Bob Russell
Main Page: Bob Russell (Liberal Democrat - Colchester)Department Debates - View all Bob Russell's debates with the Leader of the House
(11 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)
I ended my speech in the Christmas recess debate by saying:
“I am amazed that the leaders of the Christian faith around the world, whether the Orthodox Church, the Anglican Church, through the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Pope, have remained silent. It is time that the Christian leaders spoke up for the people of the holy land.”—[Official Report, 20 December 2011; Vol. 537, c. 1292.]
Five months of silence has followed. Collectively—with certain significant exceptions—the Christian Church has abandoned not only the holy land but the indigenous Palestinian people. The Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury might like to check precisely what the parable of the Good Samaritan is about.
Hunger strikes by hundreds of Palestinians in Israeli prisons have gone barely noticed by the British media. One thing is certain: the holocaust of 70 years ago was not the fault of the Palestinians. It seems, however, that Europe’s collective guilt for what happened is represented by the collective repression and punishment of the Palestinians.
The preamble to the UN charter states that the UN was created, among other things,
“to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights…to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained…to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom”
and
“to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours”.
It specifically states that
“armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest”
and refers to
“the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples”.
Article 1, chapter 1 of the charter refers to the need to
“develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take…appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace”,
and to the need to encourage
“respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion”.
Mr MacShane
The hon. Gentleman is making an interesting speech, and I do not dissent from some of the points he makes. The puzzle is that in 1948 Israel was allowed to be created by the UN, so why was the Palestinian state not created then, with East Jerusalem as its capital and including the west bank and Gaza? Why did Palestine not come into being at that time?
Sir Bob Russell
I can answer that only by saying that in the year of my birth, the state of Israel did not exist, but today, maps of the middle east show that it occupies virtually the entirety of what used to be Palestine.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
Does the hon. Gentleman believe that the state of Israel should exist?
Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)
Vis-à-vis Israel and Palestine, does the hon. Gentleman believe in a two-state solution in the middle east?
Sir Bob Russell
Sadly, the attitude of the state of Israel is such that the probability of a two-state solution being achieved is moving rapidly towards zero.
The UN declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, adopted on 13 September 2007, states
“indigenous people should be free from discrimination of any kind”.
It also makes reference to
“the urgent need to respect…their rights to their lands, territories and resources”.
Sadly, there is one country with which this country, every EU country and the United States have strong links but which practises policies of ethnic cleansing and apartheid against its indigenous people. I refer to the state of Israel.
On 11 September, the Israeli Cabinet decided to pursue the plan to resolve the long-standing issues faced by the country’s 200,000 Arab Bedouin population living in the southern Negev desert. The plan, known as the Prawer plan, will result in at least 30,000 people losing their homes. The Bedouin are Israel’s indigenous people, as accepted by the UN special rapporteur on indigenous peoples, but the Israeli Government refuse to accept it. Israel wants to move tens of thousands of Bedouin from their homes and villages into Government townships that are already overcrowded and have a large range of social and economic problems.
Last year, I had the privilege of visiting Palestine and Israel, the west bank and East Jerusalem. I witnessed at first hand those policies of ethnic cleansing and apartheid against the Palestinian people in the occupied territories—a separate matter from that of the Arab Bedouin. We have heard today about the Arab spring, but I am referring to the Arab winter. Palestinian children are being arrested, ill treated and, it is arguable, tortured. Some are being detained in Israel in violation of article 76 of the fourth Geneva convention.
I have raised concerns about the Israel-Palestine issue on numerous occasions in the House, most recently yesterday at International Development questions, when I again asked about ethnic cleansing and apartheid. On 11 January, I put my point directly to the Prime Minister. In response, he said that the United Kingdom was
“a country that should stand up for clear human rights and clear rights and wrongs in international relations. This Government have been very clear that we do not agree with the Israeli Government’s practice on settlements…and this Government will continue to act and vote on illegal settlements.”—[Official Report, 11 January 2012; Vol. 538, c. 178.]
I also raised these issues on 15 December at business questions. On 16 May, in a written question, I asked the Foreign Secretary
“what representations he has made to the EU not to renew Israel’s special trading status in view of its continued occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem in contravention of UN Resolutions”.
In response, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), wrote:
“We support closer ties between Israel and the international community… The EU has been very clear that no progress can be made on upgrading the wider EU-Israel relationship until there is substantial progress towards a two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. This is a position the UK supports.”—[Official Report, 16 May 2012; Vol. 545, c. 200W.]
On 15 September, I asked about the illegal settlements, and on 28 February, in an oral question to the Foreign Secretary, I raised for the first time the serious possibility of an Israeli armed attack on Iran. I asked the Foreign Secretary for a clear guarantee that the UK would not support Israel, militarily or diplomatically, should such an attack take place. He replied:
“We are not calling for or advocating a military attack on Iran, and at this moment we advise others not to do so. But we also believe that it is important to keep Iran under pressure and that no options are taken off the table.”—[Official Report, 28 February 2012; Vol. 541, c. 149.]
I have asked numerous other questions on human rights and the occupation.
Another interesting subject is how Israel ignores international law on the freedom of shipping in international waters. I tabled a written question about that last month, to which the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire, replied:
“The most recent incident of which we are aware”—
which suggests that there is more than one—
“is that relating to the HS Beethoven, which was boarded by the Israel Defence Force on 22 April 2012.”—[Official Report, 30 April 2012; Vol. 543, c. 1350W.]
So there we have it: international law and United Nations resolutions can, it seems, all be ignored by Israel without any retribution or action by this country, the European Union or the United Nations.
I am grateful to Ted from Liverpool, who has sent me some background information. He ends his message—the subject of which is “War War not Jaw Jaw is Israel’s way”—with the words:
“End the Occupation, then there will be Peace.”
He says:
“Many of us worry that Israel will drag us into a war with Iran… We now learn”—
the Foreign Secretary’s answer tended to confirm this—
“that Government Ministers are considering how we might be involved in the event of an Israeli strike and an Iranian response. America has already stated its own position in a Bill, HR 4133… Texan Representative Ron Paul, the only one to speak out against it, has said ‘...the objective is to provide Israel with the resources to attack Iran, if it chooses to do so, while tying the US and Israel so closely together that whatever Benjamin Netanyahu does, the US “will always be there”, as our president has so aptly put it.’…the vote was 411 to 2 in favour”
of the Bill.
Incidentally, just as a throwaway line, I am advised that the Olympic games organisers have listed Israel as a country in Europe.
Ted writes that recently in the other House,
“Baroness Brinton spoke of an Israeli army order to demolish 1,500 olive trees in Deir Istiya… the Foreign Office, whilst condemning Israel’s abuse of human rights in its Human Rights & Democracy Report for 2011, merely remonstrates with Israel over its abuses and at the same time rewards it with favoured nation treatment and trading agreements.”
Eric of Ipswich tells me:
“we are well used to Israel ejecting Palestinians from their own homes, for demolition… It is also normal for Israel to destroy Palestinian farms and land, to prevent the local population feeding itself”.
In fact, I have witnessed that myself on the west bank, where a priority for some of the illegal Israeli settlements is to stop up watercourses, depriving the indigenous population of water to grow crops, because the water is needed by the settlers for their swimming pools. Eric continues:
“in Yatta, Rateb al-Jabour…Israeli soldiers accompanied by policemen and members of the Israeli civil administration raided the area with heavy machinery and destroyed six tents housing over 30 people.”
The object of the Israeli demolition was
“to empty it of…local residents to expand the nearby”
illegal settlement of Sosiya. Israeli forces recently
“demolished an animal barn… south of Hebron,”
and
“Israeli bulldozers demolished…a 600-square-meter chicken hut, built 30 years ago, in…a village southwest of Ramallah”.
In the other House, the Foreign Office Minister Lord Howell was challenged over the destruction of Palestinian olive groves, to which, I am led to believe, he responded by saying, “Well, there are two sides to an illegal invasion/occupation,” which is an extraordinary statement. We have to ask the question put to me by Eric of Ipswich:
“How many more people have to die and suffer, before Israel is made to obey international law?”
He concludes:
“The one and only problem is the illegal occupation. Please use your position to put an end to the misery, require Israel to live in peace with its neighbours instead of attacking them all, and allow Palestinian farmers of olives and other crops and livestock, to earn their living and feed their people.”
In conclusion, I should like to draw the House’s attention to early-day motion 57, tabled by me, on the Co-operative Group’s Israeli boycott. I hope that all will support it. Sadly, Tesco does not do so: it continues to sell produce grown on land stolen from Palestinians by Israeli settlers. However, the Co-operative Group is banning all Israeli goods from the occupied Palestinian west bank. The motion
“calls on all other supermarket chains and suppliers to follow the excellent lead of the Co-operative Group; recalls that it was such boycott policies which helped end apartheid in South Africa; and calls on the Government to make representations to the EU to urge that all member states issue similar boycott measures and to end the special trading status which the EU has with Israel.”
Mr MacShane
Does the hon. Gentleman know the German term “Kauft nicht bei Juden”? If he does not, he can look it up when he reads Hansard tomorrow. I was in South Africa, where the minority white Government behaved abominably. I could not meet a black friend in an hotel. I worked with the black trade unions there. I share many of the hon. Gentleman’s criticisms of Israel, but the last time I was there, I could meet Arab Israeli parliamentarians and Arab supreme court judges, and I saw Arab women and their families swimming alongside Jews in the sea off Tel Aviv. The apartheid comparison is there for one reason only: an apartheid state cannot exist; it has no right to exist. Those who call Israel—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. With respect, the right hon. Gentleman spoke for 20 minutes, and he knows full well that interventions must be brief. A lot of Members are still waiting to speak, and I will need to consider imposing a time limit if speeches do not get a little shorter.
Sir Bob Russell
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am unable to comment on what the right hon. Gentleman has said, as I have no personal knowledge of the points that he made.
I shall conclude by reading part of early-day motion 9, which
“calls on the UK Government not to support Israel in its continuing acts of breaches of international law and UN resolutions in respect of illegal action in international waters and in the illegal occupation of the West Bank and the annexation of East Jerusalem.”
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
It is a real pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher), who represents 3rd Battalion the Mercian Regiment. In the next few months, we are going to witness some spirited debates on what might be cut from the Army. They will be particularly important to those Members who might lose regiments in their own constituencies, so as a warm-up I should like to explain my view of the regiments and the regimental system, and tell the House what they mean to me.
We all know that the Army is designed to fight for us, if directed to do so by the Government. The way in which it is organised, and its esprit de corps, are crucial determinants of how it works when it deploys. The Army is obviously a martial profession, and none of us present will have any doubts about what might be the ultimate requirement for our soldiers. Napoleon correctly identified the morale of his soldiers as the crucial ingredient of their success. He called morale “the sacred flame”, saying that it mattered more than anything else. In that respect, he also insisted that
“morale is to the physical as three is to one.”
In short, high morale can compensate for many other deficiencies, including numbers.
I saw that when I had the privilege of commanding my regiment, 1st Battalion The Cheshire Regiment, in Bosnia during 1992 and 1993. Often in conversation with the commanders of the various factions and armies, I would be asked the same question: “How many men do you have under your command?” Obviously, I would not answer; instead, I would say something like, “Lots and lots,” but then I would ask them how many soldiers they thought I had. The answer was invariably between 3,000 and 4,000. In fact, I had 800. The point is that the soldiers of my regiment gave the impression that they were far more numerous than in fact they were. It was their esprit de corps, their morale and their regimental pride that gave that impression.
Organisation and numbers are of course important to military success. The strategic defence and security review has determined that the Army is to be reduced in size, down to as few as 82,000 serving soldiers. Many definitions of an army suggest that 100,000 should be its minimum size, so what is the future for our Army? Some people have suggested that it might more correctly be dubbed a defence force. I shudder at that thought. One thing is clear: we are going to have to cut down some units from what the Army calls its teeth arms. Regiments, or parts of them, in the infantry and cavalry are going to be disbanded. All teeth arm units are formed into regiments, and we are likely to lose some historic and highly valued names.
Quite rightly, the British Army’s regimental system is respected, and sometimes copied, worldwide, but what exactly is that much-rated regimental system? The term “regiment” started in Britain in the mid-17th century when retinues that followed a certain leader were organised into some form of standing military force. Such regiments were normally named after the colonel who commanded them. For example, my own regiment, which is now called 1st Battalion the Mercian Regiment—the old Cheshires—was first formed in 1689 on the racecourse at Chester. It was then called the Duke of Norfolk’s Regiment. Later it became the 22nd Regiment, after its precedence in the order of battle, and later still it became properly linked to the county of Cheshire. A similar process happened to most of our great infantry regiments.
Under this regimental system, each regiment became responsible for recruitment, training and administration. It developed its own style, which in turn derived strength and purpose from the regiment’s history and traditions. Even today, the colonel of each regiment still has the right to select his officers. In the past, and sometimes today, it was usual for a soldier—and many officers, too—to spend their entire careers within their own regiment. They frequently served with men they had known since birth. For example, at the time of the Ballykelly bomb in 1982, I was commanding officer of A Company 1st Battalion the 22nd Cheshire Regiment when six of my soldiers were killed, and over five days in mid-December 1982 I attended their funerals. All six were buried within the borders of the county of Cheshire. Amazingly, at these funerals, several mothers put their arms around me, saying that they fully realised my sorrow, too. It is because the regimental system is so emotive that it often seems like a family.
In fact, infantry battalions take great pride in using the words “the regimental family”. That is literally true, as when I was commander many soldiers in my regiment were in the fourth, fifth or even sixth generation serving in their family regiment. That sense of family is vital in battle. When they are very frightened, soldiers are often sustained by what they see as a greater fear—that of letting down their friends and their family. It gives them what I regard as another offshoot of the regimental system—the so-called “black humour” so often found among our soldiers.
As the incident commander at the time of the Ballykelly bomb in 1982, I was devastated to find four of my own lance corporals together in a crumpled heap under tons of concrete. One had been killed immediately the bomb exploded, another died shortly thereafter, a third lingered in agony for several hours, and the fourth was trapped by his legs on top of his dead friends. After four hours, the decision was made that he would have to have both legs amputated where he lay trapped by concrete—the threat of gangrene was growing and it might have killed him regardless. I told the badly wounded Lance Corporal William Bell, whose brother was also serving and whose family went back generations in my regiment, that we would have to cut his legs off. His incredible reply sums up what the regimental system is all about: “No legs Sir! One hell of a way to get out of the Pearson trophy tomorrow, isn’t it?” The Pearson trophy was the regiment’s weekly cross-country run. All ranks do it and it is universally loathed—especially by someone like me! But that ruddy awful run was part of the regiment’s style and ethos.
The strategic defence and security review has directed that the Army is to lose perhaps four or even more battalions from Army regiments. In the next weeks and months, we in this House will be debating and arguing exactly which ones will be affected. Some have suggested that no regimental cap badge will be lost. They argue that so-called large regiments—formed in the past by pushing small regiments together into a new grouping—will remain. That happened to my own regiment last time, when the 1st Cheshires were amalgamated to become 1st Battalion the Mercian Regiment. The 2nd Mercians came from 1st Battalion the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment, while the 3rd Mercians were formed from the 1st Battalion the Staffordshire Regiment—from the area of my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth. All those battalions within those regimental groupings keep their own regimental histories and their own pride, despite coming under the umbrella title of the Mercian Regiment. It might seem easy to cut, say, the 3rd Mercians or indeed the 3rd Royal Anglians—
Bob Stewart
I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. After all, the big regiment survives, does it not, whether it be the Royal Anglians or the Mercians? Two old regiments, however, would disappear by so doing. If the 3rd Mercians go, in the area represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth, it will mean that the Staffords are finally dead; and if we say goodbye to the 3rd Royal Anglians, in the area represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Sir Bob Russell), it will mean saying goodbye to the last relics of that historic and gallant regiment, the Essex Regiment.
Sir Bob Russell
I regret to say that the 3rd Battalion, Royal Anglian Regiment, the successor to the Essex Regiment, disappeared a few years ago. The 3rd Battalion that we have today is a Territorial Army battalion. We are very grateful that it is there, but it is not the Essex Regiment as it was.
Bob Stewart
I thank my hon. Friend for that correction, and I hope that he will forgive me for my slight inaccuracy. The principle remains the same,
I know that what I am talking about may seem parochial and somewhat petty to some people, and I accept that it can look like that to those who do not understand the regimental system; but to so many who have served, or whose family members have served, such cuts will mean another very sad day for British military history. The regimental system is a tremendous bulwark for frightened men in battle, and supports others like Lance Corporal William Bell of A Company, 1st Battalion The Cheshire Regiment, who was sustained and could even laugh at his predicament when he might have been in total despair. Truly the regimental system is a band of brothers, and I for one hope very much that it will not be damaged further by what is about to happen as a result of the SDSR. It is highly unlikely that, once gone, any regiment will live again.