Harry's Place is a British political blog concerned with what the website writers perceive as extremism of the right and left, as well as anti-Zionism and

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

Politics

''Harry's Place'' was supportive of the

2003 invasion of Iraq The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including 26 ...

, the concept of liberal interventionism, and liberal dissident movements in the Islamic world. It is a supporter of a

two-state solution The two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict envisions an independent State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel, west of the Jordan River. The boundary between the two states is still subject to dispute and negotia ...

to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. It is opposed to Islamism and what it characterizes as totalitarian, pro-Islamist and antisemitic tendencies in its ranks. Figures associated with these tendencies are often strongly criticized, including

Raed Salah Raed (; Arabic: , ') is an Arabic male name, meaning ''leader or pioneer''. People * Raed Arafat (born 1964), Syrian-born physician of Palestinian descent and Romanian citizenship * Raed Elhamali, Libyan-American basketball player * Raed Fares, Syr ...

, and

Yusuf al-Qaradawi Yusuf al-Qaradawi ( ar, يوسف القرضاوي, translit=Yūsuf al-Qaraḍāwī; or ''Yusuf al-Qardawi''; 9 September 1926 – 26 September 2022) was an Egyptian Islamic scholar based in Doha, Qatar, and chairman of the International Union of ...

. In the context of UK politics, the site is particularly critical of

Jeremy Corbyn Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. On the political left of the Labour Party, Corbyn describes himself as a socialist ...

, George Galloway, Ken Livingstone, the

British National Party The British National Party (BNP) is a far-right, fascist political party in the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in Wigton, Cumbria, and its leader is Adam Walker. A minor party, it has no elected representatives at any level of UK gover ...

, the Socialist Workers Party, and the

Stop the War Coalition The Stop the War Coalition (StWC), informally known simply as Stop the War, is a British group established on 21 September 2001, shortly after the September 11 attacks, to campaign against what it believes are unjust wars. The Coalition has c ...

. It defines itself as a staunch opponent of religious and political censorship of all kinds and was supportive of the 2006 London March for Free Expression. The site was also one of the main backers of the

Euston Manifesto The Euston Manifesto ( ) is a liberal conservative, pro-American, 2006 declaration of principles signed by a group of academics, journalists and activists based in the United Kingdom, named after the Euston Road in London where it had its meetin ...

Nick Cohen Nicholas Cohen (born 1961) is a British journalist, author and political commentator. He was a columnist for '' The Observer'' and a blogger for '' The Spectator''. Following accusations of sexual harassment, he left The Observer in 2022 and be ...

has argued that ''Harry's Place'' was one of only few places where it was being noted that "a section of the left is allied with religious fanaticism and, for the first time since the Hitler-Stalin pact, hellip;has gone soft on fascism". The blog is critical of anti-Zionism and antisemitism. To a lesser extent, the blog has also challenged academics critical of Israel such as

Norman Finkelstein Norman Gary Finkelstein (; born December 8, 1953) is an American political scientist, activist, former professor, and author. His primary fields of research are the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the politics of the Holocaust. He is a g ...

Noam Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky i ...

, and

Shlomo Sand Shlomo Sand (pronounced ''Zand''; he, שלמה זנד; born 10 September 1946) is an Israeli Emeritus Professor of History at Tel Aviv University.Guardian'' award for

political blog A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order s ...

s, the 2005 Weblog awards for UK blogs.

Contributors

Harry's Place was originally started by a blogger, using the nom de plumes Harry Steele and Harry Hatchet or just Harry, who was originally the sole writer. The

11 September 2001 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commerc ...

on the

World Trade Center World Trade Centers are sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may refer to: Buildings * List of World Trade Centers * World Trade Center (2001–present), a building complex that includes five skyscrapers, a ...

served as a "wake up call" according to Harry, prompting him to try to better understand what political forces led up to it. In 2002, he began blogging as a way to clarify his own thoughts on political issues such as the impending war in Iraq, moving away from his Communism to embrace a more moderate social-democratic worldview. He made a public break with his former views in a

Workers' Liberty The Alliance for Workers' Liberty (AWL), also known as Workers' Liberty, is a Trotskyism, Trotskyist group in Britain and Australia, which has been identified with the theorist Sean Matgamna throughout its history. It publishes the newspaper ''So ...

message board An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are often longer than one line of text, and are at least temporar ...

discussion in October 2002, where he said Stalinism was a viewpoint "I now reject totally". The rapid growth in the site's audience led him to include other like-minded writers so that the blog could be updated more regularly. Harry ceased to contribute regularly at the end of September 2005. Other contributors have included Marcus, Gene Zitver (aka "Gene"), David Toube, and more recently, Adam LeBor, Brett Lock, Brian Meredith, Edmund Standing, Hasan Afzal, Michael Ezra, 'Lucy Lips', Rabbi Zvi Solomons and others. Marcus attended the 15 February, 2003 anti-war protest in London, and came away with the opinion that "I don't know if I can consider myself left-wing anymore if this is the left". Marcus wrote about his views on the politics behind the 15 February demonstration, and soon became a regular contributor. Gene is a resident of the United States from a trade union background, who has spent several years living in Israel. Harry came across Gene's posts on a George Orwell discussion list, and invited him to start posting on his blog. Gene was a strong opponent of President

Hugo Chavez Hugo or HUGO may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Hugo'' (film), a 2011 film directed by Martin Scorsese * Hugo Award, a science fiction and fantasy award named after Hugo Gernsback * Hugo (franchise), a children's media franchise based on a ...

of Venezuela, whom he accused of being authoritarian. Some Harry's Place writers post under pseudonyms: the pseudonyms used include Lucy Lips, habibi, Libby T, Israelinurse, and Alan A. David Toube is a lawyer and former lecturer, and director of policy at Quilliam. He also came to blogging after the 11 September attacks. One of his close childhood friends was among those killed in the

, while another close childhood friend became a militant Islamist, and appeared in the media applauding the attacks. Toube has said that he took up reading and writing blogs as a way of trying to making sense of these events.

Johann Hari Johann Eduard Hari (born 21 January 1979) is a British-Swiss writer and journalist who has written for ''The Independent'' and ''The Huffington Post''. In 2011, Hari was suspended from ''The Independent'' and later resigned, after admitting to ...

also contributed articles to the weblog until Autumn 2004, when he left to start his own blog.

Controversy

On 26 August 2008, Harry's Place was briefly offline following a complaint to its DNS provider. The site had reported that a member of the university and college union's discussion list had posted links to American white nationalist

David Duke David Ernest Duke (born July 1, 1950) is an American white supremacist, antisemitic conspiracy theorist, far-right politician, convicted felon, and former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. From 1989 to 1992, he was a membe ...

's website to support the call for a boycott on Israel.

References

External links

Harry's Place
{{Neoconservatism British political blogs Neoconservatism