Ashley’s new Green councillor Abdul “Dull” Malik caught the attention of Lord Mann, the government’s Witchfinder General for antisemitism, last year. A video on Ab-Dull’s Facebook page featured Hamas defending their October 7 attacks and calling Israel “a cancer that should be eradicated.”

The national Green Party jumped into action and a party spokesman apologised, explaining Ab-Dull was “unwittingly tagged into an offensive post that he assures us he did not publish”.

However, screenshots of this – now deleted – post circulating online show the video was posted on what appears to be Ab-Dull’s Facebook page. Shown the screenshot, the Green Party still  insist that Ab-Dull did not publish the post. No explanation for this eccentric interpretation of events has been provided by the party.

Are they just lying?