Palestine

Richard Graham Excerpts

Monday 1st December 2014 Westminster Hall

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) for bringing this debate to Westminster Hall today. Our debate clearly will not solve the long-standing problems and end the violence in Israel and Palestine, but it gives voice to the many feelings and frustrations of our constituents, 150,000 of whom signed the petition. In having this debate, we place uncomfortable truths on the record; we contribute to the changing winds of international feeling towards what is happening in Israel and Palestine today; we influence our own Government; and we ask awkward questions of all sides. That in itself justifies today’s debate.

Since I last joined a debate on this unhappy part of the world, on 17 July in this Chamber, much has happened, and it is worth recapping. The war that took place was the worst of the three in the past seven years, with 2,100 casualties on the Palestinian side, some 500 of whom were children. There are investigations of some 99 potential war crimes, but no report has been issued yet. Demolitions of homes in East Jerusalem have resumed and increased, and the settlements, which now encompass 341,000 illegal settlers, have substantially expanded. Some 160,000 of the Bedouins have been pressured to move from their traditional homes, and the al-Aqsa mosque was stormed at the beginning of November. Last but by no means least, and perhaps most dangerous of all, an Israeli nationality law was proposed very recently that would legally define Israel as a nation state of the Jews and strip Arab citizens of their basic rights.

[Sir Gerald Kaufman]

It is important to know that that Government apartheid Bill is going to the Knesset on Wednesday of this week to start its passage to becoming law.

[Richard Graham]

I am grateful for the right hon. Gentleman’s intervention on the timing of the debate in Israel on the proposed nationality law. He is right. As our own Prime Minister said, if that proposed nationality law became law, that would turn Israel into an apartheid state.

[Alistair Burt]

I have been careful about not intervening because so many other hon. Members want to speak, but this point is very important. As has already been said on both sides of the House, the Bill is not being proposed by the Government of the state of Israel. It is clear that the proposal has split opinion both in Israel and in the Government, but it is not being proposed by the Israeli Government. I think, bearing in mind the content of my hon. Friend’s speech, he should be very clear on that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Graham]

I am very happy to be clear on that. I do not think I said anything that contradicted it. I was going to quote the President of Israel, who said very clearly that other groups

“should not feel as the Jews had felt in exile”,

signalling his own strong disapproval of it. But the very fact that the nationality law has been proposed—we will see how much support it has in the Knesset—indicates a significant change in events since the July debate that is well worth highlighting.

Other winds of change are blowing outside Israel, in the response of the world to some of those events. It is worth noting that eight EU member states now recognise Palestine officially; Sweden is the most recent. There have been non-binding resolutions not only in this country but in Ireland and Spain, and tomorrow the French Parliament will vote on a non-binding motion. That indicates that world views are changing.

In previous debates, my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department for International Development, has talked about the UK tiring of picking up the pieces from countless incidents of violence in Israel and Palestine and has called for “meaningful political change”. Today, I ask my hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for the middle east whether he shares the concern of the author of the EU document circulated to all 28 countries that we are moving to a situation where a two-state solution may no longer be possible. Does he share the author’s belief that if that were the case, action on illegal settlements would be necessary? Does he share my belief that the tragedy of what is happening in Israel is that its actions—settlements, the demolition of homes, a hardening of attitudes and even the consideration of a nationality law—are seriously against its long-term interests and may do long-term damage to that nation state, which our country did so much to bring into being?