Middle East

Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills & Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Maude of Horsham) (Con)]

My Lords, this is by way of being my Dispatch Box swan song, unless I am summoned back here some time before 11 March. It is a great privilege to have the responsibility of winding up this debate. It has been sober, serious and thoughtful and my admiration for this House has been amplified by the skill with which noble Lords have managed to compress their wisdom, insight and knowledge into two minutes each. That is hugely to the benefit of the cause. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Grade for introducing this debate. The debate has overwhelmingly focused on Israel and Palestine, whereas the Middle East is an arena fraught with conflict and difficulty. Threats such as Daesh have recently emerged, but there is a huge number of issues which confront the stability of the world more widely.

My noble friend Lord Grade makes the case for more understanding. What drives understanding and builds confidence and friendship can be the role played by trade and investment. When people trade with each other, when they invest in each other’s jurisdictions, it builds confidence and understanding; people know each other better. We should never underestimate the benefit that flows from that. My noble friend Lord Grade focused on freedom of speech, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, the noble Lords, Lord Livermore and Lord Sacks, and my noble friend Lord Patten. All talked about the need for balance, respect, historical truths and to be even-handed, and the need not to take refuge in ancient grievances and distortions of history. Our higher education institutions—our universities—should be places where liberalism in its best sense and the respect for hearing other points of view are absolutely entrenched. I think all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate have understood that and reflected the importance of anyone who goes to university being willing to accept that they are places where open, honest debate must be allowed free rein.

Whether on campus or elsewhere, British Jews, like all communities, must be able to live their lives free from fear of verbal or physical attack. The best way to tackle anti-Semitism is through effective implementation of strong legislation against racial and religious discrimination. Of course, it is important that people in the Middle East itself should be able to be taught together; that will build understanding as well.

A number of noble Lords talked about boycotts and the BDS movement and commented on the announcement made recently in Israel by my successor as Minister for the Cabinet Office, Matthew Hancock. It is important that the BDS movement should be understood as something negative, for the organisations that seek to implement it in terms of the value for money that they get in spending public money for their institutions, and for the bad message or signal that it sends. Of course, where there is an agreed, legally established sanctions regime, that must be respected, but these kinds of movements are damaging. They divide people, reduce understanding, impede the peace process and make it more difficult to achieve the negotiated two-state solution that we all want to see.

The Middle East peace process is something that many noble Lords focused on in the course of this debate. The noble Lords, Lord Palmer, Lord Empey, Lord Stone and Lord Beecham, and many others have talked about the need for the Middle East process to get a new momentum. I cannot possibly do justice to all the points that have been raised but it is absolutely essential that we ultimately see a negotiated settlement leading to a safe and secure Israel living alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state. Of course there will need to be agreed land swaps; of course Jerusalem will need to be a shared capital of both states, with a just and agreed settlement for refugees. We know how much frustration there is; noble Lords on all sides of the Chamber have referred to the lack of progress. We know that the current situation is unacceptable and unsustainable. A just and lasting resolution that ends the occupation and delivers peace for both Israelis and Palestinians is long overdue.

We will continue to press both Israel and the Palestinians strongly on the need to refrain from actions that make peace more difficult. There is the danger that the longer it goes on, the more difficult it will be for that resolution to take place. We believe, obviously, that peace will come only through negotiations between the parties. Britain on its own cannot possibly make that happen.

We have a history in the region. It has not always been an easy one but it has been one of deep involvement. The noble Lord, Lord Empey, referred to our failure to understand. I think that in many ways we do understand it better than some others and we are more even-handed than some others. We can play a role in interpretation and mediation and we should not flinch from doing that. We will always want to judge any proposal on the basis of whether we believe it supports progress towards the two-state solution. International action, involving regional players, the European Union and the quartet, can play a role in supporting progress but we will always assess any moves on the basis of whether they support that progress towards the two-state solution.

A number of noble Lords, including my noble friends Lord Risby and Lord Rotherwick, referred to the upsurge of violence across the region since October. We should be clear that we condemn all acts of violence and we urge all sides to work together to promote peace. We want to see an end to these terrorist attacks. Every terrorist attack sets back the peace process and we want the authorities to take appropriate action against those who commit these crimes—and they are crimes. We call upon Hamas and the other militant groups to end the rocket fire and other attacks on Israel. We condemn the use of racist and hateful language. We deplore incitement on both sides of the conflict, including any comments that could stir up hatred and prejudice in a region that has already seen far too much of both.

To conclude, it is clear—if it was not clear before, this debate has made it absolutely clear—that the region faces numerous and serious challenges, for which there are no quick fixes. We must maintain our resolve to seek solutions. I go back to where I started: increasing trade and investment can enhance understanding and mutual interest and can play a part in leading to the conditions in which a sustainable, permanent solution can be found. Obviously, that change needs to be led principally by the region. I pay tribute to the work done by a number of noble Lords. The noble Baroness, Lady Nicholson, referred to the fact that three participants in this debate act as trade envoys to the Middle East region. The work they do in promoting trade and investment is important and I thank them for their commitment.

Supporting political solutions to end conflict and supporting those whose lives have been shattered by it; tackling the threat of extremism through building countries’ resilience and supporting the development of pluralistic and inclusive societies, which offer the people of the Middle East genuine hope and opportunity; and building on peace and stability to increase our mutual prosperity—these are ways, to go back to my noble friend Lord Grade’s contention at the outset, of increasing our understanding of the region. In addition, by what we do to promote mutual understanding between the communities and countries of the Middle East, we can hope to play our part, and it can be an important part, in securing a sustainable and permanent solution.