Labour fends off the Green party in closely watched UK by-election

Sagal Abdi-Wali, who arrived in the UK as child refugee from Somalia, won 3,300 more votes than Zack Polanski, leader of the Greens.

The Labour Party has won an election for a parliamentary seat vacated by former leader Keir Starmer, fending off a challenge from the left-wing Green Party in a boost for the British prime minister.

Labour candidate Sagal Abdi-Wali, the leader of the local council, won the seat in the central London constituency of Holborn and St Pancras with 12,292 votes, compared with 8,928 for Zack Polanski, the Green Party leader who came second.

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The victory, which had been expected, will buoy Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who was recently installed by lawmakers fearful that Starmer’s unpopularity was opening the way for a challenge by the populist Reform UK party at the next national election.

After losing left-wing support to the Greens earlier this year, Labour looks to have won many voters back, a result that triggered more questions about Polanski’s leadership, who had promised to make his party “an eco-populist” movement.

The Greens have drawn some voters away from Labour. There are now five Green MPs, compared with one in 2023.

But Polanski, 43, came under fire after party members passed a motion declaring that Zionism is racism at their annual conference.

The move, which called for “the establishment of a single democratic Palestinian State in all of historic Palestine” was criticised by Jewish groups, other parties and most Green Party lawmakers. Polanski did not vote on the motion.

Labour has held Holborn since the seat was created in 1983.

Labour’s Abdi-Wali, who arrived in the United Kingdom as a child refugee from Somalia, said her victory was a defeat for “those who seek to divide us”.

“We have a responsibility to defend what we’ve built and pass it on,” she said.

After conceding defeat, Polanski, who is not an MP, answered his critics, saying he would stay on as leader, and described the result as part of “Andy Burnham’s honeymoon”.

Polanski congratulated Abdi-Wali, but said, “One in three voters backed us here, and we know that many more considered it.”

Al Jazeera’s Sonia Gallego, reporting from London, said, “The constituency has been going through what some people have been calling ‘the Burnham bounce‘ … so far there is a deep sigh of relief (for Labour) that they’ve managed to hold on.”

Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has changed voter habits. The Greens, far more critical of Israel’s conduct than any other party, got a boost in the 2024 general election.

Back then, Starmer won the seat with 49 percent. Andrew Feinstein, a pro-Palestine independent candidate, came second, with 19 percent.

Polanski has raised the “progressive vote” while “reducing the Labour vote”, he said.