Israel and Palestine

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Ed Miliband]

We do not comment on intelligence and security matters, but I can honestly assure my hon. Friend that we are not involved in the occupation or actions in Gaza and the west bank. That is not the nature of our intelligence and security co-operation with Israel.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

May I join many hon. Members across the House in thanking the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister for the statement and this vital change in Government policy? However, many will ask why this action has taken so long, since the ICJ advisory opinion was issued in July 2024 and ethnic cleansing and genocide have continued both in the west bank and Gaza. Will the Foreign Secretary explain why it has taken the Labour Government so long to act? Will they now fully comply with their obligations under the ICJ advisory opinion? Will they conduct a review of British policy of non-compliance with international law in Israel?

[Ed Miliband]

I say bluntly to the hon. Member that we should have acted earlier. It has taken the new Prime Minister to come in and recognise the gravity of the situation and the degree of public concern on these questions. We concur with the ICJ’s conclusions on the unlawfulness of the occupation and we will ensure that we abide by what that implies.

Falkland Islands: Sovereignty

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Kirsty McNeill]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that it is an integral part of a country’s self-determination that it can develop its own natural resources for its own economic benefit. That will be a decision for the Falkland Islanders. Indeed, Falkland Islands representatives have already made decisions about exactly that matter.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

It is clear to the British public that the special relationship between the UK and the US is more special for the UK than it is for the US under Trump. With the US extending threats, bullying and tariff threats, it is akin to an abusive relationship. Will the Minister unequivocally confirm that Britain will not tolerate intimidation and blackmail by the US, Israel or others, and that British sovereignty matters more than our relationship with hostile states that are committing blatant, horrific violations of international law?

[Kirsty McNeill]

The United States is and will remain our closest ally. We have been clear with it, we have been clear with this House, and we have been clear most of all with the people of the Falkland Islands that the Falkland Islands are British.

Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Wednesday 8th July 2026 Westminster Hall

[Neil Duncan-Jordan (Poole) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government policy on AI and its impact on society.

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms McVey. I think we all agree that AI is a transformational technology with the potential to bring many benefits to our society, but to fully realise them we will require the Government to look at radical changes to taxation, welfare and our industrial strategy. Everyone in the UK needs to benefit from a managed AI transition that puts workers and human dignity at its heart. It must make the world fairer, not more unequal, and it should give UK citizens a meaningful say in decisions that will affect their lives.

Evidence from the New Contract, a pro-worker AI campaign organisation, reveals that the public are deeply suspicious about AI. Around six in 10 people expect the gains to flow to wealthy investors and big corporations, while just 7% think they will be shared fairly across our society. Understandably, seven in 10 workers are worried about the impact of AI on their jobs. Even the Foreign Secretary said recently that AI poses a Hiroshima-style threat to humanity unless global rules are put in place.

In today’s digital age, a cartel of technology giants—Google, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple—wield extraordinarily influence over our lives online. These platforms have become so embedded in daily life that meaningful participation in society depends on using their services. Similarly, the digital infrastructure that facilitates our work and public services is now an essential layer of the economy, but that gives oligarchs like Elon Musk enormous power to distort public discourse. We have effectively subcontracted our right to information to a handful of big tech gatekeepers.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

The hon. Gentleman is making a powerful point about big foreign tech companies. Does he believe that our dependency on six tech companies in all aspects of our lives poses a national security threat and needs to be assessed as such?

[Neil Duncan-Jordan]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention; I will deal with AI sovereignty a bit later in my speech.

We should ensure that, like a socialist Government’s approach to energy or water, the public have a stake in the development of AI technology, to ensure that the value it creates is captured and shared for the good of society as a whole. Previous waves of technological change have brought with them huge economic disruptions, but the human and social costs that followed were not inevitable. They were the product of political choices, as Governments left workers and communities to absorb the shocks alone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

I rise in support of much of what the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) has said. He has done a service to this Chamber, and Parliament more generally, by highlighting the threats that AI will bring.

Perhaps I can set the scene by reminding Members present that it took 25 years for Parliament and successive Governments to recognise that the internet must be regulated. That is extraordinary. When I was in the IT industry back in the ’80s and ’90s, I became aware of the concept of the internet—before it was widely spoken about—and even then I knew the harm it might do.

In 2000, at the beginning of the new millennium, I was privileged to be able to speak at the Spalding Gentlemen’s Society, with which I do not imagine you are familiar, Ms McVey, but suffice to say it is a learned society of the old school—it now does admit women, you will be pleased to know. It has a lecture programme on all manner of things, and I was pleased to be invited to give the first lecture of the millennium. Then, I warned of what the internet might do. Most of the audience, by the way, disbelieved what I said. It was a very civilised meeting—it was not raucous in any way—but they could not quite come to terms with what I predicted.

What I predicted then has come to pass. What has occurred is the distortion of public discourse, the enabling of widespread fraud and the provision of the means for every imaginable form of harm, from hardcore pornography being available to children, to internet gambling addiction, suicide sites and much more. Now, the prospect of AI will make all that still more chilling. As the recognition of what is real and what is invented is increasingly blurred, it will become more and more difficult for people to navigate the inevitable vicissitudes that pervade every life.

Imagine a future where the once secure certainty of what really exists is so undermined that people can no longer believe what they are told and have no place to go to establish that certainty—the basis on which we all gauge reality and are able to live reasonably productive lives. I see wellbeing being affected by that detrimentally; unless the Government take very urgent and extremely serious action, that will happen far more quickly than anyone here envisages.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that one of the primary obligations of any Government is to keep their citizens and the people living in their country safe from all avoidable harms? AI is a major potential cause of harm, and it is avoidable. Does he agree that the Government cannot wait 25 years to catch up?

[Sir John Hayes]

I absolutely agree. That is why I began by describing what has occurred over the last quarter of a century and the misunderstanding—a pervasive one that affected all political parties and Governments of all kinds—that a dangerous fascination with novelty was more important than the certainty that I have just outlined.

The hon. Member for Poole is right to issue a clarion call for action. Let me go into a little more detail. He is right, for example, that we have allowed a handful of multinational corporates, which have displayed a carelessness to the effects of what they do, to wield immense power—more power than national Governments. It is increasingly difficult for Governments to pull levers that affect these people, because they exist beyond the purview of this House or of any Government Minister. They have shown by their example that carelessness, and only when they have been prevented from doing harm have they ceased to do so.

I am delighted that the Government are now taking steps to prevent children from accessing social media and mobile telephones; I would like to go much further, actually, and I hope the Government will. I called for the ban on phones in schools, along with many other Members of this House, a long time ago. But AI makes all that more serious, because the AI available through that technology, which has the ability to distort the very nature of reality, will be immensely difficult to control. And yet we must try to do so. Legislation is not always the only means of doing that but, as the hon. Gentleman set out, it certainly must play a part.

Umberto Eco described the internet as the “empire of imbeciles”. Over time, it has become impossible to distinguish experts from idiots, and every bar-room bigot now has an audience of millions. Most people had a sense of proportion; my parents were working-class people who left school at 14, but they had a very good sense of what really mattered. Now we have elevated trivia to an extraordinary degree and, as a result, that sense of proportion, which was once taken as read, can no longer be guaranteed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

I commend the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan), as well as his two friends and allies who have just spoken, my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) and the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), on bringing this important subject to Westminster Hall. This is in danger of turning into one of those rare debates in Parliament where one learns something from everybody who speaks and we all come away better informed and equipped.

This subject is enormous, and it is only a 90-minute debate. It obviously will not be the last time we discuss these matters, and I freely confess to not being an expert on the subject. Like many colleagues, I am trying to educate myself more to understand better the implications, including the upside for productivity, the implications for energy and water, and the effect on all manner of things in the public and private spheres, such as healthcare, education, international relations, and foreign and security policy and so on. I am no expert, but one thing I have learned is that no one knows what the societal effect of AI is at this moment in time. A lot of people have a story to tell, but no one really knows. That is one of the reasons why we have to keep coming back to these subjects as our understanding iterates and evolves.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

The right hon. Gentleman says no one knows, but throughout history, when we have approached technologies or situations that we have never experienced before, we have done scenario planning and risk assessments, and we have prepared as best as possible for scenarios that may be plausible or possible. Does he agree that when it comes to AI, we have been absolutely asleep at the wheel and that planning has not happened?

[Damian Hinds]

I agree with large parts of what the hon. Gentleman says. The timeframes are obviously shorter this time than they were for say, the industrial revolution, the printing press or any of the other massive changes that we have seen in the past. When Gutenberg invented his printing press, I am not sure it was foreseeable to even the most far-sighted, omniscient individual what all the effects of that would be. That does not mean we do not try to scenario-plan and to think about the different possible outcomes and try to mitigate them.

Labour market effects are probably what we as politicians worry about the most, along with all the other implications, like the consequences for income distribution, intergenerational fairness and so many other aspects. People already say that AI has had a big impact on job markets, particularly on the graduate job market. I honestly do not know whether that is true or not. It strikes me that it is quite an easy thing to say: if a company is not doing that well this year and is not employing graduates to the same extent that it used to, it is a great thing to say, “Well, we’re investing in AI.” I do not see how a professional services firm, with the current technology deployment, would be able to substitute people for AI in quite that way.

In the future, it is true that there is a scenario in which there is mass unemployment. But it is also true that when there have been huge upheavals previously, labour markets have adapted, albeit over time, and sometimes it is that gap that makes the difference. Labour has found its way into different sectors—

--- Later in debate ---

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

Responsible AI, done right, could be the saviour of humanity. Irresponsible AI, done wrong, could lead to the destruction of humanity. There is, to my knowledge, no effective, self-regulated industry anywhere in the world that puts consumers and the planet before profit and shareholders.

I thank the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for securing this important debate. As he and many Members have highlighted, a handful of companies run by men answerable to no electorate and standing before no constituents are making decisions right now that will shape healthcare, education, employment, childhood and the economy more than most Acts of this Parliament ever will.

I will focus on topics that have not been covered and speak about safety and economic risks. I have spent 20-plus years in the pharmaceutical regulatory industry, and we can learn much from it. We regulate medicines before they reach a single patient. We do not wait for harm; instead, we test, we license and we monitor. That is the entire logic of the GxP framework that underpins pharmaceutical safety in this country, yet AI is being deployed in our hospitals, schools, courts and welfare system with no comparable safety regime at all, not because the risk is smaller but because the oversight is simply not there.

I put the following demands to the Government. First, where GxP protects patients from medicine, we need GAIP—good AI practice—regulation to protect patients from algorithms. Any AI system used in healthcare must meet a statutory standard before it touches a single patient record or clinical decision. The AI Security Institute already evaluates frontier models for biological, chemical and cyber risk, but only if the AI companies allow it to. That is progress, but progress in security assessments is not the same as regulating delivery in the healthcare industry.

This Government brought Palantir into the heart of our NHS; in doing so, they handed a US surveillance contractor that is complicit in genocide the keys to patient data that belongs to the British public, not to a share price on Wall Street. I ask the Minister to guarantee the British public that their NHS data will never be given to or allowed to be stolen by Palantir or any other private company.

Secondly, the Government must mandate independent statutory testing for AI before its release, and a yellow card scheme that would be a national register where safety incidents, near misses and harms caused by AI were reported, tracked and acted on exactly as we do for adverse drug reactions. It must not be the manufacturer marking its own homework and hoping that nobody checks; self-certification does not work and must end. Thirdly, every AI system developed in this country must have a kill switch that is triggered automatically the moment a system takes unauthorised action and that any human being can trigger manually at any time without obstruction or AI override.

This danger is not only about safety but about who pays the bill as AI unfolds. More than 300,000 private-hire drivers in this country face displacement by robotaxis. I ask the Minister how the Government will fund public services going forward. There are dangers, but there are opportunities from AI. We must try to access them as much as possible, but we must address the societal, economic and safety consequences that AI poses.

--- Later in debate ---

[Victoria Collins]

Absolutely, and that has been at the core of a lot of our debate today.

AI can drive inequalities, break down our society, security and safety, and take away jobs, or it can be used to tackle our biggest problems, empower individuals and drive growth. AI is a bit like the electricity of today—a supercharged version of electricity—and we need to think about where we are going to direct it. At some point, we started using electricity to light our cities and to power our homes, businesses and industries; now we need to think about where we will direct AI, and how we prepare people for that future.

The hon. Member for Poole and others talked about the future of our economy, tax and wealth, and there are key examples that highlight how important that is. We have started talking about donkeycorns; Members may have heard of unicorns, but donkeycorns are billion-dollar companies with one or two people. There is a legend that OpenClaw was a one-person company that was sold for £1 billion. That is a real shift in our economy, and we need to tackle it head-on.

As Liberal Democrats, we believe in embracing that progress and change, but we also believe in empowering individuals. When it comes to AI, we thought about tackling that big picture, which is why we launched a project called “Everyday AI”. We brought together over 100 global stakeholders from industry and civil society—to look at a Liberal vision for AI and how Britain can thrive in the age of AI. We looked at backing British innovation, empowering people and building trust, and building infrastructure for success.

As the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) said, no one knows where we are going. As a Member of Parliament and a politician, I often feel it is difficult to sound neither utopian nor dystopian about this issue. However, it is crucial that we ask the right questions, and keep on asking them, to make sure we are going in the right direction.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Victoria Collins]

I am going to advance, because I want to hear from the Minister.

Crucially, we need to lean into the opportunities and challenges, and I will share some of our proposals, which I would be happy to discuss with the Minister afterwards. When it comes to leaning into the opportunities, it is about helping start-ups and small and medium-sized enterprises to thrive with AI, with AI procurement guides, skills tax credits and capital expenditure reliefs for AI software and adoption.

We need to look at supporting our university spin-outs and the incredible research in this country; quintupling proof of concept funding; having a standardised national framework for negotiating IP between universities and staff; and moving towards full IP ownership by researchers and research teams. We have to help to grow these things here in the UK.

As mentioned by the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) and the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), we must use Government procurement to support UK tech. It has to be a catalyst for British sovereign tech. We are calling for a trial increase to 30% for the social value in procurement contracts. That would align with our strategic goals on digital sovereignty and AI, while maintaining open borders.

When it comes to tackling the challenges head-on, we need to look seriously at the cyber-security threats that have been talked about today. The hon. Member for Poole talked about the impact of big tech companies, and Mythos was a wake-up call. We hear that China is now developing such models, but I am most worried about those we are not hearing about.

We need to prepare for the future of work and fuel our creative industries, because we are nowhere without them. When it comes to NEETs, we have to realise that we are at a squeeze point, because companies are looking at how AI is bringing down costs. However, I would gently add that this is not the time to increase the cost of employment; that will not tackle the employment question.

We need to look at establishing safety by design in AI systems and models. We must tackle harm from chatbots through a harm-based framework, but enforcement is crucial. The AI Safety Institute is now the AI Security Institute. It is such a shame that that focus has been diminished, because we should be looking at AI ethics, as well as safety and security. We have to ensure that AI systems are not used for harm.

Members talked about AI fraud, which is a massive, serious problem in the UK. Revolut told us that the UK accounts for 22% of its customer base but 68% of its fraud costs. We are not tackling that massive problem properly, and AI is supercharging it. We are therefore calling for an online crime agency and AI labelling. We are also saying that social media companies, where a lot of AI-enabled fraud starts, should be financially liable for it.

We must tackle the energy question for AI datacentres and their role in the community, which my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dunbartonshire (Susan Murray) mentioned. We have to make sure they add value to our communities, and the AI Energy Council must tackle those issues head-on. On public services, we need to make sure a person stays in the loop.

Ultimately, we need to prepare for a future that is arriving very quickly. Underpinning that, we are calling for a national people strategy. Things are changing very quickly, so we need a single, coherent framework, from primary school to the workplace, with regional input. We must realise that the skills we need for an AI future are not just technical skills, but critical thinking and analysis.

We must also look at a digital sovereignty strategy, as many Members have said. We need to look at our tech stack to ensure that we do not have a single point of failure. A resilient tech stack would be good not just for our security and for businesses, but for our tech and our economy, so we absolutely need to look at that.

We cannot give up on frontier models; we need to start looking at them now. A point was made about proportionality in models. We do not all need massive, complex models that require massive amounts of energy to solve most of our problems. Most companies probably need simple models. They can be UK models, but if we do not start now by backing and investing in them, we will be left behind very quickly.

Finally, we need to move quicky on smart regulation. The Financial Conduct Authority has a fantastic approach to fintech that looks at output and standards. We need a flexible approach to AI, because things are moving quickly. We also need a digital Bill of rights.

We need to unlock the benefits by addressing the challenges head-on. According to the Ada Lovelace Institute, 91% of the public feel that it is important that AI systems are developed and used in ways that treat people fairly, and almost 90% are calling for an independent regulator for AI. Will the Minister listen to those concerns, take back the many great ideas that have been raised today and speak to his colleagues across Departments? AI is an extremely powerful tool, and we must embrace it. The Government must tackle this head-on. Where will they let the power be focused?

If anyone is unsure how quickly AI is going to change, I am repeatedly reminded that this year is the slowest we will ever see in AI development. If a plane going around the world is 1° off, it will be 500 miles off course. We need to decide now the direction we are going in with AI. We need to look at that holistically. We are here to support that Government work and make sure it empowers society, so that Britain can really be the leading nation on trustworthy, innovative technology.

[Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)]

It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I thank the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for bringing forward this interesting debate, and all the Members on both sides of the House who have taken part. I recognise many of those who have participated in many debates such as this and who will, I am sure, participate in many more to come.

I will start by thanking my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes)—I wish I had attended his lecture in 2000, not least to have had the experience of being in a room where everyone disagreed with him, which must have been rather unique—for making an important point about how slowly Parliament regulates and responds to change.

My right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) made a similar point about our responsiveness to this rapidly evolving sector. I also very much welcome his point about education and the challenges involved, particularly given his experience in the sector. However, more than anything, I welcome his point that nobody knows what the future outcomes will be—a point I shall come back to a bit later.

I want to focus the bulk of my remarks on employment. I share the desire of the hon. Member for Poole to look at how to support and enhance employment through the AI transition, and we do need to have more such discussions. However, I am saddened that one core proposal from Labour Back Benchers is a plan on who or what we should tax now. I regret that the hon. Member’s plans for an employment levy, which he is very passionate about and has written about previously, would not work to protect jobs—protectionism never does. It would simply put a brake on the ability of organisations, large and small, to adapt to AI, and leave us behind our competitors, losing jobs across all sectors.

The history of protectionism is, sadly, frequently a very tragic one. With each technological intervention and change, there are often calls for protectionist approaches, and when they come in—

[Iqbal Mohamed]

Will the hon. Member explain how this will work, then? Human beings at work pay national insurance, income tax and pension contributions, and then they can support their families. AI agents and AI-powered robots do not pay any of that—there are no tax receipts for the Government—so how will Government fund public services in that scenario?

[Dr Spencer]

I thank the hon. Member for his challenge regarding a future hypothetical that has yet to be realised. I think I will be able to address some of his points, but I think the premise he is setting is a bit beyond the scope of this discussion. However, I can give some concrete proposals for protecting human jobs. As a starter for 10, rather than inventing a new tax, we could start with some old ones, and rather than inventing new regs, we could start with some newish ones.

The Labour Government’s approach has been to make it as difficult as possible to employ human labour by increasing national insurance contributions from employers; making it more difficult for younger people to compete in the workplace by increasing the minimum wage; and increasing employment regulations, making it a greater gamble for businesses to take on new starters. To support jobs in the UK, we should, before looking at AI, look at the Labour Government’s policies, which are uniquely designed to make it more and more difficult to employ a person over a machine.

We are right to think about the workforce implications of the adoption of AI, but the future is always unclear and uncertain; that is the challenge of working in this sector, and I am very mindful of that position of humility as I move on to the following, more specific remarks.

Other technological disruptions, while displacing jobs, have ultimately led to more jobs through elasticity of demand. As costs decrease through automation, demand increases. That is the story of what happened with mass manufacturing in the automotive sector: to begin with, people were concerned that mechanised manufacturing would reduce jobs in the sector. Of course, the car sector exploded because the cost of a car went through the floor, and as a net result there were more jobs in the automotive sector. The issue was that they were different jobs; it is more of a transition than a replacement.

There are signals and concerns that the current decrease in the number of youth jobs is due to AI. However, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire said, it is unclear whether that is due to AI replacement, the current prevailing economic circumstances, or a mixture of the two. The data remains unclear, but I appreciate that we need to be thinking now about what possible futures could unfold. Equally, our tech sector provides growth and jobs. The UK could be the world’s fastest AI adopter, but only if it is not punished with burdensome taxes and regulations. We are already seeing a hint—just a hint—of what AI can offer, especially in the research and health sectors. Our economic future needs AI, or we are going to be left behind.

Before I come to my final questions for the Minister, let me touch on AI and tech sovereignty, which is increasingly being talked about in the media and in this place as people focus on it more and more. AI and tech sovereignty, as described in this debate and in other forums, is illusory. We work and operate in global supply chains, with technology enmeshed around the world. Whether it is microchips built by TSMC in Taiwan, microchip etches created in the Netherlands, quantum tech built in the UK or frontier models, most of which are based in the States, our sectors are completely and utterly enmeshed.

Rather than talking about tech and data sovereignty, we should be talking about resilience and leverage. What are the core functions and features that we want to have on domestic soil? We can have a discussion about that. What should it be necessary to have on British soil, and what are the core technologies on which we want to be elite? We want to be world leaders, and to be indispensable to the world so that it looks to us, as opposed to the other way around. We need resilience and leverage rather than to chase the illusory rainbow of tech and data sovereignty.

Given my remarks about regulation and competitiveness, can the Minister rule out any part of the UK being brought into the EU AI Act? That would reduce our competitiveness with the EU. Will the Minister summarise the impact on the UK AI sector of Government taxation and employment policies? Have they been positive or negative? If they have been negative, to what extent? Can he confirm that there will be a decent statement before recess, as has been promised, on social media and the regulation of chatbots? Has he spoken to the virtual Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham), about the importance of anti-protectionist policies in the UK’s AI sector?

Israel: E1 Zone Expansion

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Falconer]

Madam Deputy Speaker, let me beg your forgiveness for forgetting the customs of the House—you would think that practice would make perfect.

I thank my hon. Friend for the question. All of us, particularly in election year, need to be reminding all our friends in Israel and all the politicians of the importance of the points that he makes.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

All settlers are criminals— not just those who are violent—because they occupy land that does not belong to them. Since the late ’90s, successive Governments have called the E1 a red line because it would permanently divide the west bank and destroy the possibility of a Palestinian state. Meanwhile, more than 700,000 settlers now live illegally over 140 sanctioned settlements and 100 unsanctioned outposts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and settlements continue to expand while Palestinians continue to be forcibly displaced. The International Court of Justice has made it clear that states must not assist in this unlawful occupation. Is the E1 finally the moment when this Government will match their words with action, or will this simply become another so-called red line that Israel crosses without consequence?

[Mr Falconer]

I have tried to be as explicit as I can be about the potential consequences, while abiding to the long-standing position on sanctions.

Middle East

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Tuesday 9th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

I am sorry to say that the sanctions and actions announced today will not prevent Israel from continuing to act with impunity and committing one war crime after another. On Friday, I received a reply from the Foreign Office to a letter that I sent three months ago on the UN commission of inquiry findings that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. In that reply, the Minister for the Middle East stated:

“as soon as this Government took office, we ordered a review into Israel’s compliance with international humanitarian law, which has continued to conclude that Israel is not committed to upholding IHL in Gaza.”

Why, in the light of that assessment, are the Government still limited to giving statements of concern, rather than taking meaningful actions to prevent further atrocities and breaches of IHL?

[Yvette Cooper]

It is exactly because of that review, which was commissioned immediately after we came into government, that we suspended a whole series of arms export licences. We took practical steps, just as we have done in providing additional aid and support, and in introducing whole swathes of sanctions—this is our fourth round in this area—and we will continue to do that.

To get overall impact, however, we need an international coalition; no one country can do it alone. The impact that was felt in the autumn to achieve the 20-point plan for Gaza took countries from around the world coming together. That is what we need again, and that is why we need to drive this through international diplomacy and activity, as well as through the actions that we in the UK take.

Lebanon: Israel Defence Forces Operations

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Falconer]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his commitment to the region and developments in the middle east. We are proud that we are now one of the largest humanitarian donors in Lebanon. Access to that aid has not been impeded within Lebanon. However, as some of my hon. Friends have already set out, there have been terrible incidents involving the death of aid workers—very committed young Lebanese who are doing their absolute best to help people in their own country—and that must stop.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

The illegal actions of Hezbollah and Iran must be condemned, but so must the illegal actions of Israel. Israel carried out 11,518 attacks in Lebanon between 2 March and 11 May, with more than 3,000 further estimated attacks since. Israel has bombed and destroyed or heavily demolished more than 100 villages. As of yesterday, Israel has injured 10,577 people and killed 3,468 people, including 128 health workers. It has attacked and damaged 17 hospitals, destroying three of them. It employs double and triple-tap attacks on civilians. Will this Labour Government do anything meaningful to stop Israel’s thirst for the blood of innocent civilians, its insatiable appetite for the most barbaric violence and its Gazafication of Lebanon and the wider middle east? Does the UK support or condemn Netanyahu’s declared plan for a Greater Israel?

[Mr Falconer]

I think we have to be a bit careful when we describe the Government of Israel. I do not think they have a thirst for the blood of innocent civilians. We have to be a bit more careful with our language in this Chamber, because that sounds to me like it echoes antisemitic tropes—so I want to take a little bit of issue with the question that I was asked. I have taken clear steps in relation to Lebanon, and indeed in relation to events in Palestine, and we will continue to do so, but I do think we have to be careful with our language in here.

Freedom of Religion or Belief in China

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Wednesday 18th March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Ms Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for freedom of religion or belief in China.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Ms Jardine. I am grateful for the opportunity to lead this important debate on freedom of religion or belief in China.

I would like to open with a tragic story. On a hot August day in 2022, in Shanxi, northern China, more than 100 police officers descended on a Christian family summer camp, surrounding the gathering, forcibly searching and detaining dozens of believers—over 30 adults and 40 children. The police were breaking up not a dangerous gathering or insurgency, but a family day out. The camp was organised by an unregistered church called the Linfen Covenant House Church, and was a harmless event aimed at building church community. In the months that followed, pastors Li Jie and Han Xiaodong were arrested and reportedly subjected to harsh interrogation, including sleep deprivation, humiliation and torture. Church member Wang Qiang was later detained and tortured for weeks after refusing to renounce his faith or fabricate testimony against the church leaders.

It took three years for the court to process that case, but justice was nowhere to be found. Prosecutors did not accuse the pastors of violence or any threat to society—they could not. Instead, they charged them with fraud, arguing that the voluntary offerings given by members of their unregistered church were somehow illegal. Pastors Li Jie and Han Xiaodong were each sentenced to three years and eight months in prison and fined heavily, while church member Wang Qiang received a sentence of one year and 11 months. The community church insists that the three men had committed no crime, and that they had suffered simply because of their faith.

We have all come here today because we believe that freedom of religion or belief is not a secondary liberty; it goes to the heart of human dignity. It concerns the right to hold beliefs, to change beliefs, to have no belief, to worship in public and private, to teach and to live according to conscience without fear of intimidation, criminalisation, imprisonment or torture. That is why Parliament cannot look away, and why the situation in China requires ongoing and determined scrutiny.

What is taking place in China is not merely the sporadic mistreatment of a few isolated believers, nor is it the meddling of local officials. What we are seeing is the rolling out of a sophisticated system of repression, in which law, administration, surveillance, propaganda and coercion are all being weaponised to subordinate religion to the Chinese Communist party. The issue before us is not only persecution; it is the construction of an entire architecture designed to make genuine freedom of religion or belief impossible.

China’s persecution of religion comes under the broad policy initiative of Sinicisation. That term is made to sound mild, as if it refers only to making religion compatible with Chinese culture, but that is not the case; instead, it is political domestication. It means that every religious tradition must first be made subordinate to the ideology, priorities and authority of the Communist party. The goal is not merely to make religion Chinese, but to ensure that religion is stripped of its independence and made to serve the party’s political project.

Sacred texts can be reinterpreted, clergy can be screened and managed, venues can be monitored, publications can be censored, foreign links can be severed, and anything that escapes that framework can be branded illegal, extremist, fraudulent, subversive, or labelled as a cult. Religion must not simply co-exist with the party; it must be remade in the party’s image. Recent Sinicisation policies mean that all clergy must support the leadership of the Communist party, and must be evaluated and ideologically disciplined. All online or in-person religious activity requires a permit from Government. No child can be given religious education.

Furthermore, the sad story of the Linfen community church, which I referred to in my opening remarks, demonstrates that in China the law is always secondary to the will of the Chinese Communist party. China’s constitution appears to protect so-called normal religious activities, but in practice that protection is a joke. The same is true of China’s legal system. The party retains overriding authority over state institutions, including the courts and legislature. In other words, rights exist only to the extent that the party permits them to exist.

Evidence gathered by Christian Solidarity Worldwide takes us deeper. It shows how the law in China is drafted in deliberately vague terms to condemn believers, vaguely accusing them of “harming national interests”, “disrupting social order”, “resisting infiltration” or “extremism.” Such phrases are not carefully bounded legal concepts; they are instruments of selective enforcement. They create uncertainty by design and allow ordinary religious life to be reclassified as a threat.

As we saw with the Linfen community church, the vagueness of the rules means that donation to an unregistered church can be reframed as fraud. Similarly, a Bible study can become an illegal gathering; publishing or sharing religious materials can become an illegal business operation; and a sermon can become incitement to subversion. This is not neutral law enforcement; it is ideological criminalisation. Then, when the full weight of the justice system is brought down upon a believer, the defendant themselves becomes subject to serious procedural abuses. Lawyers are denied access to defendants, cases are shrouded in secrecy, and detainees can be isolated from family and counsel for prolonged periods, placed in legal black holes where torture and coercion become far more likely.

The case of the Linfen community church tells us a great deal. It tells us that family church life can be raided; it tells us that children are not shielded from the machinery of repression; it tells us that secret detention and torture remain live concerns; and it tells us that “fraud” is being used not as an honest response to dishonesty, but as a legal fiction to criminalise churches that refuse to submit to state control.

The situation in Xinjiang illustrates one of the most severe forms of ethno-religious persecution in China today, and as chair of the all-party group on Uyghurs, this topic is very close to my heart. Since 2016, the Xinjiang region has been transformed into one of the most heavily policed areas in the world, under a so-called counter-extremism campaign, marked by pervasive surveillance, forced interrogation and mass incarceration. It is worth pointing out that not all Uyghurs are Muslim and that non-Muslim Uyghurs are also persecuted.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this important debate. With respect to the Uyghurs, does she agree that what we are witnessing in Xinjiang and elsewhere in China is not simply a matter of restricted religious freedoms, but something far more grave? She points to the fact that the Uyghurs are subject to mass detentions and so-called re-education camps, and are used in forced labour by the Chinese Government. Does she agree that this bears all the hallmarks of crimes against humanity and, as many credible voices have argued, may well constitute a genocide?

[Ms Rimmer]

I do agree, and I will come to that later. I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has said more than I was going to say—I thought I was saying too much. Yes, he is absolutely right, and it is dangerous for us all.

The situation in Xinjiang illustrates one of the most severe forms of ethnoreligious persecution in China. It is worth pointing out that not all Uyghurs are Muslim, and not all Muslim Uyghurs are persecuted. Independent estimates suggest that between 1 million and 2 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities have been detained in camps and prisons, with many later transferred into long-term sentences. Alongside that, Uyghur imams, scholars and religious leaders have been systematically targeted, with many detained in prisons for decades or dying in custody, underscoring the deliberate dismantling of religious leadership and community life. Uyghurs have been punished for everyday religious practice, including praying, fasting during Ramadan, teaching the Quran or even using traditional greetings, while mosques and shrines have been demolished and altered, children separated into state-run schools, and homes subjected to constant monitoring.

At the same time, ordinary expressions of the Islamic faith have been criminalised, and the wider system of repression has expanded beyond detention into forced labour, cultural destruction and enforced assimilation. Coercive labour transfer programmes have expanded across multiple sectors, with significant global implications for supply chains. The trajectory is now being further entrenched through new legislation, including the 2026 ethnic unity law, which promotes a single national identity, expands ideological control over religion and culture, and introduces broad penalties for behaviour that is deemed to undermine ethnic unity, effectively formalising a system that has already devastated the Uyghurs’ religious and cultural life. Thanks to many hard-working advocates —such as Rahima Mahmut, Benedict Rodgers and Lord Alton, to name a few—the Uyghur tribunal has concluded that a genocide is taking place in China, including through the sterilisation of Uyghur women. That finding was echoed by the UK Parliament, which voted to recognise the atrocities as a genocide in April 2021.

Evidence from human rights organisations describes the regulations governing Tibetan Buddhist temples, reincarnation and monastic education, including the prohibition on allowing children of compulsory school age to study scriptures in temples. Ordinary religious expression is recast as a threat to state security. Falun Gong practitioners have also faced extreme persecution, including arrests, torture and deaths in custody, with figures suggesting that more than 2,800 were arrested in 2024 alone. A mounting body of evidence presented in 2019 at the China tribunal chaired by Sir Geoffrey Nice KC—the same person who chaired the Uyghur tribunal—pointed to the conclusion that Falun Gong practitioners have been the victims of a state-run programme of forced organ harvesting. It is unbelievable what went on there.

It is clear now that religious persecution in China has two aspects: the careful controlling of a narrow, politicised form of religion, and the outright repression of all other expressions of that faith. We see that clearly in the systemic persecution of Chinese Christians.

First, we see the careful controlling of a narrow and highly politicised form of Christianity. The so-called Three-Self Patriotic Movement, a state-sponsored form of Chinese Christianity, is presented by the authorities as the legitimate framework for Protestant worship. This is not simply a matter of registration; it is a matter of subordination. In regulating the churches, the state claims the right to decide which churches may legally exist, which pastors may lawfully preach, which cameras are installed above the doors, what theology may be taught and what children may hear. Registration does not guarantee safety; even registered churches have still been raided. That shows that the issue is not merely whether a church is registered, but whether it remains sufficiently obedient to party priorities.

Secondly, we see the outright repression of all those who refuse to conform to that limited model. While local government officials might be able to turn a blind eye to small house church gatherings, they can crack down in a flash on congregations that risk growing too large, too noticeable or too direct in their political messaging. Unregistered churches are pressured to join the state system, and refusal can trigger raids, detention and prosecution. Even the smallest acts of worship, such as organising a bible study in a home, can be labelled as illegal gatherings, leading to detention and imprisonment.

When preaching is treated as a political crime, and when ordinary worship becomes a criminal offence, freedom of religion or belief is not merely restricted, but effectively denied. What binds all these examples together is not a single denomination or doctrine, but the party’s insistence that no independent moral, spiritual, communal or transnational authority may exist outside its control.

Why should the United Kingdom care? First, because freedom of religion or belief is universal. It is not diminished by geography, and it does not become negotiable because the offending state is economically powerful. Secondly, because the United Kingdom has long claimed a role as a defender of human rights and the international rules-based order. That claim rings hollow if, when confronted with a sophisticated system of ideological repression by a major power, we choose caution over candour. Thirdly, because the evidence before us shows that China’s repression is becoming more systematic, more legalised, more normalised and more exportable. A model in which freedom of religion or belief is hollowed out through licensing, digital surveillance, patriotic indoctrination, vague criminal law and selective prosecution is not only a domestic tragedy for China’s believers, but a profound challenge to international human rights norms.

Let me conclude with several clear points. The United Kingdom should state plainly that China’s Sinicisation programme is incompatible with genuine freedom of religion or belief. We should call for the release of prisoners of conscience who are detained on account of religion or belief, including Christian leaders, Uyghur and Hui Muslims, Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong practitioners and others. We should condemn the persecution of Uyghurs as what it is—a genocide. We should press for transparency in administrative and criminal detention, an end to secret detention practices, proper access to lawyers and families, and due process consistent with international standards. We should support international efforts to establish a robust, independent UN mechanism capable of investigating China’s serious human rights violations, including against freedom of religion or belief. We should work with international partners on targeted sanctions against those responsible for gross abuse. We should ensure that UK trade engagement does not proceed as though forced labour, religious persecution, cultural erasure and ideological criminalisation are somehow separate from the overall character of the state with which we are dealing.

China’s believers are not asking this House to solve every problem in one debate, but they are entitled to expect a democratic legislature to tell the truth.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

Given the 2021 parliamentary vote recognising the risk of genocide of the Uyghurs, does the hon. Member agree that the Government should be taking every step that they are obliged to take, under the convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, to prevent genocide in China?

[Ms Rimmer]

I have to say that I did not hear everything that the hon. Member said, but I think we should do whatever we can to bring the issue to a head, one way or another. We cannot just leave it as it is.

I urge the Government to make freedom of religion or belief in China a sustained priority in our diplomacy, multilateral engagement, sanctions policy and trade posture, because if freedom of conscience means anything, it must mean something when it is hardest to defend.

Strait of Hormuz

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Monday 16th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Doughty]

I am afraid that I do not recognise the hon. and learned Gentleman’s characterisation of our response. We have British Typhoon and F-35 jets flying in defence of British people, bases and partners, including Qatar, Cyprus, UAE, Jordan and Bahrain. We have had multiple F-35s, Typhoon jets and ground-based defences shooting down drones. The Defence Secretary has just set out the operational hours and sorties that our brave crews have been flying. We also have HMS Dragon on her way to the eastern Mediterranean, and RFA Lyme Bay has sailed from Gibraltar and is also available for maritime tasks. We also have helicopters and other assets in place, so I simply do not recognise his characterisation.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

It is suspected that AI systems have been used to target and murder 165 schoolchildren and their teachers using US-made Tomahawks, with further double-tap attacks falling on survivors 40 minutes later. This Government say that tackling violence against women and girls is a priority, but in failing to call out this clear war crime, those words mean nothing as the bodies of children get buried. Will the Minister explain what the UK Government are doing to hold America and Israel to account for these war crimes, and does he share my concerns about the use of AI to kill?

[Stephen Doughty]

The Defence Secretary has set out our position in relation to autonomous systems and AI, and that is not for me to comment on as a Foreign Office Minister, but it is my understanding that investigations into the incident the hon. Gentleman refers to are ongoing and it would not be appropriate for me to comment on them at this time.

Occupied Palestinian Territories: Genocide Risk Assessment

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Thursday 5th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

I thank the hon. Member for Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber (Brendan O’Hara) for securing this crucial debate. As he said, any person of conscience can and must condemn both the illegal actions of Hamas on 7 October and the illegal actions of Israel in its response for the 850 days since that horrific day.

Despite the plausible risk of genocide inflicted by Israel upon the Palestinian people having been identified by the ICJ, the UN and multiple other agencies and experts, successive UK Governments have consistently refused to acknowledge that risk, and they have failed in their obligations to take immediate, proactive measures to prevent a genocide of the Palestinian people.

Whether the UK Government call Israel’s actions a genocide or not, it will not bring back Hind Rajab, her six family members or the two paramedics who tried to save her. Whether the UK Government call Israel’s actions a genocide or not, it will not bring back the 2,700 family bloodlines wiped out at Israel’s hands, or the relatives of more than 6,000 sole survivors. Whether the UK Government call Israel’s actions genocide or not, it will not bring back the parents of a new generation of Palestinian orphans created through Israeli slaughter, such as the three-year-old Wesam, who was left with a lacerated liver and kidney after an Israeli airstrike that killed her five-year-old brother, her pregnant mother, her father and her grandparents.

Whether the UK Government call Israel’s actions a genocide or not, it will not bring back the almost 300 journalists assassinated for trying to report Israeli war crimes in real time. Whether the UK Government call Israel’s actions a genocide or not, it will not bring back the more than 100 Palestinian hostages executed in Israeli detention centres in the last two and a half years. I regret that I do not have time to pay tribute to each and every individual murdered by the genocidal Israeli regime, who will not be affected by this Government’s decisions.

The point is that accepting the irrefutable and serious risk of genocide would oblige the UK to hold Israel accountable. It would save lives in the present by creating legal obligations for the UK Government to cease arms exports, impose sanctions and prosecute those committing war crimes.

I end my speech with a quote from Francesca Albanese:

“The ongoing genocide in Gaza is a collective crime, sustained by the complicity of influential Third States that have enabled longstanding systemic violations of international law by Israel. Framed by colonial narratives that dehumanize the Palestinians, this live-streamed atrocity has been facilitated through Third States’ direct support, material aid, diplomatic protection and, in some cases, active participation.”

The UK has aided and abetted this genocide—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. I call John McDonnell.

Oral Answers to Questions

Iqbal Mohamed Excerpts

Tuesday 20th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Falconer]

In that period, the UK has made a range of significant determinations in relation to our policy in the middle east. Of course, we continue to consider the Court’s advisory opinion on Israel’s occupation carefully. There is lots in that advisory opinion with which we agree, and which is, indeed, already Government policy. We agree that settlements are illegal, and we have already taken strong action against them. Since this Government came into office, we have introduced three packages of sanctions related to violence against communities in the west bank, and we continue to keep these matters under review.

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

Since the recent ceasefire came into effect, over 450 Palestinians have been killed by Israel. UNICEF reports that over 100 Palestinian children have been killed in Gaza since 10 October. Israeli airstrikes are ongoing, and the mental and physical torture and violence continue unabated. Will the Minister tell the children still alive in Gaza what action the UK Government will take to force Israel to comply with international law and allow essential humanitarian aid into Gaza, and to make the ceasefire a real one and stop the killing?

[Mr Falconer]

I know how deeply so many of our constituents and, indeed, Members of this House feel about these issues, and how often they raise them. We will continue to take action in the way that the Foreign Secretary set out this morning. It is vital that the ceasefire holds, and that we make progress in the three areas set out already, and that is the priority for Ministers.