UK to suspend some arms exports to Israel, foreign secretary announces

The UK will suspend some arms export licences to Israel, the foreign secretary has announced.

David Lammy told the House of Commons that 30 out of 350 licences will be put on pause following a review of the country’s compliance with international law.

They include components for military aircraft, helicopters and drones.

The decision comes as mass protests spread across Israel, demonstrating against Benjamin Netanyahu’s approach to the war in Gaza following the recovery of the bodies of six people held hostage by Hamas on Saturday.

Lammy told MPs: ‘Throughout my life, I have been a friend of Israel.

‘A liberal, progressive Zionist who believes in Israel as a democratic state and a homeland for the Jewish people, which has both the right to exist and defend itself.

‘But I believe also that Israel will only exist in safety and security if there is a two-state solution that guarantees the rights of all Israeli citizens and their Palestinian neighbours, who have their own inalienable right to self determination and security.’

He said the suspension would go ahead due to a ‘clear risk that [the arms] might be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law’.

The foreign secretary emphasised that the decision was not intended to pre-empt any court decisions on whether Israel had broken such laws.

He also used his statement in the Commons to repeat his call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

Asked by SNP MP Brendan O’Hara why he has not introduced a ‘blanket ban’ on arms exports, Lammy said Israel continues to face ‘real threats’ from Hezbollah in Lebanon and Houthis in the Red Sea.

He added that the MP should ‘recognise the long standing relationship that this country has with Israel’, adding: ‘It’s for that basis that my remarks are measured and I defend that.’

Layla Moran, the Liberal Democrat spokesperson for foreign affairs, asked if the government would also ban goods produced in illegal Israeli settlements and whether far-right Israeli government ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich might be sanctioned.

Lammy responded that the government condemns ‘the settler expansion […] and of course, the increase in settler violence’ as well as the rhetoric of Ben-Gvir and Smotrich.

He continued: ‘(Moran) raises important issues, and she recognises that, of course, in terms of labelling, we do label in relation to goods from settlements alongside the 1967 borders particularly, but the issues are very, very complex.’

Following a visit to Israel last month, Lammy issued a joint statement with French foreign minister Stéphane Séjourné saying: ‘All actors in the region must make concrete gestures if they genuinely want to avoid war.

‘We stand ready to engage with them to that end.’

The Labour government has been under immense pressure to act on the war in Gaza since several party incumbents were defeated by pro-Palestine independent candidates at the July General Election.

Earlier today, a group of five independent candidates – Shockat Adam, Ayoub Khan, Adnan Hussain, Iqbal Mohamed and ex-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – announced they would be uniting as a political force.

In its first joint statement, the Independent Alliance said its members would call for an end to arms sales to Israel among other objectives.

Israel itself has been heavily disrupted by a rare general strike intended to pressure the government into rethinking its handling of the crisis.

Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets yesterday, in what is believed to be the biggest protest since the beginning of the war.

The families of Hamas hostages and much of the Israeli public has blamed Netanyahu for the deaths of the six people whose bodies were recovered at the weekend, saying they could have returned alive if a deal had been struck.

Negotiations have dragged on for more than a year, with the prime minister favouring a strategy of military pressure on Hamas and promising to achieve ‘total victory’ over the group.

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