THE Labour Party has removed a potential election candidate after her previous comments about Jews sparked a furore.

But critics say questions remain unanswered about how former Respect activist Nasreen Khan came to be shortlisted for political office in the first place.

A spokesman for the online group Labour Against Anti-Semitism asked how Ms Khan had been allowed to join the Labour Party, had been approved as a potential election candidate and had then made it onto a shortlist-of-two in Little Horton, despite previous “anti-Semitic behaviour that had received press coverage”.

He said: “The answers will decide whether the case of Nasreen Khan is simply another failure of candidate vetting, or more worryingly, indicative of a broader failure by a Labour Party now fundamentally unable to deal with anti-Semitism effectively.”

Ms Khan, who had been shortlisted by the party to contest the safe Little Horton seat on Bradford Council, had apologised over the comments she made on Facebook five years ago, which she said were “inappropriate and unacceptable”.

She had hit headlines in 2012 when, commenting on a video called ‘The Palestine you need to know’ and using the name Naz Kahn, she had said: “It’s such a shame that the history teachers in our school never taught us this but they are the first to start brainwashing us and our children into thinking the bad guy was Hitler.

“What have the Jews done good in this world??”

When questioned about the comment, she had added: “No, I’m not a Nazi, I’m an ordinary British Muslim that had an opinion and put it across. We have worse people than Hitler in this world now.”

And, facing further criticism, she had said: “Stop beating a dead horse. The Jews have reaped the rewards of playing victims. Enough is enough!!”

But after the Telegraph & Argus last week exclusively revealed she had made the Labour shortlist, the party once again found itself facing accusations in the national media of failing to deal with anti-Semitism.

The party re-interviewed Ms Khan on Wednesday and that evening a spokesman for the Labour Party said: “Following an investigation, Nasreen Khan has been removed from Labour’s panel of approved candidates in Bradford.

“Labour condemns all anti-Semitism in the strongest possible terms.”

The spokesman confirmed she remained a member of the party.

Ms Khan was yesterday unavailable for comment.

Bradford Synagogue chairman Rudi Leavor, who had called Ms Khan’s previous comments “odious” while acknowledging her apology, said he welcomed the party’s decision to remove her as a potential candidate.

But Councillor Simon Cooke, leader of Bradford Council’s opposition Conservatives, said: “It is quite shocking that it’s taken a national media furore in the end to get the Labour Party to actually remove this person from their selection process.”