Israel and Gaza

Richard Burgon Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his powerful statement and also agree with him, We must think about the future, and in spite of this awful tragedy, we cannot lose sight of the better future that we all want to strive for. Indeed, in my conversations with leaders we have already been thinking about that, and it is something I raised with the Prime Minister of Israel as well. We all want that better future for the Israeli and Palestinian people, and hopefully out of this tragedy we will find a way to move closer towards it.

[Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)]

The massacre of Israeli civilians was a heinous act of terrorism that we all utterly condemn and the hostages must be released immediately. In the words of the United Nations Secretary-General,

“the horrific acts by Hamas do not justify responding with collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”

But that is what we are seeing in Gaza, with civilian areas bombed and food, electricity, water and medicines all cut off. Such collective punishment is a war crime under the Geneva conventions, so will the Prime Minister take this opportunity to make it clear to the Israeli Government that this collective punishment of Palestinian civilians must end immediately?