Tony Greenstein

Tony Greenstein (born December 1953) is a British left-wing activist and writer. An anti-fascist and former squatter, he was a founder member of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and stood for parliament as a representative of the Alliance for Green Socialism. In 2018, he was expelled from the Labour Party for "harassment" and "abusive language", over allegations of antisemitism. He was educated at King David High School, Liverpool.

He has written that he returned to formal education in later life. In 1996 he received a master's degree in Colonial History from Birkbeck, University of London. From 2000 to 2002 he took a law degree from the University of Sussex immediately followed by a Legal Practice Course at The College of Law in Guildford.

Career

In 2013, Greenstein was secretary of the Brighton and Hove Unemployed Workers Centre, a community centre in Hollingdean.

He was a founder member of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and in the 1980s, he ran the Labour Movement Campaign for Palestine.

Political activity In 1980, he was one of the founders of the Brighton Campaign Against Youth Unemployment and he was also involved with anti-fascist campaigns.

In 2005, Greenstein stood unsuccessfully for parliament in the Brighton Pavilion constituency for the Alliance for Green Socialism, getting 188 votes.

Greenstein was barred from joining the Labour Party in 2015 and then joined following the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader. He was suspended in 2016 regarding accusations of antisemitism and then expelled in February 2018 after a review by Labour's National Constitutional Committee.

Greenstein co-founded Labour Against the Witchhunt and told a Jewish Voice for Labour meeting during the 2018 Labour Party Conference that charges of antisemitism in the UK Labour Party were designed to destabilise Corbyn.

In July 2026 Greenstein reported that he had been expelled from the Green Party (having been suspended in April 2026) for alleged antisemitism.

Court cases In 2019, Greenstein sued the Campaign Against Antisemitism for libel over its claim that he was a "notorious antisemite". A court ruled that the CAA could use a defence of honest opinion rather than needing to prove its allegation was factually correct. A High Court justice dismissed Greenstein's case in 2020, ruling that based on tweets published by Greenstein in which he wrote about "racist scum", "Jewish Nazis", Nazi collaboration, and "Zios", an honest person could reasonably consider Greenstein an antisemite.

In December 2021 Greenstein accepted a two-year restraining order in return for the Crown Prosecution Service dropping two charges of harassment against the Labour Party's disputes team. The restraint order prevented him from further contacting the disputes team.

In September 2023 Greenstein was given a 9-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, for his part in a Palestine Action attack on the factory of Elbit Systems, an Israeli arms company, at Shenstone near Walsall. He was convicted, with three others, of intent to cause criminal damage.

In November 2024 Greenstein was charged with a terrorism offence under Section 12(1) of the Terrorism Act 2000. Greenstein was accused of supporting the proscribed organisation Hamas. The charges stemmed from social media comments posted by Greenstein on 7 October 2023, in which he expressed support for the "Gaza ghetto uprising". One post contained links to a blog post which stated "Whatever criticisms one can make of Hamas, we should congratulate them on this well planned and audacious attack on the Zionist enemy". During his trial in 2026 Greenstein said in his defence that he supported Hamas' actions against Israel but had consistently opposed it as an organisation. The judge cautioned Greenstein several times for discussing the Arab-Israeli conflict, stating that the jury was "not concerned with events in the Middle East". Greenstein gave the closing speech to the jury himself, rather than relying on his barrister. The judge said she considered charging him with contempt of court following this speech.