Peterborough shows that the next general election will be the most divisive— and dirtiest— of modern times | thearticle

The Peterborough by-election is a reminder that new parties rarely establish themselves as permanent features on the British political landscape. The Brexit Party is no exception. Nigel

Farage might have won the seat if he had stood himself, but he did not take the risk. Nor did he manage expectations. Beating the Tories into second place was a good result that looks like a

defeat. Though he and his party live to fight another day, the Labour victory was a reality check. Farage has always been a much greater threat to the Tories than to Labour. Boris Johnson

will feel vindicated by the close result. His message is: vote Farage, get Corbyn. If the Brexit Party had not fought the seat, the Conservatives would probably have taken it. Unless they

can somehow “put Farage back in his box”, they face defeat, if not “extinction”, at the next general election. And Boris looks like the man to do it. This opens up the possibility of an

electoral pact. None of the candidates for the Tory leadership will talk about this during the contest, but they are all thinking about it. What price can Farage exact? He may never be more

powerful than he is now. The threat he poses is more powerful than the execution. Yet many Brexit Party voters would be furious if their leader were to abandon the “revolution” he has

promised. A deal with the Conservative Party, even one led by a committed Brexiteer, would look like the kind of betrayal that has been the stock in trade of Faragiste oratory. Don’t expect

talks between the two parties any time soon. How did Labour win the Peterborough by-election? There was much praise for their “ground game”; clearly the other parties were outnumbered and

outgunned. But as the polls closed, the BBC’s seasoned correspondent John Pienaar drew attention to another, possibly decisive, factor. Labour, he bravely pointed out, had been highly

effective at getting out “the Muslim vote”. Has the BBC ever broken this taboo before? Pienaar, any rate, was not afraid to do so. Across parts of the country, the Muslim vote has long been

Labour’s secret weapon — so much so, in fact, that it is often seen among other minorities, such as Hindus and Sikhs, as “the Muslim party”. Campaigning in areas heavily populated by Muslims

is of course legitimate. But there is suggestive evidence that at Peterborough such campaigning crossed a line into the kind of dog-whistle politics of which Labour accuses Farage. Lisa

Forbes, the Labour candidate, used Facebook to signal her openness to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. She “liked” posts that claimed Theresa May was a puppet of “Zionist slave masters” and

that Isis was created by Mossad and the CIA. Though she later apologised, a subliminal message was sent to voters with similar sympathies. Such conspiracy theories are staples of Islamist

propaganda. The same phenomenon can be observed on a much larger scale every time Jeremy Corbyn and his comrades are caught peddling anti-Semitism. The more the Jewish community and others

protest, the more Labour can consolidate support among those voters who believe that the Brexit Party is Islamophobic and the Tories are bankrolled by Jewish donors. The Peterborough result

suggests that, in marginal constituencies, Labour knows it will benefit at the ballot box from turning a blind eye to anti-Semitism. Peterborough marks a new phase in the Brexit story. From

now on, the looming deadline of October 31 means that Westminster is braced for convulsions that may well plunge the country into what promises to be the most divisive general election of

modern times. Theresa May stands down as Tory leader today. Her departure may in retrospect be seen to signify the end of a game of two-party politics played according to rules laid down in

another era by those whom the Queen both commemorated and represented this week: the “resilient” generation. The first rule of the new political game is: there are no rules. The new politics

will be more unpredictable — and much, much dirtier.