Oral Answers to Questions

Tommy Sheppard Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

11. What recent assessment he has made of Israel’s compliance with its obligations under international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (David Rutley)]

As a friend of Israel, we have a regular dialogue on human rights and all matters relating to the occupation. That includes encouraging the Government of Israel to abide by their obligations under international law. We are concerned by instability on the west bank and call on all sides to work together to urgently de-escalate the situation.

[Tommy Sheppard]

In the past year, we have had three compelling reports, produced by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Israeli organisation B’Tselem. All of them accuse the Israeli authorities of committing the crime of apartheid. We have had plans published recently to effectively annex the west bank into Israel, and we now have the appointment of violently racist Ministers into the Israeli Government. Is it not time to step up the diplomatic pressure on Israel to ensure that it abides by international law and upholds the rights of Palestinians?

[David Rutley]

First, we do not recognise the terminology about apartheid. Any judgment on serious crimes under international law is a matter for judicial decision, rather than for Governments or non-judicial bodies. We do work closely with the Israeli Government. We condemn any incidents of violence by settlers against the Palestinians.

Palestine: Road Map to Peace

Tommy Sheppard Excerpts

Wednesday 17th November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Tahir Ali), on bringing forward the debate. For almost 30 years, we have been discussing, and there has been international consensus on, the prospect of a two-state solution. Most people in this Parliament, and most nations across the world, would endorse that approach. It is the approach that my party fully supports. However, we recognise that we have to consider that policy objective against the reality of what is happening on the ground. We cannot turn our eyes away and pretend that one of those states has not been engaged, ever since the Oslo accords, in systematically destroying the building blocks on which the other state will emerge and develop.

First, and most obviously, the Israeli state is occupying the lands designated to become the Palestinian state. Not only is it militarily occupying them, but it has no policy objective to ever end that occupation. Secondly, as has been referred to, the programme of settler colonisation has seen more than 600,000 people move into the militarily occupied areas, which has led to the displacement of the Palestinian populations that were there. The infrastructure that comes with that results in the de facto annexation of the territory, even if it is not legally claimed. Thirdly, there is the question of Jerusalem, as has been indicated. There is what can only be called the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian communities to remove them from the east of In East Jerusalem. That has been given a veneer of legitimacy and respectability by Israel’s law, although that law would not pass any international test of fairness.

Finally, the Israeli Government are, as a matter of policy, systematically trying to reduce and deny the capacity of Palestinian society to represent itself politically. That is why the recent criminalisation of six non-violent civil organisations is of so much concern. The extension of that criminalisation, by military law, to the occupied territories may well result in arrests and offices closing. All of that denies Palestinian people the ability to organise and be represented. I say to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), that all of that creates conditions in which young Palestinians have so much despair and so little hope that they are attracted to the ideas put forward by Hamas and others.

We need to try to do something about this. I expect that the Minister will say that the Government also believe in the two-state solution. If somebody says that they believe in a two-state solution in the middle east, and yet they do nothing—make no comment, take no action—about the things that are happening to actively undermine that objective, they are being insincere and not serious.

Our Government have to be seen to be taking action to make sure that the conditions are brought about in which a two-state solution could become a reality once again. First, they need to fully implement UN resolution 2334, and make a distinction between Israel proper and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, given the settlement economy that is going on there. The Government should take serious economic action to end economic trade with settlements in the occupied areas that sustain the occupation.

Secondly, as has been said, we should recognise the state of Palestine. Why not? If we believe that it should exist, we should recognise it, and try to help it and develop it, so that it becomes a proper state. Our not doing that puts the Palestinians always at a disadvantage.

Finally, it is time to understand that Israel, as a matter of Government policy, has been conducting its activities with impunity for many years in breach of international law. Its military action is in breach of the Geneva convention, and it has been undertaken with no sanction and no impediment. That must stop. We might wish to be good friends with the state of Israel, but we need to say to its Government, “You cannot continue with these policies. If you do, there will be consequences. This country will not stand by and idly watch this happen.”

Israel and Palestine

Tommy Sheppard Excerpts

Monday 14th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd, and thank you for squeezing me into the debate.

All of us will have been appalled at the loss of life in the conflict in Gaza and in Israel last month, particularly the loss of life of non-combatants and many children, who we saw on our television screens. The real tragedy is not that, but rather that this will happen again—next week, next month, next year—and it will keep happening until the root cause of the conflict is tackled. As the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott) has just said, the root cause of the conflict is the fact that Israel is in military occupation of the Palestinian territories that were designated for a future state of Palestine.

From an Israeli point of view, it makes sense to continue that occupation. Not only do the Israeli Government not set any policy to end that occupation, but with every day and week that passes, through the process of settlement building, evictions and other measures, that occupation is entrenched, to the point where, in the words of B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organisation, there is now a “one-state reality”.

Within that one-state reality, people’s life chances and how they are treated are fundamentally different depending on whether they are Palestinian or Israeli. For more than 50 years, Israel has maintained this policy almost consequence free. Of course, there have been many UN resolutions and people have wrung their hands and said, “It’s not right,” but Israel has been able to maintain this military occupation pretty much unrestricted.

The petitions before us today are from people who are clearly concerned about the plight of the Palestinian people. I ask colleagues, particularly those on the other side of the argument, to see things through their eyes for a moment. If we do not take action to persuade Israel to end the occupation and bring about a two-state reality, we are breeding further despair among Palestinian communities and galvanising the extreme right wing of Israeli politics, resulting in a situation where groups such as Hamas fill the political void. That is why we need to take action.

The new Israeli and American Governments provide a moment for this country to step up to the mark and do something. If people say that a boycott of Israel will not work, the question that the Government have to answer is, “What sanctions should be applied to try to make the Israeli Government behave in a manner consistent with international law?” Surely this must be the time to recognise Palestine. If we are sincere about a two-state solution, we cannot say that on the one hand and refuse to recognise one of those states on the other.