Fresh Labour antisemitism row after controversial cartoon awarded as prize at event where Corbyn's wife spotted

Exclusive: Labour members enter draw to win drawings rejected by national newspaper amid antisemitism controversy

Labour is facing a fresh antisemitism row after a signed copy of a controversial cartoon was handed out as a raffle prize a fringe event at the party's annual conference.

The event, organised by the left-wing Labour Representation Committee (LRC) group, featured speakers who had been expelled or suspended by the party over antisemitism, including controversial MP Chris Williamson. Jeremy Corbyn's wife, Laura Alvarez, was spotted at the event, although Labour insisted she had attended by mistake.

LRC's president is John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, who faced fresh calls to resign from the role.

Members at the packed-out LRC event in Brighton took part in a raffle to win two signed drawings by controversial cartoonist Steve Bell that were rejected by The Guardian, where he works.

One of the cartoons depicted Labour's deputy leader, Tom Watson, as a horse-back "antisemite hunter" encountering Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and labelling him "an antisemitic trope".

It was the subject of a major row after The Guardian newspaper refused to print it, prompting Mr Bell to send a furious email to all of the paper's staff insisting that the cartoon was "not antisemitic, nor is it libellous".

He accused the paper of having "some mysterious editorial line that has been drawn around the subject of antisemitism and 'antisemitic tropes' and added: "In some ways this is even more worrying for me than specious charges of antisemitism."

The other cartoon depicted Theresa May meeting with Mr Netanyahu while Razan al-Najjar, a Palestinian nurse killed by Israeli forces, burned in the fireplace behind them.

Mr Bell had claimed he was being "unfairly traduced and censored" after it was pulled last year.

Several hundred members at the LRC event heard from Mr Williamson and Jackie Walker, an activist who was expelled by Labour for claiming that Jews had funded the slave trade. Ms Walker also questioned why Holocaust Memorial Day should focus so much on Jewish people.

Mr Williamson is currently suspended from Labour after being filmed arguing that the party had given "too much ground" on antisemitism and been "too apologetic".

Mr McDonnell was not present at the event, and his spokesman insisted he had "no day-to-day involvement in the operation of the LRC and is not responsible for its activities".

But in a tweet, the Jewish Leadership Council said: "John McDonnell has been made aware of the issues with LRC on multiple occasions. If we needed any more proof of why any politician who claims to be anti-racist should play no role in the organisation, here it is.

Asked why Mr Corbyn's wife had been present at the event, a Labour Party source said: "Laura was not attending the LRC event. She was attending another event in the same venue and had no idea the LRC event was taking place beforehand. When she got to the venue, the LRC event was still going, so she left.

"The LRC event was supposed to take place in a different venue and the website still advertises it as taking place in a different venue so there's no way she could have known it was on before the event she was attending."