Israel and Palestine

Peter Dowd Excerpts

Monday 14th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Peter Dowd (in the Chair)]

I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice to support the new hybrid arrangements. Timings of debates have been amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate. There will also be suspensions between each debate. I remind Members participating physically and virtually that they must arrive for the start of debates in Westminster Hall. Members are expected to remain for the entire debate.

I remind Members participating virtually that they are visible at all times, both to each other and to us in the Boothroyd Room. If Members who are attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address, [e-mail]. Members who are attending physically should clean their spaces before using them and as they leave the room. I also remind Members that Mr Speaker has stated that masks should be worn in Westminster Hall. Members attending physically who are in the latter stages of the call list should use the Public Gallery and move on to the horseshoe when seats become available. Members can speak from the horseshoe only where there are microphones.

Before I move on, we will have a formal time limit of three minutes, given the amount of interest and the number of people speaking. After Catherine McKinnell, there will be a limit of three minutes, and I exhort Members to stick to it, or we will have to drop it down a little.

--- Later in debate ---

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd.

Like many thousands of my constituents, I watched in absolute horror a few weeks ago when violence was used against worshippers gathering during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan at the al-Aqsa mosque. The scenes were truly shocking. They were deeply painful to watch and they motivated many thousands of my constituents to write to me. Like me, so many of them were thinking, “There but for the grace of God go I”.

The ceasefire is, of course, welcome. We all pray that it holds and is strengthened, and that a path forward can be charted, but it is essential that all holy sites in that holiest of cities—holy to so many people of many different faiths—are protected and respected. I press the Minister to do whatever he can to ensure that there is no repeat of the scenes we saw just a few short weeks ago.

The history of Palestine and Israel is in so many ways a perpetual cycle of loss, sorrow and conflict, pierced only occasionally by moments of hope and fleeting opportunities for positive and lasting change. Even those moments have become ever rarer in recent years, with a cycle of violence that has decimated entire communities, led to the loss of countless lives, and laid bare the shaky foundations on which any aspirations of a negotiated, diplomatic settlement have been built. The goal of a viable and sovereign Palestinian state alongside a safe and secure Israel remains the shared objective of so many in this House and all over the world, but in truth, it has rarely seemed further away. The end of Benjamin Netanyahu’s 12 years as Prime Minister of Israel at least suggests that a path towards a settlement, political and practical, could be charted. Indeed, the high-wire balancing act that led to his removal points to a long-missing political tenacity that could bode well.

However, among those who have removed an indisputable roadblock to peace are some with still greater belligerence, with opinions more extreme and entrenched even than Benjamin Netanyahu’s. The fact that they will serve alongside those with an unequivocal commitment to a viable two-state solution is welcome, and it is perhaps to them that we must reiterate that the illegal occupation and proposed annexation of the west bank is violating international law. Only when they accept that can we make progress in the field of peace. Any and every road towards a just and lasting peace requires that the occupation is brought to a permanent end, with both Palestinians and Israelis enjoying true and meaningful security, dignity and human rights.

Some may try to argue that formal annexation has been stopped—that we no longer need be concerned. It is impossible to articulate adequately how dangerous and misguided such counsel is. The truth is that illegal settlement expansion has continued, and Palestinians are still being evicted from their homes. I cannot condone these violations of international law, nor should anyone in this House or in the international community. The Labour party has repeatedly called on the UK Government to object to the expansion of settlements in the strongest possible terms, and we have raised this issue in Parliament, in public, and directly with the Israeli ambassador to the UK. I urge the Minister today to change the dial on the facts on the ground by recognising the state of Palestine.

[Peter Dowd (in the Chair)]

If colleagues wish to remove their jackets in the light of the heat, they should feel free to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sam Tarry (Ilford South) (Lab) [V]]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing this important debate at a crucial fork in the road for Israel’s Government, following Naftali Bennett’s replacing Benjamin Netanyahu as Prime Minister yesterday. I hope that the new Administration will listen to the voices of Governments around the world on the issue of justice in Palestine and urgently change direction, because for too long peace and the hope of peace has been crushed by military might. I know that a large number of my Labour colleagues wish to speak in the debate, including my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum), whose constituency had the highest number of signatories, alongside mine, to the petition that urges the UK Government to recognise the state of Palestine.

In recent weeks, we have witnessed millions of people marching in almost every major city in the world. Israel’s illegal occupations, annexations and bombardment of the Palestinian people and those trying simply to exist in Gaza can no longer be ignored. Indeed, there is an enormous sense of anger and injustice in my constituency of Ilford South, which has the highest number of signatories to the petition, at around 6,000. Individually, 5,000 people in my constituency have written to me. This has happened during the covid pandemic, which shows that people care deeply about what is happening around the world. My constituents rightly feel that human rights abuses should be challenged, be they in Kashmir, Myanmar, Yemen or, indeed, in Gaza.

Although people are rightly concerned about events in the middle east, I want to be clear that it is never acceptable for members of the Jewish community, both in my Ilford South constituency and across the UK, to be subject to criticism, abuse and attacks because of the actions of the Israeli Government. It is clear that there is a huge groundswell of support for justice as the escalation of this conflict has continued, with the needless deaths of civilians on both sides, the recent illegal seizure of land and the incendiary storming of the al-Aqsa mosque. The proliferation of evictions, demolitions and new settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories not only runs counter to international humanitarian law, including the fourth Geneva convention; it also serves to make a viable two-state solution ever more distant.

The Labour party has long urged both sides to come together to ensure a just two-state solution that enables Palestinians and Israelis to peacefully co-exist. I have travelled to Israel and Palestine extensively, on more than half a dozen occasions, and I have seen at first hand the conditions in which Palestinians are forced to live. However, I have also met many progressive activists and politicians in Israel, and I encourage Members from both sides of the House to forge links with those groups and with partners for peace on both sides of the divide. As we have seen in recent weeks, they were highly effective in helping to bring the latest conflict to an end. The many powerful protests in the likes of Lod, Ramla and Umm al-Fahm show that hundreds of thousands of Israelis are united with the Palestinian people in their condemnation of the events in Palestine and Gaza.

The UK Government should therefore consider every possible avenue to put pressure on the Israeli Government. That includes reviewing the £360 million-worth of arms that they sell to Israel, and challenging—

[Peter Dowd (in the Chair)]

Order. Can you wind up, please?

[Sam Tarry]

Indeed, Mr Dowd. The UK Government have an historical obligation, as do all of us on both sides of the House, to support the state of Palestine in coming into being, and to ensure a future of hope, in which two peoples can co-exist on the same land.