Sir Keir Starmer is scheduled to engage in discussions with Israeli President Isaac Herzog at Downing Street on Wednesday.
Downing Street sources indicate that Sir Keir plans to address the “intolerable situation in Gaza” and emphasize the “action Israel must take to end the horrific suffering we’re witnessing” during his meeting with the Israeli president.
This meeting occurs in the wake of an Israeli strike targeting senior Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, coupled with warnings issued to Gaza City residents to evacuate immediately in anticipation of a large-scale ground offensive.
A coalition of sixty Members of Parliament and peers, representing Labour, the Green Party, and the SNP, are urging the government to deny Herzog entry to the UK, citing concerns about potential complicity in genocide in Gaza under the terms of a UN treaty.
Israel maintains that its actions are aimed at dismantling Hamas and securing the release of hostages. The nation has firmly denied allegations of genocide, which are also under examination by the International Court of Justice.
While Isaac Herzog’s role is largely ceremonial, his office has stated that the visit is intended “to show solidarity with the Jewish community, which is under severe attack and facing a wave of antisemitism.”
However, Health Secretary Wes Streeting has asserted that Herzog must address the allegations leveled against the Israeli government regarding its conduct in Gaza.
“I think he needs to answer the allegations of war crimes, of ethnic cleansing and of genocide that are being levelled at the government of Israel,” he told Times Radio.
“I think he needs to explain how, when we have seen so much evidence of the atrocities being perpetrated by the Israeli army, how he can possibly claim that the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) is the most moral army in the world.
“I think he should explain that, if it is not the intent of the government of Israel to perpetrate genocide or ethnic cleansing, how on earth does he think his Israeli government is going to achieve its stated aim of clearing Palestinians out of Gaza without the war crimes, without ethnic cleansing, or even without genocide?”
Downing Street emphasized Sir Keir’s “revulsion” at the suffering in Gaza but refrained from echoing Streeting’s calls for Herzog to answer for alleged Israeli war crimes and ethnic cleansing.
A spokesman said Sir Keir will raise the “intolerable situation in Gaza” and the “action Israel must take to end the horrific suffering we’re witnessing” with the Israeli president.
Sir Keir condemned the strikes on Doha, in a post on X, saying they “violate Qatar’s sovereignty and risk further escalation across the region”.
In a letter to a select committee published last week, sent when he was foreign secretary, David Lammy said the UK had not concluded that Israel is committing genocide, as set out in a United Nations treaty.
But Downing Street insisted on Tuesday this did not represent a shift in the UK’s position, which was still that it is for international courts to determine whether Israel “has or has not” committed genocide in Gaza.
In the letter, sent before he was replaced as foreign secretary in Friday’s cabinet reshuffle, Lammy said: “As per the Genocide Convention, the crime of genocide occurs only where there is specific ‘intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group’.
“The government has not concluded that Israel is acting with that intent,” it added.
The prime minister’s official spokesman said Lammy’s letter “reflects the UK’s position that we’ve not come to any conclusion as to whether genocide has or has not been committed in Gaza”.
The spokesman said the government was clear that it was for “international courts to make these determinations”.
Foreign Office sources said the government had merely considered whether there was a “serious risk of genocide” – as it was obliged to do as a signatory of the Genocide Convention.
That assessment, the sources said, was required under its arms exports licensing criteria and reflected a one-off judgement based on the information at the time. And it was then that the government did not conclude that Israel was acting with genocidal intent.
Lammy, who was made justice secretary and deputy prime minister in the reshuffle, had been responding to a letter from the Labour chair of the development committee, Sarah Champion.
In her letter to Lammy, dated 12 August, Champion raised concerns that the UK’s decision to exempt F-35 fighter jet components from suspended arms exports to Israel breached its duty to prevent genocide under the UN treaty.
In a statement, campaign group Amnesty International said Sir Keir Starmer “must not provide diplomatic cover for a state committing genocide,” when he meets Herzog.
“This visit is a test of leadership and principle: polite handshakes and warm words will demonstrate neither.”
The new Green Party leader Zack Polanski called for the arrest of Herzog when he visits the UK, accusing him of being part of the “Israeli government engaged in an ongoing genocide”.
On Monday night, Sir Keir hosted Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas in Downing Street.
Abbas welcomed Sir Keir’s pledge to recognise a Palestinian state ahead of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York later this month if Israel does not change course.
Both leaders agreed there will be “absolutely no role” for Hamas in the future governance of Palestine, a Downing Street spokesman said.
“They discussed the intolerable situation in Gaza, and the prime minister reiterated the need for an urgent solution to end the horrific suffering and famine – starting with an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages and a huge surge in humanitarian aid.”
Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey also met Abbas, and called on the UK government summon the US ambassador to demand the reversal of what he called President Trump’s “reckless and callous” block on Palestinian visas ahead the UN meeting.
“He [Trump] can’t be allowed to act as a block on progress towards a two-state solution,” added Sir Ed.
The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.
At least 64,605 people have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.
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