Rushanara Ali
Main Page: Rushanara Ali (Labour - Bethnal Green and Stepney)Department Debates - View all Rushanara Ali's debates with the Cabinet Office
(10 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Sanctions are not soft if they are well targeted—they can hit an economy quite hard. The danger of trying to find a coalition of the willing rather than working including through the institutions of the European Union is that some of these areas are governed by European Union procedures and we need to get the agreement of everyone in order to make these sanctions count.
Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)
Does the Prime Minister stand by his words of 2010 that the blockaded Gaza
“must not be allowed to remain a prison camp”?
Does he believe that the killing of 500 people and the displacing of 83,000 people is a proportionate response to the attacks he has mentioned? May I appeal to him to show courage and international leadership and to act as an honest broker to help bring an end to this conflict and humanitarian catastrophe?
The Prime Minister
The point the hon. Lady makes by reading out the remarks that I made is that I have a consistent record, yes, of defending Israel’s right to defend itself, but also of speaking out when I think that wrong things are being done. I am doing everything I can to help bring this conflict to an end. The most important thing, as I said, is for Hamas to accept the ceasefires that Israel has been prepared to accept.