A Labour councillor accused of calling for the execution of Jews in an anti-Semitic Facebook post has claimed his account was hacked.
Bognor Regis town councillor Damien Enticott was suspended from the Labour Party on Friday after a post appeared on his Facebook page calling Talmud Jews “parasites”.
It appeared that Enticott shared a video which accused Jewish people of drinking blood and sexually assaulting babies, posted with the accompanying words: “They also believe any child over 3 years old that isn’t a Jew should be treated like a parasite, they believe it is okay to even rape that child because it’s [sic] is worthless”.
The post continued: “To treat a non Jew decently means that you are as bad as them. All Talmuds need executing!”
But Enticott told HuffPost UK someone had accessed his page without his knowledge.
“It’s someone in my house that has accessed it and thinks its funny,” he said. “I live in a shared house – I live in a pub, with a lot of people above it in a shared house and one of them has put it up in a post.
“I’ve had massive problems from the Labour Party because of it, because obviously they have been under fire and I’ve taken it off and everything like that, so it’s not something I have put up myself.”
Insisting that that he is “not anti-Semitic in any way”, Enticott continued: “I’ve actually got Jewish friends.”
Commenting about “Talmud Jews”, he added: “I share views against some of the stuff that they do, but it’s not something I would express on things like that and it’s not the way that I would express it either.”
The Talmud is a written version of Jewish oral law and commentaries about it.
A spokesperson for the Labour Party said it takes all complaints of anti-Semitism “extremely seriously” and that it is “committed to challenging and campaigning against it in all its forms”.
“Complaints about anti-Semitism are fully investigated in line with our rules and procedures and any appropriate disciplinary action is taken.”