Oral Answers to Questions Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateHolly Lynch
Main Page: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)Department Debates - View all Holly Lynch's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(3 years ago)
Commons ChamberMy right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary met the Israeli President Mr Herzog and the Israeli Foreign Minister Lapid during their respective visits to the UK in November. I also recently discussed the situation in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories with Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Roll and Palestinian Prime Minister Shtayyeh.
The Foreign Secretary made clear her commitment to the Abraham accords at the Gulf Co-operation Council-United Kingdom Foreign Ministers’ meeting on 20 December. The UK is working with Gulf partners to help deliver shared prosperity and security for Arabs and Israelis alike. We support the objectives of the US Middle East Partnership for Peace Act and we will continue to engage with the US to identify opportunities for further collaboration. I outlined the UK’s support for increasing dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians at the Alliance for Middle East Peace’s “light the way” gala on 12 December.
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right that the UK enjoys excellent relations with all the signatory nations to the Abraham accords. Indeed, I was in Bahrain when the first ever Bahraini ambassador to the state of Israel was announced, and it was genuinely a joyous occasion. The UK will continue to support the Abraham accords and greater joint working between the states in the region. Ultimately, that is the best way to pursue peace, prosperity and freedom for all.
In 2017, I had the opportunity to visit Israel and Palestine, and what I saw in the west bank really shocked me. We must never see a return to last year’s violence. Will the Minister renew our commitment to an international fund for Israeli-Palestinian peace, based on the model of the International Fund for Ireland, and update the House on our international efforts to make the fund and lasting peace a reality?
The hon. Lady makes an important point about the relationships between Israelis and Palestinians. The UK has, does and will continue to support and facilitate people-to-people contacts and cross-community contacts as well as ensuring that the Government of Israel and the Palestinian Authority also have a good working relationship. That is and will remain a foundation stone of our foreign policy in the region.
With regard to ALLMEP—the Alliance for Middle East Peace—we have had discussions with the United States of America, and I have had discussions with representatives of the organisation. We will continue to explore what role the UK might play in the future delivery of that.
The Commonwealth is a vibrant and valued network of countries and we are deeply committed to it. Commonwealth nations are crucial friends in the delivery of the Foreign Secretary’s vision of a network of liberty and the need to plant the flag for freedom around the globe. We look forward to hosting the Commonwealth games in Birmingham this summer and to attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Kigali in Rwanda soon.
We are soon to launch the developing countries trading scheme, which will help developing countries to get better access to the UK market. We have also just launched British International Investment, which will help developing countries with their climate change adaptation by supporting their investment.