"We don't do those kinds of things", he said adamantly and we never have."
He was the leader, the person in charge.
He, who must be obeyed.
Yet, through time, his words and actions were found to be deceitful.
He would have him believe that it was all a matter of "process" and that he meant what he said.
How could he be anything but trustworthy?
You might think that I am referring to the current Leader of her Majesty's Opposition. The man that each of us fears could Gd forbid be the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
But I'm not.
I'm talking about one of his predecessors, another foe of the nascent Jewish nation - Jacob's uncle, Laban/Lavan.
In 1965, Father Edward Flannery, a Catholic Priest wrote an important book called "Anguish of the Jews, The : Twenty-Three Centuries of Antisemitism (Studies in Judaism and Christianity) "
He famously wrote:
"Anti-semitism is the longest and deepest hatred of human history...What other hatred has endured some twenty three centuries and survive a genocide of 6 million of its victims in its twenty-third century of existence only to find itself still intact and rich in potential for many years of life"
Authors have searched high and low for a rationale for the 'Longest Hatred'.
What is it about the Jews' that brings out such animosity in people?
Why would this hate warrant an entire so-called civilised nation to expend its time and resources to devise the Final Solution?
Why?
Last week, the Chief Rabbi wrote an extraordinary and unprecedented piece in the Times.
He asked the perennial question:
"Should the victims of racism be silenced by the fear of yet further vilification?"
"As we sit powerless, watching with incredulity as supporters of the Labour Party have hounded parliamentarians, party members and even staff out of the party for facing down anti-Jewish racism. Even as they received unspeakable threats against themselves and theire families, the response of the Labour leadership was utterly inadequate".
He continues in this vein with a list of frankly jaw-dropping accusations:
"Would associations with those who have openly incited hatred be enough?
Would support for a racist mural, depicting powerful hook-nosed Jews supposedly getting rich at the expense of the weak and downtrodden be enough?...."
And the response from the Labour leadership?
An 'apology' that is as vapid as the breath emanating from the sorrowful mouth that uttered it.
And then the Head of the Unite Union who criticised the Chief Rabbi's article, had the chutzpah to say "...everybody should be concerned and sorry about the type of hurt that has been caused by the Jewish Community".
"Should the victims of racism be silenced by the fear of yet further vilification?"
And it all began with Lavan.
What is it that gives him this unsavoury moniker?
Let's examine his behaviour towards Yaakov:
Laban begins by seeming like a friend.
He offers Jacob refuge when he is in flight from Esau, who has vowed to kill him.
He profits off Jacob, promising his daughter's hand in marriage and then cheats him by substituting her sister.
Jacob ends up working for his uncle for a period of 20 years and then -
Laban’s sons accuse him of getting rich at their father's expense
Laban is, in effect, the first anti-Semite.
History shows us that Jews continuously sought refuge from those, like Esau, who wished to kill them. The nations who gave them refuge seemed at first to be as benefactors, but at the same time, they saw in Jews, people who would make them rich. In other words, Jews didn't posess a sense of "British irony".
Wherever the Jews went, they brought prosperity to their hosts but they refused to be owned.
They had their own identity and way of life and insisted on the basic human right to be free.
The host society eventually turned against them and claimed that Jews were exploiting them - causing "hurt" to that same society for standing up for their rights. And like Jacob they realised that they had to flee to guarantee their freedom.
When Jews succeeded,they were accused of theft:
“The flocks are my flocks! All that you see is mine!” says Laban after Jacob has looked after and exponentially increased the animals he had been assigned.
They forgot that Jews had contributed massively to national prosperity - because it was much easier to blame them for the countries' woes.
So the yellow brick road of Haran eventually led to the blood splattered roads of Berlin and Vienna, Prague and Budapest, London and Paris, New York and Mumbai, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
And yet, like Jacob our ancestor, despite everything that was thrown at us, we survived and prospered. We overcame and vanquished the hate. Haran is but a memory in our shattered collective experience.
In 1944, some Czech Jews sang Hatikvah at the entrance to the Auschwitz/Birkenau gas chamber and we beaten by the SS guards. On 20th April 1945, five days after their liberation from Belsen, the survivors sang the very same song during the first Shul service in many years.
On Thursday, we will hopefully witness the undoing and humiliation of Laban's descendants and breathe a sigh of relief as a result. We have seen them before and we will shall see them again but, though "the very soul of our nation is at stake", we must have faith that our fellow Britons will eventually see through the bluster and see these racists for whom they really are.
The Labour Party can and must, rise from the quagmire that it has found itself in, if it really wishes this to happen. We, the descendants of Laban's nephew will do everything we can to ensure that the hurt that has been caused to us, will come to haunt the likes of Momentum, Unite and ultimately, the PLP itself.
Shabbat Shalom.