Is ‘Labour Future’ a repeat of McSweeney’s ‘Labour Together’?

After the corruption of Morgan McSweeney’s Labour Together operation, a new Starmer-linked ‘think tank’ has been popping up on X timelines. Introducing ‘Labour Future’: an account with only 7,000 followers, but whose paid ads receive millions of views.

Those viewing figures suggest thousands of pounds in expenditure, but as with other Labour Party-affiliated lobby groups, the source of Labour Future’s funding seems unclear.

Demanding loyalty

The X ads demand loyalty to the ailing Keir Starmer, the most unpopular Prime Minister in recorded history. They also call for an end to “anonymous briefings against your own leader”.

However, Labour Party sources have not been limited to criticising the Starmer administration off the record. After giving a fiery interview to Jody McIntyre on 26 March, Labour MP Karl Turner was summarily suspended from the party within days, despite having been a member since the age of 13.

Like Morgan McSweeney’s outfit, Labour Future operates as a limited company. ‘Labour Future Limited’, which a Labour spokesperson once claimed had no affiliation to the party, was dissolved in 2022. It was reborn as ‘Labour Future (2025) Limited’ last August. Their director is sitting Labour councillor Brendan Chilton, but their advisory council includes a key McSweeney ally.

Maurice Glasman and the Labour Together network

Maurice Glasman, who once described Morgan McSweeney as ‘one of ours’, now sits on the four-man advisory council of Labour Future.

Glasman also joined Labour Together in its early days, working alongside the former Labour MP Jon Cruddas to attract initial funding from Trevor Chinn and Martin Taylor. Now housing minister Steve Reed, a long-time parliamentary supporter of Labour Friends of Israel (LFI), was introduced to the two lobbyists through Glasman and Cruddas, who were already receiving money for their ‘Blue Labour’ project.

As well as providing financial impetus, Chinn went on to serve as a director of Labour Together alongside McSweeney. He also made a personal £50,000 contribution to Keir Starmer’s 2020 leadership campaign. Chinn admitted that he ‘had great concerns about the election of an outspoken opponent of the Jewish state as Labour leader’, and was happy to back McSweeney’s preferred successor to Jeremy Corbyn.

When McSweeney was caught concealing over £730,000 in donations to Labour Together, the decision was attributed, at least in part, to protecting Chinn’s identity as the pressure group’s ‘great benefactor’.

As well as Maurice Glasman, Labour Future’s advisory council includes MPs Graham Stringer (another parliamentary supporter of Labour Friends of Israel) and Tris Osborne.

Epstein connections

In 2024, Glasman collaborated with his old Labour Together colleagues, LFI veteran Jon Cruddas and fellow Blue Labour devotee Jonathan Rutherford, to launch a ‘Future of the Left’ project.

The project was sponsored by Policy Exchange – another think tank that refuses to identify most of its donors. At times, however, Policy Exchange has acknowledged funders within its reports. One notes the ‘generous support’ of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, for example.

Bill Gates is reported to have ‘discussed the Gates Foundation and philanthropy’ with notorious paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. As with many of Epstein’s associates, Gates now says that he ‘regrets’ the relationship. Epstein’s ‘best pal’, Labour Party grandee Peter Mandelson, was a long-time mentor and ally of Morgan McSweeney.

The Mandelson scandal eventually led to McSweeney’s resignation, but Labour Together continues to operate.

Former IOF soldier joins board

Labour Together’s board now includes Jonathan Kestenbaum. In November 2010, a single paragraph in the Jewish Chronicle described Kestenbaum as ‘an ex-IDF soldier [and] holder of the Israel army’s “outstanding soldier award”‘, but the claim has never been repeated since.

Kestenbaum is also noted as ‘a former mazkir of Bnei Akiva’ – the international Zionist youth movement. On the website of their UK branch, Bnei Akiva define their ideology as ‘a religious Zionist worldview, actively seeking to be involved in the development of Medinat Yisrael [the State of Israel].’

Most evidence of Jonathan Kestenbaum’s time in the IDF seemed to have been scrubbed from the internet. There had been no mention of his military service on his Wikipedia page until I published my research on X on 13 April, having previously jumped straight from his time at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem to his return to the UK.

I did, however, find one source still available online: a 1989 article in the academic Journal of Palestine. The issue includes stories taken from the Israeli press, one of which is a series of ‘entries from the diary of a young Israeli soldier in the West Bank during the intifadah‘, which had been published in the September 24th 1988 international edition of the Jerusalem Post.

Jonathan Kestenbaum is described as an ‘IDF reservist’, and his diary excerpts are preceded by an introduction describing how what:

Kestenbaum … and his colleagues were not prepared for were the moral questions posed by service in the administered territories, although they were taught how to use clubs and tear gas.

Kestenbaum also describes ‘a policy of humiliation’ defined by ‘moments of arbitrary violence and excesses perpetrated by junior officers, enjoying unexpected power.’

‘Britain’s most active pro-Israeli lobbying organisation’

Kestenbaum was nominated to the House of Lords by the Labour Party’s leadership in 2010, following a seven-year stint as a director of the pro-Israeli lobby group BICOM.

BICOM were described in 2009 as “Britain’s most active pro-Israeli lobbying organisation”. At the time, the Guardian reported on BICOM’s approach:

Foreign reporters are bombarded with press releases and invitations to interview senior Israeli ministers and advisors at top London restaurants. Set up in 2001, it has regularly flown journalists to Tel Aviv.

BICOM was founded by billionaire Poju Zabludowicz. Zabludowicz inherited much of his wealth from his father Shlomo, ‘an arms dealer who made a fortune out of his close relations with the Israeli state.’ Former BICOM employees include Labour peer Ruth Smeeth and Luke Akehurst donor Lee Petar. Convicted fraudster Gerald Ronson and Wes Streeting donor David Menton have both funded the group.

The Israeli ambassadors

Labour Together’s Jonathan Kestenbaum has a cosy relationship with former Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor; leaked correspondence between the pair revealed an email with the subject line ‘From London with love’. By 2016, Kestenbaum was attempting to secure a job at oil company BP for Prosor, who he described as an ‘exceptional asset’.

A further set of leaked diaries revealed that in September 2024, Kestenbaum visited the residence of then Israeli ambassador Tzipi Hotovely for brunch. Hotovely’s diaries also revealed meetings with Stuart Roden, another Labour Party donor. Last January, Roden gave Labour Together £100,000.

RIT Capital Partners

From 2008-22, Kestenbaum was Chief Operating Officer at RIT Capital Partners, formerly known as the Rothschild Investment Trust. RIT’s founder, Jacob Rothschild, was the chair of the family’s Israel-based Yad Hanadiv foundation from 1989 until his death in 2024.

The foundation was ‘instrumental’ in the construction of the Israeli Parliament (Knesset) and Supreme Court buildings, and more recently entered into a partnership with the Israeli government to ‘renew’ the National Library of Israel.

Genie Energy

In 2010, an ‘entity connected to Jacob Rothschild’ purchased a 5% stake in Genie Energy. Jacob was also appointed to the Genie Strategic Advisory Board, alongside media baron Rupert Murdoch and former US vice-president and Halliburton CEO Dick Cheney.

In 2013, the Israeli state awarded Genie Energy exclusive gas and oil exploration rights in a 153-square mile area in the south of the Golan Heights, a Syrian territory illegally occupied by the Israeli state. At the time, an Israeli political analyst told the Financial Times:

This action is mostly political – it’s an attempt to deepen Israeli commitment to the occupied Golan Heights.

United Jewish Israel Appeal

Kestenbaum also previously served as chief executive of the United Jewish Israel Appeal (UJIA) charity. UJIA’s website declares ‘decades of experience in sending young Jews in the UK to Israel on rite of passage programmes’, which have previously included stays in illegal settlements. Trevor Chinn is president of the UJIA.

Labour Together may be attempting a rebrand in the post-McSweeney era, but their ties to the Israel lobby endure.