Arnold Leese, notorious British anti-Semite, was cleared today by a British court of charges of defamatory libel. The suit was brought against Leese on the basis of his calling London’s police chief, Sir Harold Scott, a Jew.
In his anti-Jewish news sheet “Gothic Ripples,” Leese wrote that “police in the East End of London (heavily populated by Jews) appear to be instructed by their Jewish chief to knock off any street corner orator who dares to mention the word Jew in any disrespectful sense.” Leese denied that the statement was defamatory and the court upheld him, despite a police official’s statement that the police chief “feels his office has been impugned.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
