King’s Speech

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Wednesday 15th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab) (V)]

My Lords, I want to raise two issues. The first is the war in Ukraine, which I have opposed since its beginning. I supported the more cautious original approach of France and Germany, which, if followed, would have saved billions in cash and thousands of lives, although later they were forced to compromise. That war has recast relations between East and West, has led to a mass population movement, undermined the international oil markets and provoked recession in Europe. I have supported wars in the Falklands, Iraq and eastern Europe, but not this one. If Ukraine had recognised separate regional status for Donetsk and Luhansk, and had not banned the official use of the Russian language in Donbass, and if NATO, conscious of Russian paranoia over NATO expansion, had insisted on the retention of non-nuclear barrier status for a string of states stretching from Finland to Georgia, then occupation and war would have been avoided. Russia would not have felt threatened. My view did not prevail. We now await the demise of the brutal Putin and a rebellion in America over the cost of the war.

I turn to Gaza, on which I without hesitation support my party’s position. Sixty-four years ago, in 1959, as a 16 year-old schoolboy I won a Daily Express essay competition. The prize: a visit to Jordan and Israel. At that time, Jerusalem was divided, with the east in Jordan and the west in Israel. I recall visiting refugee camps in Jordan and talking to the displaced, and then my excitement on entering a rapidly developing Israel, a country I have grown to love and admire to this day. It is a country I have followed over half a century, with occasional visits.

Recent events have shaken my faith. Netanyahu and the settlement movement have alienated world opinion and undermined worldwide support for the Jewish homeland, and policies of repression in Gaza and the land grab in the West Bank, while assisting the settler movement, have been disastrous. They have shattered the Oslo process, thereby breeding the worst forms of anti-Semitism.

So where do we go from here? I find it hard to condemn Israel, but there has to be urgent change. Post-conflict Gaza and the West Bank need to be internationally re-recognised by all as the new Palestinian state. Palestine should be given full protectorate status under a renewed United Nations mandate, the legal definition of which is defined as a state under protection by another state for defence against aggression and other violations of law.

The new state should be free of all Israeli jurisdiction and occupation. An administrative power should be appointed under a process administered by the permanent members of the United Nation Security Council, perhaps very similar to the arrangements under the 1945 Berlin declaration, with defined geographic areas for individual national responsibility. The boundaries should be as advised under the Geneva accords, with the creation of a limited number of agreed settlements. However, with the murder of 1,300 innocent Israeli citizens and the consequential brutal assault on Gaza, regional tensions are likely to remain high and Israel will need further security guarantees. Gaza will require a protective wall that blocks the import of weaponry. This wall should be provided under the proposed UN mandate.

The answer to this crisis is not to further restrict the Palestinians, which is current Israeli policy. Gaza and the West Bank, united under a single administrative authority, should be physically linked by a security-fenced roadway to allow the free flow of people and goods under strict security control. It could be modelled on the Berlin corridor. Yes, that is controversial, but I am afraid that we need compromise and new thinking all round. As the late William Whitelaw, a neighbouring Member of Parliament in Cumbria, said to me on a long train journey in the late 1980s, if there is another World War it will be started over Israel.