SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
david lammy
UK Foreign Secretary’s Empty Words: Weapons and Spy Flights Expose Hollow Promises
Lammy called Israel’s escalation of the genocide “morally unjustifiable.” But what is beyond unjustifiable is for Lammy to say this while directly arming and providing surveillance information for the genocide.
May 23, 2025
On Tuesday, after releasing a joint statement with France and Canada threatening “concrete actions” if Israel did not allow aid into Gaza, the U.K. government suspended talks on its upgraded free trade deal, summoned the Israeli ambassador, and imposed new sanctions on settlers in the occupied West Bank. While this might appear substantial for the goal of isolating the Zionist state, it amounts to little more than face-saving measures.
In his speech announcing these measures, U.K. Foreign Secretary David Lammy couldn’t even bear to say these words without condemning the October 7 operation and maintaining Israel’s right to commit genocide. We can’t fall for these empty measures, even if they appear to be a positive push toward some justice. In reality, they are a distraction and feign action from a government supporting Israel as it accelerates its genocidal attacks. Each day, as Israel commits new massacres with American weapons, it is using the Royal Air Force Akrotiri, a British military base on Cyprus, to conduct surveillance flights and facilitate weapons transfers.
The government’s suspension of negotiations on its free-trade agreement is misleading. This is not the existing free-trade agreement in place between Britain and Israel, but a future plan to deepen relations. Known as the 2030 Roadmap, this was initiated under the previous Conservative government in 2022, and the Labour government continued negotiations immediately after entering government in July 2024. Stopping these negotiations is a good first step, but they must end their current free-trade agreement if Lammy’s words are worth their salt.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the world “won’t stop us.” Our leaders bought by Zionism will certainly not, but the people will.
The sanctions on a handful of people and companies in the occupied West Bank might be a generally positive step. But at a closer look, these measures are only on three people, two outposts, and two organisations. All of the 700,000 settlers occupying the West Bank in their 150 settlements and 128 outposts are illegal under international law. These very narrow sanctions then give wider justification for the illegal occupation of the West Bank, scapegoating a handful of “extreme” characters but not contending with the occupation itself. Last year, the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestine is illegal. Once again, Britain is ignoring international law, just as it does in refusing to hand over surveillance data on Gaza to the International Criminal Court.
Britain’s recent moves should rightly be compared with the United States, which has formed the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a private company of U.S. military veteran mercenaries to run an aid distribution operation, better described as a trojan horse to occupy Gaza. As Israel accelerates its genocide in Gaza, the U.S. and Britain are attempting to conceal their role in the violence. We might see these as necessary measures for Israel to be committing what many are referring to as the final stage in the genocide.
Over the past few days, the Starmer government’s statements have given us the illusion of a change in course toward Israel. Yet in five of the six days leading up to May 20, Britain has flown a surveillance flight over Gaza for Israel.
Britain has made no material change in its policy of arming Israel, providing surveillance information, and using its military base on Cyprus for weapons shipments. Therefore, not only are these statements hollow and vacuous, but they are a pernicious and sly attempt to divert attention from Britain’s role as it directly participates in Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people.
On Sunday (May 18th), Britain sent an A400M Atlas plane to Israel from RAF Akrotiri. This aircraft can carry up to 37 metric tons of cargo, including weapons and soldiers. Two hours later, it sent a surveillance flight over Gaza. These operations have been purposefully concealed from public knowledge, but this is clearly shifting. The only reason we know about these flights is because of the work of Matt Kennard, Declassified U.K., and Genocide-Free Cyprus, among other groups. There clearly is mounting pressure as a result of the revelations of Britain’s direct role in Israel’s genocide, and perhaps we must recognize it has a role in Lammy’s face-saving attempts.
Last week, the U.K. government defended its continued provision of F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel, pointing to the need for “national security.” In court, they claimed “no genocide has occurred or is occurring,” that Israel is not “deliberately targeting civilian women or children.” Britain is defending Israel legally, diplomatically, and militarily. No statement can change that fact.
Israel stopped all aid trucks from entering Gaza on March 2. It has taken more than 11 weeks for the government to take any action at all. Every day, the Israeli occupation commits heinous massacres. They are even bragging that the world “won’t stop us.” And so far, they’re right.
In the face of this, we cannot despair. Palestinians in Gaza remain steadfast each day, for the 18 months of this escalation in the genocide that has been ongoing for more than 77 years. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the world “won’t stop us.” Our leaders bought by Zionism will certainly not, but the people will. We must continue our demands for a full arms embargo, an end to British surveillance flights, and the total liberation of Palestine.
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Admission of Guilt': UK Suspends Some Arms Export Licenses to Israel Over Gaza
"Finally—but this is both too little and too late," said the International Center of Justice for Palestinians.
Sep 02, 2024
As governments enabling Israel's devastating war on the Gaza Strip face growing global demands to impose arms embargoes, a U.K. minister on Monday announced the suspension of approximately 30 of 350 weapons export licenses.
"This is not a blanket ban. This is not an arms embargo," stressed U.K. Foreign Secretary David Lammy, part of Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour Party, which took control of the government after voters ended 14 years of Conservative rule in July.
While describing himself as a "friend of Israel" and "a liberal, progressive Zionist," Lammy said that "it is this government's legal duty to review export licenses" and "the assessment I have received leaves me unable to conclude anything other than that for certain U.K. arms exports to Israel, there does exist a clear risk that they might be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law."
The targeted licenses are for "equipment that we assess is for use in the current conflict in Gaza, such as important components which go into military aircraft, including fighter aircraft, helicopters, and drones, as well as items which facilitate ground targeting," Lammy told the U.K. Parliament. The remaining exports "will continue" and "the government will keep our position under review."
According to the Financial Times:
The move will not affect components for the multinational F-35 joint striker fighter program, except regarding parts sent directly to Israel.
U.K. officials determined that suspending critical components within a global pool of spare parts could harm the maintenance and operations of F-35s in other nations.
"When Israel is carrying out a genocidal assault in Gaza, we shouldn't just ban a small fraction of arms licenses to Israel,"
said Zarah Sultana, a Labour Party member who represents Coventry South in Parliament. "This ban still allows the U.K. to sell parts for F-35 fighter jets, known as 'the most lethal' in the world. The government needs to ban ALL arms sales."
Stop the War Coalition
called the suspension "an admission of guilt" and similarly stressed that "we need a full, comprehensive ban on arms sales to apartheid Israel—not this half-hearted approach."
Lammy's announcement came as the Danish news outlet
Information and NGO Danwatch connected Israel's use of an F-35 stealth fighter to a July 13 attack on an Israeli-designated "safe zone" in southern Gaza, which killed scores of Palestinians and injured hundreds more.
In a statement responding to both developments, Sam Perlo-Freeman, research coordinator for the Campaign Against Arms Trade,
said:
The government's statement today that it is suspending 30 arms export licenses to Israel is a belated, but welcome move, finally acting upon the overwhelming evidence of Israeli war crimes in Gaza. But exempting parts for Israel's F-35 is utterly outrageous and unjustifiable.
These are by far the U.K.'s most significant arms supplies to the Israeli military, and just today we have confirmation that they have been used in one of the most egregious attacks in recent months. The government has admitted that there is a 'clear risk' that Israel is using fighter aircraft among other weapons to violate international humanitarian law. How can this 'clear risk' not apply to the F-35s? The only right and legal course of action is to end the supply of F-35 parts to Israel, along with the rest of U.K. arms sales.
Although the suspension is not as bold as critics of Israel's bombardment have called for, it was still seen as another positive step under Starmer, whose government has also recently resumed funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and dropped a challenge to the International Criminal Court prosecutor's request for arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant as well as Hamas leaders.
While Gallant said he was "deeply disheartened" by the U.K.'s latest move, Dearbhla Minogue, senior lawyer for the Global Legal Action Network (GLAN), declared that "this momentous decision vindicates everything Palestinians have been saying for months."
GLAN and Al-Haq on Saturday had threatened the U.K. government with new legal action if it failed to engage the suspension mechanism following revelations in The Guardian and The Telegraph regarding communications between Attorney General Richard Hermer and the Foreign Office about weapons sales to Israel.
"The U.K. government was backed into a corner," Minogue said Monday. "Our most recent letter showed that a suspension was the only right and legal thing to do. This is a truly historic victory for Al-Haq and for Palestinians. The exhaustive evidence we filed in mid-August showed that there was only one legally sound decision available to the government—that it is against the law to supply Israel with weapons for use against Palestinians in Gaza."
Both groups are now considering their next actions. Fellow GLAN lawyer Charlotte Andrews-Briscoe emphasized, "Now that the government has taken this important step, it must do much, much more, and abide by its obligations under international law to do everything in its power to prevent the commission of genocide."
Israel faces an ongoing South Africa-led genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its nearly 11-month assault on Gaza, which has killed at least 40,786 Palestinians, injured another 94,224, and forcibly displaced most of the enclave's 2.3 million residents, who are struggling to find food, water, shelter, and adequate medical care.
The Associated Pressreported that "British firms sell a relatively small amount of weapons and components to Israel compared to major suppliers such as the U.S. and Germany. Earlier this year, the government said military exports to Israel amounted to £42 million ($53 million) in 2022."
Still, the suspension could increase pressure on other allies of Israel to take similar action and
strain relations with the U.S. government—which, under President Joe Biden, has showered Israel with weapons and diplomatic support since the current escalation of the decadeslong conflict began in October.
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Complicit in War Crimes': UK Official Resigns Over Arms Sales to Israel
Mark Smith, a diplomat, is the first known U.K. official to resign over Gaza.
Aug 19, 2024
A British diplomat on Friday resigned in protest of the United Kingdom's arm sales to Israel, saying that there is "no justification" for the sales and that Israel has committed war crimes.
Mark Smith, who was a second secretary at the U.K. embassy in Dublin, had a previous official role working on arms export licensing assessments for the Middle East, he said. He is the first known British official to resign over the war in Gaza.
He sent an email to a long list of fellow officials in the Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (FCDO). Iraqi-British journalist Hind Hassan obtained the email and published it on social media.
"It is with sadness that I resign after a long career in the diplomatic service; however, I can no longer carry out my duties in the knowledge that this department may be complicit in war crimes," says the email, which was later verified by other sources.
"There is no justification for the U.K.'s continued arms sales to Israel yet somehow it continues," it says.
Full resignation letter from FCDO British diplomat Mark Smith: pic.twitter.com/k9y7varCHC
— Hind Hassan (@HindHassanNews) August 16, 2024
In an interview with BBC Radio 4 on Monday, Smith said that "anybody who has a kind of basic understanding of these things can see that there are war crimes being committed" and it was "not once, not twice, not a few times, but quite flagrantly and openly and regularly."
At least a dozen officials in the United States have resigned over the Biden administration's handling of the war in Gaza that began last year. Last month, twelve of them issued a joint statement calling out the U.S.' "undeniable complicity" in the killings and forced starvation of Palestinians.
More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since October 7, according to the Gaza health ministry. In late October, Craig Mokhiber, a top U.N. official in New York, resigned his position over the U.N.'s response to Israel's assault on Gaza. Another estimate put the likely death toll much higher. More than 1,100 Israelis were killed by Hamas and allied groups on October 7.
However, no British officials had made a similar move until Smith on Friday.
Since 2008, the U.K. has granted export licenses for $727 million in arms sales to Israel, largely for aircraft and radar systems; U.K. parts are also used in U.S.-manufactured F-35 combat aircraft destined for Israel, according to the Campaign Against Arms Trade.
The U.K. government recently "played down" its supply of weapons to Israel, saying it was "relatively small" at $53 million in 2022, the BBCreported. That's just a fraction of the weapons transfers to Israel made by the U.S., which approved another $20 billion worth last week.
The U.K. government, led by the center-left Labour Party since last month, is conducting a review of its weapons sales policy to Israel to determine if it's in compliance with international law. Foreign Secretary David Lammy reportedly ordered the review on his first day in office and has raised the possibility of cutting off sales of offensive weapons to Israel, while allowing the sale of defensive weapons to continue.
Led by the Conservative Party for the first nine months, the U.K. was in lockstep with the U.S. on the assault on Gaza but has taken steps that show a bit of divergence since Labour took power. The government has reestablished funding for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and announced that it would not, despite an earlier pledge, challenge the International Criminal Courts plan of seeking arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders.
In response to Smith's resignation, an FCDO spokesperson told the BBC that the department was committed to upholding international law and "will not export items if they be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of International Humanitarian Law."
The Middle East Eyereported that the FCDO promised officials in the department a "listening session" after Smith's email was sent. Smith criticized the organization for not listening to repeated pleas for a change of course on weapons sales to Israel.
"I have raised this at every level in the organization, including through an official whistle blowing investigation and received nothing more than 'thank you we have noted your concern'," Smith wrote in the email.
British newspapers reported that Smith was a "junior" diplomat but Hassan wrote on social media that this was in an attempt to undermine him.
"For one, he is a mid-level diplomat: Second secretaries can often have a decade of experience, if not more," she said.
"Furthermore the point of focus should be that Mark Smith is experienced in arms licensing; he knows what he's talking about when it comes to arms sales and governments," she added.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular