England's Greens peel Muslim votes away from Labour
The Greens win a by-election with an Urdu-language campaign ad and appeal to the Muslim vote against Labour. Could they replace them as the third force?
English · Original discussion in Spanish · Published
England's Green Party is chipping away at Labour's Muslim vote: a real threat?
Three weeks after winning the Gorton & Denton by-election with a campaign ad entirely in Urdu, the British Green Party is positioning itself as Labour's biggest headache. Their recipe: appealing to the Muslim vote with a hard line against Israel and accusing Starmer of being complicit in genocide. The strategy worked in that constituency, and the party is already looking ahead to the general election.
A sectarian campaign that works
The campaign video, circulating on social media, shows a photo of Keir Starmer alongside Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The message is direct: British Jovenlandeses of Pakistani origin — who already view Labour with suspicion — must "punish Labour over Gaza". The move makes sense: India and Pakistan are historic enemies, and linking Labour to Modi is emotional dynamite. The result was victory in Gorton & Denton, a constituency with a strong Pakistani presence.
The party's leader, Zack Polanski, is Jewish. A detail that does not go unnoticed: a leader with that profile heads a party that has made the Palestinian cause its main electoral weapon. On their X accounts, the Greens congratulate Jovenlandeses on Eid al-Adha and spend every day calling Labour politicians "genocide accomplices".
Green outside, but what inside?
The ideological profile of the British Greens is a matter of dispute. Some see them as a "watermelon" party (green outside, red inside), trinc Gramscian theory: they prioritise identity struggles over workers' material problems. Others, however, place them in a liberal "yellow" camp, deeply pro-NATO and pro-EU, closer to the establishment than to the radical left. Recent evidence suggests that, at least in the UK, the Greens are further to the left than their German counterparts, and in Wales and Scotland they even embrace independence and republicanism.
The open question is whether this sectarian appeal strategy can scale to national level. Labour has been losing support among British Jovenlandeses for years, and the Greens have found a goldmine. If the rest of the left-wing parties fail to react, the "Pagueta party" — as one analyst dubbed it — could keep stealing seats in key constituencies.
Related debates in the forum
Three weeks after winning the Gorton & Denton by-election with a campaign ad entirely in Urdu, the British Green Party is positioning itself as Labour's biggest headache. Their recipe: appealing to the Muslim vote with a hard line against Israel and accusing Starmer of being complicit in genocide. The strategy worked in that constituency, and the party is already looking ahead to the general election.
A sectarian campaign that works
The campaign video, circulating on social media, shows a photo of Keir Starmer alongside Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The message is direct: British Jovenlandeses of Pakistani origin — who already view Labour with suspicion — must "punish Labour over Gaza". The move makes sense: India and Pakistan are historic enemies, and linking Labour to Modi is emotional dynamite. The result was victory in Gorton & Denton, a constituency with a strong Pakistani presence.
The party's leader, Zack Polanski, is Jewish. A detail that does not go unnoticed: a leader with that profile heads a party that has made the Palestinian cause its main electoral weapon. On their X accounts, the Greens congratulate Jovenlandeses on Eid al-Adha and spend every day calling Labour politicians "genocide accomplices".
Green outside, but what inside?
The ideological profile of the British Greens is a matter of dispute. Some see them as a "watermelon" party (green outside, red inside), trinc Gramscian theory: they prioritise identity struggles over workers' material problems. Others, however, place them in a liberal "yellow" camp, deeply pro-NATO and pro-EU, closer to the establishment than to the radical left. Recent evidence suggests that, at least in the UK, the Greens are further to the left than their German counterparts, and in Wales and Scotland they even embrace independence and republicanism.
The open question is whether this sectarian appeal strategy can scale to national level. Labour has been losing support among British Jovenlandeses for years, and the Greens have found a goldmine. If the rest of the left-wing parties fail to react, the "Pagueta party" — as one analyst dubbed it — could keep stealing seats in key constituencies.
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Summary of a discussion on Burbuja.info - Foro de economía, actualidad y política., translated from Spanish and reviewed before publication. Read the full discussion (12 replies).
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