AXED shadow education secretary Rebecca Long Bailey finally deleted the tweet to the anti-semitic article which got her sacked by Sir Keir Starmer.
The Labour MP was dismissed last week after she shared an interview with the actress Maxine Peake, describing her as an “absolute diamond”.
However, in the article Ms Peake had claimed the tactic used by US police to kill George Floyd was “taught by the Israeli army”.
Sir Keir said at the time: “The sharing of that article was wrong because the article contained anti-semitic conspiracy theories and I have therefore stood Rebecca Long-Bailey down from the shadow cabinet.”
But Ms Long Bailey – who stood against Sir Keir for the Labour leader role when Jeremy Corbyn announced he would quit – did not delete the tweet until last night.
A twitter account which records tweets that MPs delete showed it had been ditched at 11.43pm last night.
Ms Peake said in the article: “The tactics used by the police in America, kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, that was learnt from seminars with Israeli secret services.”
The article, published in The Independent added: “A spokesperson for the Israeli police has denied this, stating that ‘there is no tactic or protocol that calls to put pressure on the neck or airway’.”
Ms Peake has since admitted she was wrong and denied being antisemitic, which she said she finds “abhorrent.”
She said: “I feel it’s important for me to clarify that, when talking to The Independent, I was inaccurate in my assumption of American Police training & its sources.
“I find racism & antisemitism abhorrent & I in no way wished, nor intended, to add fodder to any views of the contrary.”
Sir Keir said that the article contained conspiracy theories but he does not believe that Ms Long-Bailey is antisemitic.
In a question and answer session with Scottish journalists, which was delayed until 3pm as Ms Long-Bailey was sacked, he twice said that he was “having one of those days” and declined to give any details of the conversation between the pair.
“I asked Rebecca Long-Bailey to step down from the shadow cabinet for sharing the article,” he said.
“I didn’t do that because she is antisemitic, I did it because she shared the article which has got, in my view, antisemitic conspiracy theories in it.
“My primary focus is on rebuilding trust with the Jewish communities. I didn’t think sharing that article was in keeping with that primary objective.”
The sacked front-bench MP for Salford and Eccles was forced to clarify her comments, saying: “I retweeted Maxine Peake’s article because of her significant achievements and because the thrust of her argument is to stay in the Labour Party.
“It wasn’t intended to be an endorsement of all aspects of the article.”
Sir Keir’s decision to sack Ms Long-Bailey has sparked a furoius row between the hard left of the Labour party who rushed to Ms Bailey defence.
Chair of the hard-left group Momentum Jon Lansman labelled the sacking as a “reckless overreaction”.
