Jeremy Corbyn held a private meeting with a Holocaust denier in Parliament and failed to disclose it when quizzed by a Home Affairs select committee inquiry into anti-Semitism, MailOnline can reveal.
The meeting with Deir Yassin Remembered (DYR), run by Holocaust denier and notorious anti-Semite Paul Eisen, took place in 2014, one year before Mr Corbyn was elected Labour leader.
When giving evidence to the select committee in 2016, Mr Corbyn admitted attending public DYR events but claimed to have stopped when he learned of its leader’s views.
He made no mention of a private meeting in Parliament just two years before. Mr Eisen has been open about his Holocaust denial since at least 2005.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, of which Mr Corbyn is a patron, disavowed Mr Eisen and DYR in 2007 due to Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism. The group’s co-founder, Tony Greenstein, publicised the decision in an article in the Guardian.
‘Participation in DYR is incompatible with being a member of PSC,’ he wrote. ‘You cannot oppose racism against the Palestinians and turn a blind eye to anti-Semitism.’
The Labour leader continued to attend DYR public events for a further six years, however, and is today exposed as having met privately with them in Parliament a year later.
It comes as veteran Labour MP Frank Field resigns the whip in protest against the party leadership, which he said has become ‘a force for anti-Semitism’.
Jeremy Corbyn, centre, meets members of the board of Deir Yassin Remembered (DYR), in Parliament in April 2014. Omar Shalabi, right, was imprisoned in Israel for encouraging terror attacks online, and Thair Anis, left, has praised terrorists as ‘martyrs’
Mr Corbyn giving evidence to the Home Affairs select committee at Parliament, when he claimed to have cut ties with Paul Eisen and his group when he discovered his views
Paul Eisen, right, with DYR members Gill Kaffash, far right, and Omar Shalabi, left, at a meeting at the Palestinian embassy in London on the same day as the group met Mr Corbyn. It is not known whether Mr Eisen met the Labour leader along with his fellow group leaders
The revelations call into question the evidence given by Mr Corbyn to the select committee during an inquiry into anti-Semitism in 2016.
When asked by Victoria Atkins MP about his involvement with DYR, Mr Corbyn said: ‘[Mr Eisen] used to hold an annual event called Deir Yassin Remembered, and I indeed attended some of those Deir Yassin Remembered events.’
He added: ‘He later produced these [Holocaust denial] views, with which I totally and profoundly disagreed, and I let them know. I have not attended anything else since.’
The fact that he did not mention the meeting in the House of Commons in April 2014 has led to accusations that he misled Parliament.
Gideon Falter, chairman of the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn’s association with the appalling DYR group is made even worse by the fact that he may have misled MPs.
‘This chilling new information shows that he was still close to the organisation seven years after the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, of which Mr Corbyn is a patron, had disowned DYR over its leader’s penchant for Holocaust denial.’
MailOnline first exposed the Labour leader’s links with Mr Eisen and DYR in 2015. At the time, Mr Corbyn said:
‘Fifteen years ago [Eisen] was not a Holocaust denier. Had he been a Holocaust denier, I would have had absolutely nothing to do with him… At that time I had no evidence whatsoever.’
It followed Mr Eisen’s claim in a blog post that the Labour leader ‘attended every single Deir Yassin commemoration’ and put his ‘cheque book on the table’ to fund DYR, something Mr Corbyn has denied.
But in a picture published by MailOnline today, Mr Corbyn can be seen posing with two members of the DYR board at the meeting in Parliament in 2014.
The picture is believed to have been taken by Gill Kaffash, a DYR official who was banned from the Labour party in 2016 because of her Holocaust revisionism. She confirmed to MailOnline that the meeting took place and that she was present.
‘Yes, I was there,’ she said. ‘We met Jeremy. I can’t remember whether Paul [Eisen] was there or not, actually. However, you know, whatever use you want to make of it, you just make use of it.’ Mr Eisen has not responded to attempts to contact him.
In the photograph, Mr Corbyn can be seen posing with Palestinian DYR leader Omar Shalabi, who was imprisoned in Israel for encouraging terror attacks online. He is also accompanied by DYR official Thair Anis, who has praised terrorists as ‘martyrs’.
Another photograph taken on the same day shows the DYR delegation at a meeting at the Palestinian embassy. Mr Eisen appears in that picture, but it is not known whether he personally attended the meeting with Mr Corbyn.
In a Facebook post unearthed by MailOnline, Mr Eisen appeared to confirm Mr Corbyn’s unusual support, writing that even after he was banned by his organisation, the Labour leader ‘never failed, when he ran into me, to say hello’.
Paul Eisen, left, is a self-professed Holocaust denier who frequently shares anti-Semitic and far-Right content on his blog. Jeremy Corbyn, right, who according to Eisen has attended ‘every single’ one of his organisation’s annual events, appears to sit attentively during one such meeting in St John’s Wood Church in 2013
An article in the Times from 2005 showing that Mr Eisen was already well-known as a Holocaust denier at the time. Mr Corbyn supported him and his group until 2014
A post on Paul Eisen’s Facebook page. One person commented, ‘that’s a rhetorical question of yours, yes?’
Paul Eisen writing that anti-Semitism is ‘a legitimate response to Jewish bad behaviour’
Mr Eisen, an open Holocaust denier, is one of Britain’s leading Jew-haters. In a Facebook post revealed today, he called anti-Semitism ‘a legitimate response to Jewish bad behaviour’.
In another post, he shared a graphic asserting that politics is not ‘Right v Left’ but ‘Jew v Gentile’, commenting, ‘could this be true?’ One of his friends commented, ‘that’s a rhetorical question of yours, yes?’
He has written several times of the support Mr Corbyn gave him over the years. On his blog, he recalled a period when he felt ‘despised’ by mainstream society, and only Mr Corbyn refused to shun him.
‘During the time when I felt so marginalised and isolated, when the movement with which he was associated so despised me, Jeremy always said hello,’ he wrote.
Mr Eisen’s Holocaust denial is well-known. In 2008, he published an essay entitled ‘my life as a Holocaust denier’.
He wrote: ‘Deny the Holocaust! For my money, a child of six can see that something’s not right about the Holocaust narrative… “Holocaust denier” is a label I accept.’
Mr Eisen is also a supporter of David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, 9/11 ‘truther’ and notorious conspiracy theorist.
When promoting a Duke video entitled The Zionist Red Army on his website, Eisen wrote: ‘Oh, how I wish I could stop posting David Duke (it gets me into no end of trouble). Trouble is, he just will not stop telling the truth.’
The video in question includes an extended anti-Semitic rant by Duke. Towards the end, he says: ‘The people of Europe and America, [the Jews are] coming for you… Together we will defeat the true apostles of hate’.
He also promotes articles from a prominent White Supremacist website on his blog. One of these, posted in March, refers to Jews as ‘rats’ and talks of the ‘battle we wage’ against ‘international Jewry’.
Mr Eisen’s group, DYR, stages annual commemorations to the village of Deer Yassin, where 100 Palestinians were killed by Zionist paramilitaries in 1948.
The organisation has long been seen as a front for anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, something recognised by Mr Corbyn’s organisation in 2007 when it voted to cut ties with it.
The private 2014 meeting was set up by the late Labour politician Gerald Kaufman. Labour MP Frank Dobson also attended. Both are known for their anti-Israel views.
Gill Kaffash, the DYR official understood to have taken the picture of Mr Corbyn, was denied membership of Labour’s Holborn and St Pancras branch in 2016 due to her Holocaust revisionism.
Keir Starmer, the local MP, said at the time: ‘I am pleased that, having held a full hearing into the case of Gillian Kaffash, the party has refused her membership application,’ adding that ‘anti-Semitism is entirely against Labour values.’
A Labour party spokesman has been contacted for comment.