of Commons, the winning Labour Party lost four of its seats to pro-Gaza candidates from some key constituencies with large Muslim populations, the media reported on Friday.
Poll watchers had identified 21 such ‘sensitive’ seats, out of a total 650 in the House, where Labour could lose support because of its ‘ambivalent’ Gaza policies.
The Keir Starmer-led Labour Party, which dislodged the Rishi Sunak-led Conservatives from power after 14 years of the Tories’ rule, has long supported Muslims and other minority groups, including immigrants. But its vote fell on an average by 10 points in seats where over 10 percent of the population is Muslim.
Labour Party suffered significant election setbacks in areas with large Muslim populations on Friday amid discontent over its position on the ongoing Israeli war in Gaza.
Jonathan Ashworth, who had been expected to serve in Keir Starmer’s Labour government, lost his seat to independent Shockat Adam, one of at least four pro-Gaza candidates to win.
Several other Labour candidates came close to losing.
“This is for the people of Gaza,” Adam said, holding up a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf at the end of his acceptance speech on winning in the Leicester South constituency, according to reports.
Pro-Gaza independents also won in Blackburn, and Dewsbury & Batley, beating Labour into second in both. Labour also failed to win in Islington North, where its former leader, veteran left-winger and ardent pro-Palestinian activist Jeremy Corbyn won as an independent.
While Labour has said it wants the fighting in Gaza to stop, it has also backed Israel’s right to defend itself, angering some among the 3.9 million Muslims who make up 6.5 percent of the United Kingdom’s population.
