Palestine

Lord Turnberg Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Turnberg]

My Lords, while we are all very anxious for a two-state solution to emerge from all this, to follow the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, does the Minister agree that it is rather unhelpful for a Palestinian Government who include Hamas to seek membership of the United Nations at the same time as they deny the existence of another state that belongs to the United Nations, namely Israel?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, a great deal of unhelpful statements are being made on both sides. It was brought to my attention that one British national newspaper the other week published an advertisement by the Israeli Ministry of Tourism that showed the state of Israel as including Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights. That is not entirely helpful for an agency of the state of Israel, either. There are real problems, and both sides recognise that. If we concentrate on the problems on both sides, we will not get back to negotiations, which is, above all, what we need to do.