King’s Speech

Lord Leigh of Hurley Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)]

My Lords, I start by congratulating Labour on their win three weeks ago and the Ministers on their appointment. I canvassed hard in a number of seats held by the Conservatives and despite, or possibly because of, my endeavours on the street, and despite a record 35,000 steps in one day, we lost them all.

I do not normally speak on the foreign affairs day of the humble Address, as I tend to focus on economic and business matters, but it seems to me that we are now facing unique and unprecedented challenges in respect of our foreign policy and it is seeping into our domestic politics—to such an extent that some 500,000 of our His Majesty’s subjects are represented by an MP who regards Gaza as the most pressing matter, to the point that some have claimed that their win is for Gaza alone. This is a very unsatisfactory situation for those in such constituencies who may regard their and their family’s welfare and well-being at home as more important. So it is vital that the Government are very clear on where it stands on certain issues and do not send mixed messages, as may be the case.

In this respect, I would be grateful if the Minister could unequivocally advise us on the Government’s stance on the International Criminal Court. Does the Minister agree that that there is no moral equivalence between Hamas, responsible for the worst attacks on Jewish people since the Holocaust, and Israel? I was horrified to hear earlier on a suggestion of equivocality between the hostages and the criminals in jail in Israel. Accordingly, will HM Government continue to object the prosecutor’s application for arrest warrants for democratically elected Israeli officials?

At this point, I refer your Lordships to my various declared interests in the Middle East and thank the Government of Qatar for inviting me to meet the Prime Minister while he was in London and their Foreign Secretary, Dr Mohamed Al-Khulaifi, among others in Doha.

As always in the Middle East, there are nuances that need to be understood and a huge amount of work that happens away from the public eye to try to resolve a very difficult situation. Naturally, I regard the release of the hostages as the absolute key and first step that must be implemented. Unlike some—and, I hope, like our Government—I do not believe this can be post ceasefire; it needs to happen now, and I hope the Minister shares my concern. We all recognise that, if the hostages are released now, the fighting will cease.

In the short time I have left, I want to concentrate on UNRWA. I have seen the work of Senator Chris Smith and the evidence that his committee has examined, showing how the Colonna report is a whitewash. Given Ms Colonna’s previous position, this is not a surprise, but even her report conceded that UNRWA does not vet employees for connections or sympathies with Hamas or Islamic Jihad.

For many the whole premise of UNRWA is flawed; it is serving the great-grandchildren of the people it was meant to help, many of whom are in such dire circumstances only due to the failure of Arab states to allow their integration and former Arab leaders failing to agree a peace deal which was in their grasp.

Please be in no doubt that my heart goes out to the very many totally innocent victims in Gaza—and of course elsewhere, but particularly in Gaza—where the main organisation charged with helping them has in fact become twisted into inciting violence as an incubator of hatred, even to the point of encouraging children to “martyrdom” as suicide bombers. There will never be a two-state solution while this continues.

The monitoring group UN Watch disclosed that more than 3,000 UNRWA staff and teachers celebrated the 7 October attack on Telegram, praising murderers and rapists as heroes, and Hamas war rooms have been found in UNRWA’s offices in Gaza City. Some of the hostages were held in the houses of UNRWA teachers—teachers who incite anti-Semitism and celebrate terrorism. I ask the Minister for categoric assurances that the very controversial decision to recommend funding UNRWA will be properly monitored and, most importantly, that genuine efforts will be made to find alternative and better routes to provide aid.

In conclusion, I have been to the border pass at Kerem Shalom, I have seen the lorries piled up and I have listened to the evidence of looting and theft by Hamas of aid which is so desperately needed by the innocent victims. Deflecting the blame to Israel misses the point. Of course there have been catastrophic mistakes on all sides, but one party is in Gaza to prevent future terrorism and the other is there to promote it. We need to be clear where we stand and protect our taxpayers’ money from abuse and waste. As the London Times said this week:

“UNRWA is only indispensable to Hamas, not ordinary Palestinians”.

King’s Speech

Lord Leigh of Hurley Excerpts

Wednesday 15th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)]

My Lords, shortly before the fateful day of 7 October, I had just read Jonathan Freedland’s book The Escape Artist about the one person who managed to escape successfully from Auschwitz, and I had just started the outstanding book by my noble friend Lord Finkelstein entitled Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad. Both works tell remarkable stories about a minuscule number of exceptionally brave and strong people who managed to escape the horrors of the Holocaust physically, if not mentally. Of course, 6 million Jews did not survive, and the Jewish people swore: never again. Nearly all the world, and certainly the western world, agreed that the Jewish people should be granted the right to live in a very small part of the land that some of them had called home for some 2,000 years.

The history is relevant—I speak in front of eminent historians—to the recurrent war in the Middle East in order to understand that Israel is not prepared to take any chances against a group that declares it wants to exterminate its citizens. Those who chant “From the river to the sea”, as they are doing right now outside our House, should know that every time they chant that particular chant they stiffen the resolve of the Jewish people to ensure that the wish that that chant expresses of wiping out the Jewish state will not be allowed to take place, whatever the cost. While many who marched last weekend did so with a simplistic desire to stop pain and suffering, it is clear, as video clips testified, that some did not, calling for “Death to the Jews” and “Hitler was right”.

The conflict is most unlikely to end with a ceasefire as Hamas has made clear, through the likes of Khalil al-Hayya, that the goal of the war was not to improve life in Gaza for its inhabitants but to turn the state of war with Israel into a permanent one. Iran wants borderless open war against Israel to annihilate Israel. It may actually be that Hamas launched its atrocities against Israel without Iran’s support, as Iran would rather have waited until such time as it became a nuclear state. That is probably the only reason that Iran and Hezbollah have not joined in the war. If they had waited, it is almost certain that Iran would then have insisted on a global dimension against Jews in North and South America, Europe and, of course, here in the UK. So it was reassuring to hear in the King’s Speech that steps are going to be taken to counter anti-Semitism in this country. We will need them.

The existential threat that Israel faces requires it to eliminate Hamas as best it can. Of course, warfare cannot defeat an ideology, but it can neutralise it, if only for a while, and it can certainly neutralise its ability to commit the genocide that it seeks. So the heart-breaking pictures of innocents in Gaza killed because Hamas used them as human shields will haunt us, but we must remember that the IDF is recognised by British military experts as one of the most humane armies in the world. Every single attack is carefully considered and warnings, even as localised as specific telephone calls, mark them out as undertaking a campaign unlike any other ever undertaken anywhere in the world’s history, to try to mitigate civilian casualties.

It is now clear that Hamas stores weapons in tunnels right underneath Gaza’s al-Rantisi hospital and others—in tunnels most probably built in part by aid given to Gaza in good faith by countries such as our own and stolen by Hamas for its leaders’ benefit. I am of course pleased to see that we have offered a further £30 million of humanitarian aid, but can we be sure that that is not going to buy fuel to fire rockets and subsidise luxury living in Qatar?

I am afraid I do not believe that the two-state solution will happen in our lifetime. Rather, a more innovative structure may be required whereby Palestinians have control over nearly all aspects of their lives, but not security or defence—rather like in this country, where the devolved nations do not have their own military. Apart from my other relevant interests in the register, as your Lordships will recall, I am chairman of the Jerusalem Foundation in the UK. As such, I talk to residents of East Jerusalem, and many there want to be part of the Israeli state. They want the healthcare and the benefits, and they want the vote.

It is premature to plan for two states, but there are practical steps that His Majesty’s Government can take. First, we should be offering help to both sides. We are rightly offering humanitarian help to Gazan citizens. British military personnel have outstanding skills in medical rehab for combat casualties, as I saw for myself at a Royal Marines fundraiser that I was honoured to attend last week. They are ready and able to assist Israeli soldiers injured in combat. Will my noble friend Lord Minto respond to this request?

Secondly, we need to be at the centre of the plan to rebuild Gaza. We should be talking to the Arab countries —and others who are understandably and correctly expressing sympathy for those Palestinians who are caught up in this conflict—about a reconstruction fund of some $100 billion, ideally with grants available to every citizen of Gaza to rebuild their lives, free from Hamas and Iran. Israel has created a booming economy next door to Gaza, and it can be done in Gaza under a different leadership.

Finally, the news that this House will soon have the future Lord Cameron as a Minister, and now has my noble friend Lord Roberts on our Benches, is one of the very few pieces of good news that we have had in the last month. I for one am really pleased to be welcoming him to your Lordships’ House to address the very difficult times we face ahead.