West Bank: Forced Displacement Debate
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Brian Leishman
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West Bank: Forced Displacement
Brian Leishman Excerpts(3 weeks, 3 days ago)
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Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)
It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Turner. Thanks go to my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North (Martin Rhodes) for securing this vital debate.
Sixty-one years ago, Tony Benn wrote:
“Of all the weaknesses that beset those in authority, blindness to reality is always the most crippling and usually the most inexcusable.”
In that article, Mr Benn was calling for international sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa. The weakness he wrote of back then is applicable to those in authority in the UK today, because words of condemnation have not stopped the displacement, segregation and apartheid being suffered by Palestinians.
Mr Turner, imagine soldiers, tanks and bulldozers rolling into your constituency, destroying buildings, essential infrastructure, schools and medical facilities. Imagine being forced out of the house you call home and fences going up around what was your community. For Palestinians in the west bank, who live under occupation and are seeing their community seized by state-backed Israeli settlers, that is their reality.
Since 7 October 2023, the west bank has experienced an average of four documented incidents of settler violence per day. Settler expansion and violence is, I repeat, a state-backed initiative, the goal of which is the erasure of Palestinian land from the map. It is total absorption—does the Minister not see that as being Netanyahu’s ultimate aim and driving force? I hope the Minister answers that question, because all the evidence points to it being the systematic removal of Palestinians from their land. It is not just hamlets, villages and towns that have been destroyed; even the refugee camps at Jenin, Nur Shams and Tulkarem have been attacked, as mentioned by other hon. Members.
I say to the Minister and other Members: when it comes to displacement, death and the building of 22 new illegal settlements in the west bank, do not be blind to reality, as Tony Benn said. Netanyahu and his murderous regime are not stopping. They will not stop—not when the international community are allowing war crimes to happen.
Will the Government agree to an independent public inquiry, as per the ten-minute rule Bill introduced by the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn), which will come back to the House on Friday and has widespread political and public support? The British public, Palestinians in the west bank and Gaza, and the wider Palestinian diaspora all deserve answers.