Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of the policies of the (a) Israeli and (b) US governments on the expansion of settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

As the Prime Minister said in the House on 22 January, we are deeply concerned by what is happening in the West Bank. We have raised this a number of times in the various exchanges that we have had with Israel at both ministerial and official level. It is in no one's interest for further conflict and instability to spread in the West Bank. The risk of instability is serious and the need for de-escalation urgent. We continue to call on Israeli authorities to exercise restraint, adhere to international law, and clamp down on the actions of those who seek to inflame tensions. We are clear that Israeli settlements are illegal under international law and harm prospects for a two-state solution. The UK strongly condemns settler violence. On 15 October, the Foreign Secretary announced new sanctions targeting three illegal settler outposts and four organisations that have supported and sponsored violence against communities in the West Bank. These measures will help bring accountability to those who have supported and perpetrated such heinous abuses of human rights.