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Put it in writing
Green Party councillor
Cllr Charli Thompson
Woodhouse ward, Barnet
Reported saying: “I support the decision. I understand Zionism as an ethnonationalist political project, and my opposition to it is rooted in a simple principle: equal rights for everyone, regardless of ethnicity or religion. I oppose political ideologies which privilege the rights of one ethnic or religious group over another.”
- Party
- Green Party
- Reported
- 10 October 2026
What they put in writing
“I support the decision. I understand Zionism as an ethnonationalist political project, and my opposition to it is rooted in a simple principle: equal rights for everyone, regardless of ethnicity or religion. I oppose political ideologies which privilege the rights of one ethnic or religious group over another.”
Cllr Charli Thompson, Green Party councillor for Woodhouse ward, Barnet, backed the motion in public, as Jewish News reported on 10 October 2026. Told the Barnet Post, as reported by Jewish News, after Barnet's three Labour MPs wrote to the local Greens about the motion. Their words are quoted exactly from that report.
Cllr Thompson: if this report has misunderstood you, tell us and we will correct the record straight away.
Is Zionism racism? No.
Why they are wrong
Zionism is the belief that the Jewish people, like the French, the Irish or the Palestinians, have the right to self-determination in their ancestral homeland. Around nine in ten British Jews hold it, including many who are fierce critics of Israeli governments.
Racism is hostility, prejudice or discrimination against people because of their race or ethnicity. Zionism claims a right for one people; it does not deny that right to any other. Calling it racism calls most British Jews racists, for a belief about their own people. No other people is told that wanting a homeland is racism.
The working definition of antisemitism of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, adopted by the UK Government, gives as an example "denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor".
In 1975 the United Nations General Assembly declared that "Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination". In 1991 it revoked that, by 111 votes to 25. The Green Party has brought back the line the world withdrew, and one of its own councillors has backed it in public.
What the motion's authors really sayThe motion, line by line
Councillors of every other party are saying the opposite
Councillors and MPs of every party in England and Wales are putting their names to one sentence: Zionism is not racism. See who has signed, or ask your own councillors and MP to sign.