Ed Miliband: UK had to 'call out' illegal Israeli settlements before it was 'too late'
The UK has announced trade sanctions against illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Ed Miliband said the UK had to “call out” illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank before it was “too late” to save the two-state solution.
The foreign secretary also said the prospect of a Palestinian state alongside Israel is “being destroyed by the facts on the ground” and that “settler terrorists” were carrying out “ethnic cleansing” while the Israeli government turned a “blind eye”.
However he rejected suggestions that sanctions could lead to increased antisemitism towards Jewish people in the UK.
Yesterday Mr Miliband told parliament that the UK will ban the import of goods from illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The Foreign Office says it is “confident” the UK will be able to impose these sanctions.
Within hours, Israel responded with four counter-measures, including closing the UK consulate in Jerusalem and banning 11 MPs from entering the country.
Speaking to BBC Breakfast, Mr Miliband said: “We and our allies did not feel we could stand by and be passive and powerless in the face of this destruction of the two-state solution.”
He said he is a “proud British Jew” who is very aware of the “scourge of antisemitism”, but added: “Anyone who holds British Jews responsible for the actions of the Israeli government is engaging in antisemitism, pure and simple, and we all have to call it out.”
Mr Miliband also told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he does not agree with Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis’s view that the sanctions were a “truly dark day for British Jews”.
Mr Miliband says Israel’s response is “regrettable and damaging” and the closure of the Jerusalem consulate will be “damaging for the Palestinian people”.
He said the UK has “important intelligence and security relationships with Israel”, but added: “It is right to act because the bigger danger here is the wider suffering and oppression of the Palestinian people, which is continuing unabated and we have a responsibility to seek to make a difference to that”.
Alex Gandler from the Israeli Embassy in London also told the programme that these new sanctions were imposed due to “internal UK politics”, adding “the timing could not be worse than it is” as the Jewish High Holy Days are approaching.
He said the decision “creates an atmosphere for violence against Jews” and adds that it “creates a fertile ground for antisemitism to flourish”.
So far the White House has not commented on the UK’s decision to impose sanctions, but US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US does not want to see “anything destabilising” in the West Bank as there is “so much going on in the region”.
He added: “We think it has implications as well on our ability to make progress with regards to Gaza, on the 20-point plan and the board of peace that we’re very committed to.
“Obviously we’re not going to do what the UK did.”
Concerns have also been raised at the fact these sanctions come so close to upcoming elections in Palestine and Israel.
Hamas has said it plans to run in any Palestinian election, which Mr Miliband said the UK Government opposes. He said Hamas’ 7 October attacks on Israel were a “murderous atrocity” and the group can play “no role in the future of Gaza”.
The foreign secretary said Hamas has to disarm and the Gaza peace plan needs to be implemented urgently before a “proper peace process” can return.
However he refused to use the word “genocide” in his interview, instead saying he is “deeply concerned about obviously what’s happened in Gaza” and that there is “increasing evidence of war crimes”.
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