Andy Burnham calls on Polanski to reverse Green Party’s ‘completely wrong’ motion on Zionism

Prime Minister Andy Burnham has called on Zack Polanski to reverse his party’s ‘completley wrong’ motion on Zionism, which has been criticised by Labour Party MPs as well as Jewish groups and has also exposed deep splits within the Green Party.

Members at the Green Party conference passed the motion, which defined ‘zionism as racism’, by 1,022 to 813 votes. It also states that Zionism as an ideology supports “an ethnonationalist Jewish state” and backed a “single democratic Palestinian state in all of historic Palestine”, which includes modern-day Israel. That goes against the long standing position of a two-state solution supported by most democracies around the world.

Before the conference, former Green Party leaders Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay both issued statements saying they would be voting against the motion. Green Party leader Zack Polanski did not cast a vote.

Green Party MP and former co-leader Adrian Ramsay told LBC he’s “deeply saddened” by the Zionism stance that “doesn’t reflect long-standing Green principles”.

Now Burnham has called on Polanski to reverse the Green Party’s motion, saying that it was ‘completley wrong’ and “shouldn’t be supported in any way, shape or form.”

Burnham said: “In my view, all political parties in the UK should do everything they can to support the two-state solution between Israel and Palestine.”

The Prime Minister’s comments come as he faced calls to rule out any coalition with the Greens. Asked if he would rule out entering into coalition with the Greens as long as they back such a policy, Mr Burnham said he would not be drawn on “any business about what might or might not happen in the future”.