George Galloway has asked Pope Francis to “intervene” over a tweet by Alan Sugar in which he compared Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet to the skulls inside a Roman Catholic chapel.
The former Labour politician said the post by the businessman and host of The Apprentice was “intolerable”, blasphemous and “an offence against the Church”.
Addressing his message to the Pope, Mr Galloway said: “Please Father intervene.”
Lord Sugar, visiting the Ossuary Chapel of the Cathedral of Otranto in southern Italy, had tweeted a photo showing the skulls of Christian martyrs, along with the quip: “Looks like @jeremycorbyn shadow cabinet.”
In a sequence of outraged responses, Mr Galloway said: “This man is literally unhinged, deeply disturbed, deeply disturbing.”
Calling Lord Sugar “Lord S****”, the former Respect MP added: “Sacred relics of martyrs in a Cathedral used in a contemptuous mockery of Corbyn by Sugar.
“Thank God nobody will reciprocate against any other religion because that too would be sacrilege.”
Mr Galloway was sacked by TalkRadio in June after congratulating Liverpool for beating Tottenham Hotspur in the Champion’s League final by tweeting: “No Israel flags on the Cup!”
He also directed crossbench peer’s tweet to Twitter Support team, stating: “This is blasphemy.”
The 1,000-year-old cathedral in Otranto contains the bones of around 800 Christian martyrs killed by Ottoman invaders, and is visited by thousands of tourists and religious pilgrims each year.
Lord Sugar quit the Labour party in 2015 and has been a constant critic of the party’s left-wing leader.
He did not respond to criticisms of his joke, only saying “p*** off” when one Twitter user pointed out a spelling error in his tweet.
