Middle East

Helen Hayes Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lammy]

I was with the Qatari Foreign Minister on Sunday, and we were in touch overnight. I of course thanked him for his tremendous work to get this deal over the line. I think that, while working together over the past few months, we have become friends. There is much that the UK Government can and will continue to do. As I said on the radio last week, diplomacy is failing until it achieves success. The hon. Member will know from his experience and wisdom that success has many fathers and mothers.

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I welcome the announcement of this long overdue ceasefire today. My thoughts are with all those who have lost loved ones on and since 7 October, the families of hostages anxiously awaiting news, and the tens of thousands of families in Gaza who have suffered bereavement, displacement and destitution. My thoughts are also with all those for whom the announcement is bittersweet; I think particularly of Rachel Goldberg—the mother of Hersh Goldberg-Polin—whom I met in East Jerusalem in February. She has campaigned with such dignity for the release of her son, who was tragically killed in August. I think, too, of the families in Gaza who are losing their loved ones even now as this ceasefire is being announced. But while the war has raged in Gaza, the settlers have dramatically increased their activity in the west bank, taking land that does not belong to them in a systematic attempt to undermine the possibility of a viable Palestinian state.

As our thoughts now turn to the peace process ahead and the aim of a two-state solution, what action is the Foreign Secretary taking to address illegal settlement? Without a more robust approach, a two-state solution simply cannot be achieved.

[Mr Lammy]

May I pay tribute to my hon. Friend? We have worked together over many years. Her constituency, in so many ways, is not dissimilar from mine, and I know how heart-rending this has been for her constituents. I also know the grace, the manner and the fortitude with which she has represented their interests very strongly within the Labour movement.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to centre the west bank, the expansion and the violence that undermines the two-state solution. It was very important for me to be able to discuss these issues with President Abbas. One hugely important role that the UK Government play is in relation to reform and supporting the Palestinian Authority. That work must continue. We stand by the 1967 borders that we think can achieve the two-state solution that is required. We worry about the security situation in the west bank. We worry, too, about the arms and the supplies that are coming in from malign forces, particularly from Iran and some neighbouring states. But we are also in an intense dialogue with the Israeli Government about what we think are breaches of international law in relation to how the area is properly secured and policed. We certainly do not want to see the language, the rhetoric or the behaviour that undermine the possibility of the two-state solution.