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'I’ll Wear It as a Badge of Honor,' Says MP Sultana After Israel Bars Entry to 11 UK Lawmakers
"I will not be intimidated into silence," said MP Zarah Sultana. "If anything, this ban only strengthens my resolve to keep speaking out."
Sep 08, 2026
Zarah Sultana, a member of the UK Parliament, said she won't stop speaking about the rights of Palestinians after Israel banned her from entering the country on Tuesday.
"Given that this is a fascist government presiding over genocide, apartheid and an illegal occupation, I’ll wear it as a badge of honor," she said in a post to X. "I will not be intimidated into silence. I will continue to speak out against Israel’s genocide and against the UK’s complicity. If anything, this ban only strengthens my resolve to keep speaking out."
Sultana, who represents Coventry South and is a co-founder of the left-wing Your Party, was one of 11 members of Parliament whom Israel announced it was blocking from entry in retaliation after the UK joined Canada, France, and other nations to announce an import ban on goods from Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law.
Following a year of record violence against Palestinians in the territory, UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said the import ban was in response to the "ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in areas of the West Bank—perpetrated by settler terrorists."
Israel has reacted with fury at the move, closing the British consulate in East Jerusalem, which handles relations with Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza.
Also banned from the country are UK Labour MPs Diane Abbott, Richard Burgon, John McDonnell, and Naz Shah; Green MPs Siân Berry, Ellie Chowns, Carla Denyer, Adrian Ramsay, and Hannah Spencer; as well as Jeremy Corbyn, who led the Labour Party from 2015-20 before co-founding Your Party with Sultana in 2025.
Remarking on his and his colleagues' ban from the country, Corbyn said Israel's treatment of Palestinians was "the real scandal."
"I have visited all parts of Palestine on several occasions, where I have witnessed the horrors of occupation, as well as the resilience and humanity of the Palestinian people," Corbyn wrote on X. "They are the ones who suffer from Israel's apartheid. It is their freedom which is egregiously curtailed, alongside thousands of Palestinian refugees who are denied the right of return."
He added: "As the world wakes up to the genocide in Gaza, it is shocking that Israel continues to deny entry to UN investigators and international journalists. Israel doesn't want the world to see what it is doing—but we can never give up in our attempts to expose the truth."
Israel also banned Fahad Ansari, a lawyer who has represented Hamas’ political wing in court in the UK and—like Sultana—said on X, “I am neither British nor an MP but do take this as a badge of honor (although pretty sure I’m already a persona non grata in the apartheid state).”
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Corbyn Urges UK Government to Condemn Gaza Genocide After Israeli Settlement Trade Ban
"This is not merely a matter of semantics. This is a matter of international law."
Sep 08, 2026
Amid Israeli settlers and soldiers' unprecedented violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, Member of Parliament Jeremy Corbyn was among those arguing on Tuesday that the United Kingdom's new "sanctions on illegal settlements are welcome, but not enough," and calling on Prime Minister Andy Burnham to condemn Israel's war on the Gaza Strip as genocide.
On behalf of the UK's ruling Labour Party, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband announced a ban on trade with illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. He was joined by leaders from Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden, who confirmed "their intention to introduce national and/or support European restrictions" on trading with Israeli West Bank settlements.
Corbyn, a former Labour leader from Islington North who has since co-founded Your Party, declared that "Britain must end all arms sales, all military cooperation, and all forms of support that sustain Israel’s system of apartheid, occupation, and genocide."
In addition to speaking in Parliament on Tuesday, Corbyn wrote to Burnham that "for three years, we have witnessed the abominable destruction of human life in Gaza," where "Israel has killed at least 73,000 people, excluding an untold number of people lost under the rubble."
While welcoming Burnham's recent admission that Labour "got it wrong" and its "initial response to the treatment of Gaza caused huge hurt," Corbyn said that "it is extremely disappointing that these words have not translated into meaningful action."
"It has not gone unnoticed that, 50 days into your premiership, you have declined to call 'the treatment of Gaza' what it really is: a genocide," the MP stressed, noting that the term has long been used by scholars and human rights advocates globally. "This is not merely a matter of semantics. This is a matter of international law."
"Far from preventing genocide, the British government has facilitated genocide through ongoing military, economic, and political cooperation," Corbyn charged, pointing to his call for an independent public inquiry into the UK's complicity. "The question is not whether Labour got it wrong. The question is what your government will do now."
Corbyn asked Burnham to confirm if he will establish an inquiry, end all military cooperation with Israel, impose widespread sanctions, overturn the ban on the advocacy group Palestine Action, and support the work of the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice—the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, and the ICJ has taken up South Africa's genocide case on the Israel Defense Forces' (IDF) conduct in Gaza.
As Corbyn pushed UK leaders to go further than the new trade ban—which is largely symbolic—the Israeli government responded to the sanctions by taking aim at a dozen people, including Corbyn and his Your Party co-founder, MP Zarah Sultana, barring them from entering Israel.
Israel also banned four Labour MPs—Diane Abbot, Richard Burgon, John McDonnell, and Naz Shah, as well as five members of the Green Party: Siân Berry, Ellie Chowns, Carla Denyer, Adrian Ramsay, and Hannah Spencer. The final person barred from Israel is Fahad Ansari, a lawyer who has represented Hamas' political wing in court in the UK, according to The Times of Israel.
Ansari replied on social media Tuesday that "I am neither British nor an MP but do take this as a badge of honor (although pretty sure I'm already a persona non grata in the apartheid state)."
Meanwhile, others in the United Kingdom and around the world joined Corbyn in framing the Labour government's sanctions as progress, while also emphasizing that, as the Corbyn-founded Peace & Justice Project put it, "they should only mark the start of the process in bringing about real peace and social justice for the Palestinian people, who have been subjected to decades of unimaginable subjugation, ethnic cleansing, and genocide."
"The UK government must commit to a full arms embargo on Israel, ending all forms of military cooperation with the IDF, and supporting the ICC arrest warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and members of his Cabinet," the project declared, calling for the full implementation of recommendations from the Gaza Tribunal report from last year.
Describing the UK's "concrete action" and recognition of "Israel's unlawful occupation and ethnic cleansing" as "hugely welcome," Kerry Moscogiuri, Amnesty International UK's chief executive, noted that Miliband "promised a 'comprehensive reset' and today could be the sea change that is needed."
“Amid ethnic cleansing, genocide, and apartheid against Palestinians, today's measures are a genuine step towards accountability for Israel's repeated and flagrant violations of international law," she said. "The commitment to ban trade in settlement goods and some services, prohibit financing of settlements, refuse arms that contribute to the occupation, and support the genocide case before the International Court of Justice represents a significant change of course."
"For years, Amnesty has worked with members, partners and parliamentarians from across the political spectrum to press for meaningful change, and today shows that campaigning for human rights works," she added. "But today is not the end of the road. The test now is whether these commitments are properly implemented and enforced, and followed by the wider action needed to hold Israel accountable for its crimes and meet the UK's obligations under international law."
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'Good Riddance': Keir Starmer Resigns as UK Prime Minister
"Getting rid of Keir Starmer is not enough. We need to get rid of the politics he represents: corporate greed, anti-migrant rhetoric, and endless war," said former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
Jun 22, 2026
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced his resignation on Monday, less than two years after his Labour party swept into power in a landslide election.
In his resignation speech, Starmer said that he was stepping down because members of his party did not feel he was the best choice to lead them into the next general election, with polls showing the far-right anti-immigration Reform party currently on track to receive the most votes.
Starmer also said that whomever is chosen as his successor "will inherit a Britain that is far stronger and fairer than the one I inherited two years ago, better prepared for the challenges ahead and better able to ensure the Labour party secures a second term in office."
Starmer's progressive critics disputed this characterization of his governance, which they said has done little more than legitimize the far right.
Specifically, critics pointed to the Labour government's continued support of Israel in its genocidal assault on Gaza, its decision to proscribe Palestine Action as a terrorist group, and its efforts to court far-right voters by restricting immigration as some of its most destructive actions.
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said that Starmer had wasted the large majority that Labour had won and had done little if anything to improve the lives of the UK working class.
"Keir Starmer could have ended child poverty, homelessness and the grotesque levels of inequality in this country," Corbyn wrote. "Instead, he abandoned those in need, destroyed our civil liberties, and facilitated genocide in Gaza. That is how this prime minister will be remembered—and that is the legacy of moral and political bankruptcy he leaves behind."
Corbyn added that "getting rid of Keir Starmer is not enough," as "we need to get rid of the politics he represents: corporate greed, anti-migrant rhetoric, and endless war."
Member of Parliament Zarah Sultana, a former Labour MP who has since joined Corbyn's Your party, noted after watching the prime minister's speech that "the most emotion Keir Starmer has shown is over losing his job, not enabling the genocide of the Palestinian people."
"Good riddance," Sultana said. "His next stop should be The Hague."
Zack Polanski, leader of the Green party, predicted that Starmer's premiership would be remembered entirely negatively.
"Bills up. Wages too low," Polanski wrote, summarizing life in the UK under Starmer's leadership. "Record profits for oil and gas. Fifty richest families with more wealth than 50% of population. Shit in our rivers. Pensioners jailed for protesting. Migrants thrown under the bus. Supporting a genocide. That's Starmer's legacy."
Journalist Owen Jones delivered a similarly scathing assessment.
"Keir Starmer lied through his teeth to become Labour leader," Jones wrote. "He justified Israeli war crimes, arrested opponents of genocide, attacked pensioners, disabled people, and migrants, pocketed freebies, crushed dissent, and threw others under the bus to save himself. History damns him."
Economist Yanis Varoufakis delivered a lengthy rundown of Starmer's failures as prime minister, arguing he "was not merely a disappointment" but "a mendacious figure of ethical decrepitude, a man who won the Labour party leadership based on promises that he jettisoned five seconds after winning."
"History will remember Mr. Starmer as a man without conviction," Varoufakis wrote, "a prime minister who offers not a shred of honesty, but merely the cruel illusion of change. He is ethically decrepit because he had chosen, consciously, to abandon principle for power. And for that, history will indict him. Good riddance, I say."
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Starmer Expected to Resign as PM, But UK Left Warns of 'More of the Same' From His Replacement
Jeremy Corbyn said Andy Burnham would be "accepting too much of the austerity that we've had imposed upon us" and "doesn't appear to be doing anything different internationally."
Jun 20, 2026
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is expected to announce as soon as Monday that he will resign, according to new reports, as Labour supporters abandon the party.
But many on the left remain skeptical that his likely replacement, Andy Burnham, will truly bring the "change" he promises.
Britain's Observer newspaper reported on Saturday that the prime minister appeared "resigned" to stepping down, well aware that "support isn't there" for his continued leadership amid the party's dismal unpopularity.
Though Starmer swept away nearly a decade and a half of Conservative rule in 2024, his honeymoon has been short-lived. His embrace of austerity in the face of a cost-of-living crisis and his government's ferocious crackdowns on pro-Palestinian speech have left progressive supporters seeking alternatives like the ascendant Green Party.
Meanwhile, his hard-right pivot on immigration has done little to siphon votes from Brexiteer Nigel Farage's far-right Reform UK party, which currently leads in national polls.
The immediate trigger for Starmer's reported resignation was Burnham's victory in Thursday's Makerfield by-election, which marked the former mayor of Greater Manchester's return to Westminster. Burnham comfortably defeated a Reform UK candidate, and The Guardian reported that he was expected to have support from about 200 Labour MPs in a leadership challenge against Starmer.
Burnham emphasized during a victory rally that it was "a last chance to change" Labour as it heads for electoral oblivion.
Responding to what he said were requests from constituents to "do something to make life more affordable," Burnham called for an end to "trickle down economics," with government interventions to bring down utility bills and rail fares, public procurement of businesses, pushes for reindustrialization, and job guarantees for people ages 16 to 18.
But some leaders on the British left have warned that Burnham will do little to deviate from Starmer's failures.
While he has pledged to reverse Starmer's welfare cuts and privatizations of public services, Burnham has also committed to maintaining the party's spending limits, which may make significant changes impossible.
Islington North MP Jeremy Corbyn, who led the Labour Party from 2015-20, said that while he personally likes Burnham, "his basic economic strategy and views... seem to me to be accepting too much of the austerity that we've had imposed upon us."
The ex-leader also said Burnham "doesn't appear to be doing anything different internationally," noting that he has not given a straight answer on whether Britain should conduct an inquiry into the UK government's policy on Gaza and its supply of weapons to Israel.
Burnham has also drawn criticism for saying he would maintain Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who has spearheaded hard-line changes to UK asylum policies and has enforced the repressive ban on Palestine Action, which has led to the arrest of thousands of nonviolent protesters, many of whom have been charged with terrorism.
"The architect of Labour’s cruel plans on settled status and persecution of free speech and protest stays in place," said Green Party leader Zack Polanski, who said it was a sign of "more of the same."
Remarking on Burnham's team of economic advisers, who include former chief economists for the Bank of England and Goldman Sachs, Polanski said it "isn’t a team of advisers which looks like challenging wealth and power."
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'Shameful': Global Fury at Racist Trump After Somali Referee Bound for World Cup Refused Entry by US
"I’m just simply a referee who’s trying to live his dream, the biggest dream of my life, to come to the World Cup."
Jun 09, 2026
The Trump administration is facing international outrage after Somali referee Omar Artan, who was selected by FIFA to work at the 2026 World Cup, was barred from entering the US.
As ESPN reported on Monday, FIFA confirmed that US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had denied Artan entry into the country after he arrived in Miami on Saturday on a flight from Istanbul.
CBP said that it had denied Artan entry after subjecting him to "additional inspection" and determining him "to be inadmissible due to vetting concerns."
FIFA released a statement after Artan's denial of entry in which it didn't criticize the US for barring one of its own referees, merely saying that "FIFA is not involved in host country immigration processes, including visa adjudications."
Artan reacted with disappointment to being denied the opportunity to referee the World Cup, but said he is "in a positive mood" and "focused on the next challenges in my refereeing career."
"I would like to thank FIFA and [the African federation] for all their support and I promise to keep my refereeing levels up as I concentrate on the future," Artan added. "I want to thank the football family for their messages and wish my colleagues all the best success during the World Cup and I look forward to joining them again in future competitions."
In an interview with The New York Times published Tuesday, Artan said that he was interviewed by CBP at the Miami airport for 11 hours and then detained for several more before being told he was being sent home.
"I am very, very disappointed," Artan told the Times. "I’m just simply a referee who’s trying to live his dream, the biggest dream of my life, to come to the World Cup."
"I had the right papers and everything," Artan added. "I had the right visa."
As noted in a Monday report from Agence France-Presse, Artan is a highly respected official, having been "named by the Confederation of African Football as men's referee of the year."
President Donald Trump has a long history of making racist attacks against Somalis, referring to them collectively as "garbage" last year, and accusing them last month of being "all crooks." Last June, Trump issued a proclamation designed to "fully restrict and limit the entry of nationals" from Somalia and other nations.
Given Trump's well documented bigotry, critics were quick to link the president's racism with the poor treatment Artan received upon arriving in the US.
"What an absolute disgrace," commented Jeremy Corbyn, former leader of the UK Labour Party. "A FIFA-certified referee being denied entry to the United States purely because he is Somali. The World Cup is meant to bring people together. This is racism, plain and simple. Shameful."
Meral Hussein-Ece, a Liberal Democrat and member of the UK House of Lords, accused the Trump administration of completely spoiling the entire purpose of the World Cup, which is to bring people together in friendly global competition.
"A Somali referee makes history—first ever from his country to officiate a World Cup match," wrote Hussein-Ece. "The US: 'Not allowed in.' So much for 'sport brings the world together.' Unless you’re from the 'wrong' country. Shameful. The ‘World Cup’ belongs to everyone—not just those the US approves of."
Christina Unkel, president and general manager of the Tampa Bay Sun Football Club, said what happened to Artan is "heartbreaking on so many levels," as "he worked so hard, proved himself on so many levels, and [was] selected as the best of the best."
Journalist Helen Kennedy said that countries around the world need to send Trump a strong message that the treatment of Artan is unacceptable.
"The world should boycott these games," she wrote. "How much does it take to show that?"
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‘Absurd and Cowardly’: Labour Government Slammed for Barring Hasan Piker, Cenk Uygur From UK
"An Israeli politician who oversaw genocide? Here's a red carpet!" one critic said in response to the ban.
Jun 01, 2026
The UK government is drawing heavy criticism for barring Cenk Uygur and Hasan Piker, two prominent critics of Israel, from entering the country.
According to a Monday report from The Guardian, the UK's Home Office cancelled electronic travel authorizations (ETA) for both Uygur and Piker on grounds that their presence in the country "may not be conducive to the public good."
Uygur took to social media shortly afterward and said the UK banned him due to his criticisms of Israeli influence over US policy.
"I didn't get banned for criticizing the UK, but for criticizing Israel," Uygur wrote. "They broke the irony record by saying it was because I said Israel might control other governments."
"Think about it," Uygur added, "if I had said that the Israeli government controls the British government so thoroughly that they'll ban someone from coming to the UK just for criticizing Israel, they would have said that was an antisemitic statement. This is absolutely Kafkaesque."
Shortly after Uygur's post, Piker, who is Uygur's nephew, accused the UK government of barring him for similar reasons.
"The UK has revoked my visa as well," Piker wrote. "All at the behest of Israel. The west is betraying 'liberal values' for a genocidal fascist foreign government."
UK commentator Owen Jones noted the "double standard" in the UK's decision to bar Israel critics such as Uygur and Piker, but not applying the same restrictions to Israeli politicians who have engaged in genocidal rhetoric against Palestinians.
"An Israeli politician who oversaw genocide? Here's a red carpet!" wrote Jones. "And you can say anything, however murderous, about Palestinians and freely enter. If you say: 'I'm glad Israel wiped Gaza from the face of the earth,' in you come!"
Jeremy Corbyn, former leader of the UK Labour Party, the current ruling party whose government decided to bar the two Israel critics, described the move as "an absurd and cowardly decision from an increasingly authoritarian government."
"Let us call this what it is," Corbyn added, "an attack on the freedom to criticize Israel, as well as the UK government’s own complicity in genocide."
Jemimah Steinfeld, chief executive of the Index on Censorship, told The Guardian that the ban is "paternalistic" on the government's part because it "assumes we are just passive consumers of views rather than people who can think, judge, and challenge."
Steinfeld also predicted that the ban would ultimately be ineffective.
"It confers an underdog status to the people not allowed to enter, it could embolden other countries to follow suit, and it feels fairly meaningless in the internet age where people can simply go online to hear what they have to say," she said. "Free speech is tested by hard cases and, in this instance, the UK is failing."
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'This Is Piracy': Israel Condemned for Seizure of Gaza-Bound Flotilla Near Greece
"How on Earth," asked the UN's top Palestine expert, "is possible that Israel is allowed to assault and seize vessels in international waters just off Greece/Europe?"
Apr 30, 2026
Palestine defenders on Thursday condemned Israeli forces' raid of the latest Global Sumud Flotilla—which was sailing off the Greek coast while attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza—and the arrest of more than 200 of its participants, with some prominent critics calling the seizure an act of piracy.
Greenpeace International—whose MY Arctic Sunrise is the flotilla's most prominent ship—said that the maritime convoy's 58 vessels were "boarded and harassed by Israeli forces in international waters 45 nautical miles west of the Greek island Kythira and 600 nautical miles from Gaza."
Flotilla organizers said on X: “Our boats were approached by military speedboats, self-identified as ‘Israel’, pointing lasers and semi-automatic weapons ordering participants to the front of the boats and to get on their hands and knees. The boat communications are being jammed and an SOS was issued."
The organizers said 211 flotilla participants were seized by Israeli forces. Flotilla activist Yasmine Scola said members were "kidnapped."
Global Sumud France spokesperson Helene Coron said that 10 French nationals, including communist Paris City Council Member Raphaelle Primet, were seized.
"We don't have the information for the other nationalities, but the boats were mixed in terms of nationality, so there were crew members from all 48 delegations," Coron added.
Israel's Foreign Ministry said that "approximately 175 activists from more than 20 boats... are now making their way peacefully to Israel."
Responding to Israel's interception, former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said on social media that his country's government "is either complicit or incapable of defending our seas from Israel."
"So much for freedom of navigation and international law," he added.
Independent British Member of Parliament Jeremy Corbyn said of the flotilla members: "They were not intercepted. They were abducted in international waters. This is piracy—and is a flagrant violation of international law."
Another British lawmaker, Labour MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy, wrote on X that "last night, Israel's navy committed an act of armed piracy in international waters, threatening unarmed civilians aboard."
"Our government must condemn this attack, extend diplomatic protection to British participants, and work to ensure safe passage," she added.
The migrant search and rescue group SOS Mediterranee France said on X that "attacking or threatening" Global Sumud Flotilla vessels "in international waters constitutes a violation of maritime law."
"Furthermore, the Geneva Conventions are clear: Any person engaged in a humanitarian mission must be protected. Solidarity is not a crime, Preventing aid, however, is," the group added.
In the United States, Council on American-Islamic Relations executive director Nihad Awad said in a statement that “Congress must demand that the Israeli apartheid government immediately release the American citizens and other humanitarian activists it kidnapped in international waters in a blatant violation of international law."
"Our nation would not tolerate, much less fund, the kidnapping of American citizens in international waters off the coast of Greece by any other state," Awad added. "It is long past time for the out-of-control Netanyahu regime to face consequences of its crimes, including American citizens.”
The United States supports Israel with tens of billions of dollars in armed aid, and diplomatic cover including repeated vetoes of United Nations Security Council cease-fire resolutions for Gaza.
Last year, dozens of boats carrying hundreds of activists from over 40 nations took part in the last Global Sumud Flotilla—sumud means “perseverance” in Arabic—as it attempted to break Israel’s naval blockade and deliver desperately needed humanitarian aid including food, medicines, and baby formula to starving Gazans amid a growing famine.
Israeli forces intercepted and seized the flotilla vessels in international waters in early October, arresting all aboard the boats and temporarily jailing them in Israel.
In 2010, Israeli forces raided one of the first convoys carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza by sea. The attackers killed nine volunteers aboard the MV Mavi Marmara, including Turkish-American teenager Furkan Doğan.
Members of past Gaza flotillas have reported abuse at the hands of their Israeli captors, although they have urged the world to focus not on them, but rather the people of Gaza, who have endured nearly 31 months of genocidal war and siege.
More than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces since the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023, including thousands who are still missing and presumed dead and buried beneath rubble. Most victims are civilians. Around 2 million other Gazans have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened.
Israel—whose prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza—is facing an ongoing genocide case at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
The Israeli government continues to blockade Gaza by land and sea, strictly limiting the entry of humanitarian aid into the besieged coastal strip.
“We renew our call on world leaders to take concrete and immediate action in the face of the genocide being inflicted by Israel on the people of Gaza," Pujarini Sen, project lead aboard the Arctic Sunrise, said Thursday. "The international community’s ongoing failure to enforce international law leaves it culpable for Israel’s actions."
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Corbyn Submits Gaza Tribunal Findings of UK ‘Complicity in Genocide’ to ICC
"The report recommends a full investigation by the International Criminal Court into Britain’s complicity and participation in genocide," said the leftist lawmaker.
Mar 18, 2026
A report led by progressive British parliamentarian Jeremy Corbyn and submitted Wednesday to the International Criminal Court recommends that the Hague-based tribunal investigate UK government officials complicit in Israel's genocide in Gaza.
"The Gaza Tribunal report exposes the full scale of Britain's complicity in genocide," said Corbyn, a former Labour leader who represents Islington North for the leftist Your Party. "Complicity demands consequences. That's why, today, we submitted The Gaza Tribunal report to the International Criminal Court (ICC)."
"The report concludes that the British government has failed in its fundamental obligation to prevent genocide, has been complicit in atrocity crimes, and in some instances has even been an active participant in these crimes," Corbyn wrote in a foreword to the publication. "The report recommends a full investigation by the International Criminal Court into Britain’s complicity and participation in genocide."
According to the report, "Britain has played a vital role in Israeli military operations in Gaza," including through weapons sales, Royal Air Force surveillance flights, diplomatic support, and failure to sanction Israeli officials responsible for a war that United Nations experts, jurists, scholars, national and other governments, and others say is genocidal.
Report co-author and international law professor Shahd Hammouri said: “In our hands we have evidence that British officials knowingly hid the truth and distorted the truth. They had the legal advice and chose to overlook it. British citizens in good conscience who sought to uphold their legal and moral obligations of standing up against power were threatened with their livelihoods and asked to either quit their jobs or shut the hell up."
In 2024, the ICC issued warrants for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged crimes against humanity, and war crimes in Gaza, including murder and forced starvation. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also in The Hague, is weighing a genocide case against Israel filed by South Africa and supported by an increasing number of nations.
"Israel has committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in Gaza," the tribunal's report states. "The genocide in Gaza must be understood within its historical context: as part of a decadeslong, ongoing, and systematic effort to destroy the Palestinian people in whole or in part. We heard from a range of witnesses who described in devastating detail the human and social reality of displacement, ethnic cleansing, and genocide."
The report notes the deliberate destruction of Gaza's healthcare and education systems, targeting of journalists, and famine caused by Israel's "complete siege" of the embattled strip.
The Gaza Tribunal report notes the UK's legal obligations under international law, which include:
- The immediate suspension of arms transfers and related military exports where there is a serious risk of use in genocide, crimes against humanity, or grave international humanitarian law violations;
- The suspension of intelligence sharing, training, and other security cooperation that could materially assist unlawful acts;
- Measures to ensure nonrecognition and nonassistance in respect of Israel’s unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territories, including review of its existing trade and investment relations with Israel and Israeli entities;
- Support for humanitarian relief and opposition to policies producing famine conditions; and
- Full cooperation with international bodies of accountability, including the ICC, ICJ, and the relevant United Nations special rapporteurs, among others.
The publication of the Gaza Tribunal report—which is related in spirit and method to a separate Gaza Tribunal headed by former UN special rapporteur Richard Falk—follows last year's finding by the Corbyn-led body that Britain is complicit in the Gaza genocide.
The UK government has also faced international condemnation for persecuting members of Palestine Action and other activists. Last month, the British High Court ruled that the government illegally banned the protest group, some of whose members nearly died while on recent hunger strikes.
The report also comes as Israeli forces continue killing, maiming, and forcibly displacing Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, where the ICJ found in 2024 that Israel is guilty of illegal occupation and apartheid.
To date, more than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded in Gaza, according to officials there. Around 2 million others have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened.
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'10 Classrooms Full of Children': US-Israeli War Kills Hundreds of Iranian, Lebanese Kids
"Classrooms of children in Iran. Hundreds of people in Lebanon. The ongoing genocide in Gaza," said Jeremy Corbyn. "The message from our political and media class is clear: Their lives are less valuable than others."
Mar 09, 2026
US and Israeli airstrikes have killed nearly 300 Iranian and Lebanese children over the past nine days as the attackers target apartment towers, single-family homes, schools, medical facilities, and other civilian infrastructure.
Iran's Health Ministry said Sunday that 198 women and 190 minors have been killed by US and Israeli attacks since February 28, including six children under the age of 5. The youngest reported victim is an 8-month-old girl. Children account for more than 30% of those killed, according to the ministry, which also said that 1,044 women and 638 children have been injured.
Overall, Iran said that more than 1,300 people have been killed by the airstrikes, which are reportedly targeting 30 of the country's 31 provinces.
The Lebanese Health Ministry announced Sunday that 394 people, including 42 women and 83 children, have been killed by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) attacks after Iran-backed Hezbollah joined the war.
The US-based charity Save the Children noted Monday that the number of slain Iranian and Lebanese minors is the equivalent of "10 classrooms full of children."
“It is devastating that airstrikes in Lebanon have reportedly caused the deaths of 83 children... among nearly 300 children killed in the region," said Save the Children Lebanon director Nora Ingdal. "These are not just numbers—these are young lives cut short and children whose futures have been forever scarred by war."
Israel claims it has killed around 200 Hezbollah fighters. However, the IDF's routine attacks on apartment towers and other residential buildings have drawn widespread condemnation.
On Sunday, an IDF strike massacred 18 people sheltering in an apartment building in Sir El-Gharbiyeh in Nabatieh district. The building was housing some of the nearly 700,000 Lebanese forcibly displaced by Israeli attacks, including around 200,000 children. Local officials said women and children were among the victims.
Israeli airstrikes hit a residential block in Sir Al-Gharbiya, a village in southern Lebanon, early this morning, killing at least 20 civilians, among them women and children.
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— Josep Goded (Backup Account But Still Active) (@josepgoded2.bsky.social) March 8, 2026 at 12:25 AM
Another IDF aerial massacre in the southern Lebanese town of Tafahata killed eight people, including five members of the Ezzedine family, whose home was bombed.
"This time is much worse than the previous war,” Nabatieh Civil Defense chief Hussein Faqih told the National, referring to Israel's 2023-25 attacks on Lebanon that killed more than 4,000 people, including nearly 800 women and over 300 children, in retaliation for Hezbollah's rocket strikes in solidarity with Palestine during the Gaza genocide.
Israeli attacks on Iran during last year's 12-Day War also killed more than 1,000 Iranians, including 436 civilians.
In the worst reported bombing of the current war—and possibly the deadliest US massacre since over 400 Iraqis were wiped out in a "precision strike" on a Baghdad bomb shelter during the 1991 Gulf War—around 175 Iranians, most of them young children, were killed in what first responders and victims' relatives said was a so-called double-tap strike on an elementary school in Minab in southern Iran.
US military investigators reportedly believe the strike was carried out by US forces, but President Donald Trump has blamed Iran.
On Monday, a group of Democratic US senators lead by Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire said they were "horrified" by the school strike.
"The killing of school children is appalling and unacceptable under any circumstance," the senators said in a statement. "This incident is particularly concerning in light of [Defense Secretary Pete] Hegseth’s openly cavalier approach to the use of force, including his statement that US strikes in Iran wouldn’t be bound by ‘stupid rules of engagement,’ in his words."
Multiple members of the UK Parliament have condemned the killing of Iranian and Lebanese children. Leftist Independent Jeremy Corbyn, a former Labour leader, said Monday on Bluesky: "Classrooms of children in Iran. Hundreds of people in Lebanon. The ongoing genocide in Gaza. The message from our political and media class is clear: Their lives are less valuable than others."
"Every human being matters, and every human being deserves a life of peace," Corbyn added.
Zahra Sultana, who quit Labour and started the socialist Your Party with Corbyn last year, mocked US and Israeli pretensions, saying in a BBC interview on Sunday—International Women's Day—that the girls in the Minab school were slaughtered "apparently to liberate women."
The US and Israel are committing war crimes in Iran and Lebanon.Keir Starmer must stop acting as Donald Trump’s poodle and end UK arms sales, military cooperation and the use of British bases.
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— Zarah Sultana MP (@zarahsultana.bsky.social) March 8, 2026 at 2:10 PM
Retaliatory attacks by Iran have killed at least 11 Israelis and wounded nearly 2,000 others since February 28, according to Israel's government. No Israeli child deaths have been reported. Seven US troops and at least 15 people in Gulf Arab nations have also been killed by Iranian counterattacks.
While the world's focus is on Iran, Israeli occupation forces have continued killing and wounding people in Gaza and the West Bank of Palestine. Drop Site News reported Monday that eight Palestinians were killed in Gaza over the past 24 hours, including two women and at least as many children.
🚨 An Israeli drone strike in central Khan Younis has critically injured a young girl and killed her father. Julia Al-Qedra was preparing to leave for kindergarten when the strike hit. Her father, Ahmad Al-Qedra, who was accompanying her, was killed. Doctors are now fighting to save Julia’s life.
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— Drop Site (@dropsitenews.com) March 7, 2026 at 12:24 PM
More than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces since the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023. More than 20,000 children have been killed and over 44,000 others wounded. More than 1 in 4 fatalities have been children in a war for which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, and Israel is facing a genocide case currently before the International Court of Justice.
Since the 9/11 attacks, US-led wars have left nearly 1 million people dead in more than half a dozen countries in the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa—over 400,000 of them civilians, according to the Costs of War Project at Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs.
"Every war is a war on children, and once again we are seeing them pay the highest price for a conflict they neither started nor had a say in," Ingdal said Monday.
"Wars have laws, and children must be off limits in every conflict," she added. "World leaders must act urgently to prevent further escalation. There must be an immediate cessation of hostilities, and all parties must uphold international humanitarian law and do everything in their power to protect civilians—especially children.”
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Corbyn Accuses Starmer Government of ‘Echoing Tony Blair’s Obedience to Washington’
"Blair dragged the UK into an illegal war that triggered a spiral of hatred, conflict, and misery," Corbyn said. "Twenty-three years later, another Labour prime minister is doing his best to follow in Blair’s footsteps."
Mar 03, 2026
As UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer allows British bases to be used as part of the US-Israeli war against Iran, the former leader of his Labour Party says he's making the same mistake that another Labour PM made 23 years ago.
Jeremy Corbyn, the socialist member of Parliament who led Labour from 2015 to 2020, said on Tuesday that Starmer was "echoing Tony Blair’s obedience to Washington", referring to the then-prime minister's decision in 2003 to join US President George W. Bush's war in Iraq.
"Ignoring the wisdom of ordinary people who could see the catastrophe ahead, Blair dragged the UK into an illegal war that triggered a spiral of hatred, conflict, and misery. More than a million Iraqi men, women, and children paid the price." Corbyn wrote in a Tuesday piece for the democratic socialist publicationTribune.
Infamously pledging to Bush, "I will be with you, whatever," Blair helped to promote the false claims that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. And despite a lack of support from the United Nations, he joined Bush's "coalition of the willing," committing 46,000 British troops to the war.
"This was the last time a Labour prime minister blindly backed the wishes of the US and its warmongering president," Corbyn said. "Twenty-three years later, another Labour prime minister is doing his best to follow in Blair’s footsteps and drag us into a catastrophic, illegal war."
Unlike Bush, US President Donald Trump has not yet put boots on the ground in Iran, instead waging a destructive campaign of aerial bombings and missile strikes that have taken out the nation's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and other senior Iranian officials.
As of Monday, the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), a US-based monitor of human rights in Iran, reported that at least 742 civilians had been killed since Saturday by US and Israeli attacks, with nearly 1,000 injured and more than 600 deaths still under review.
While Starmer has stressed that the UK "had no role" in launching the war, he has lent credence to the questionable case the US and Israel have made to justify it, including emphasizing that Iran "must never have nuclear weapons."
Iran has always contended its nuclear program was not for military purposes, and it had no desire to produce a nuclear weapon. Prior to Saturday’s strikes, reports indicated that Iranian negotiators had offered to give up the nation's entire stockpile of enriched uranium.
And though he has accused Iran of launching "indiscriminate strikes" across the Gulf, Starmer has been reticent to criticize similar actions by the US and Israel, which have had vastly larger death tolls, including the bombing of a girls' school that reportedly killed 165 people, most of them girls between ages 7 and 12, and attacks on several hospitals.
One day after the first strikes were conducted, and following mounting pressure from Trump, Starmer announced that he'd given the US approval for "specific, limited defensive" use of three Royal Air Force (RAF) bases—Fairford in England, Akrotiri in Cyprus, and Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean—in order to destroy Iran's missiles "at source" after a drone hit Akrotiri, causing minimal damage.
However, Starmer continued to claim that the UK had learned the "mistakes of Iraq," and "will not join offensive action now."
Corbyn said that Starmer's insistence that bases would only be used "defensively" was merely "meaningless vocabulary that reveals Starmer’s contempt for the intelligence of the British people."
In Parliament on Monday, Starmer said that "the use of the bases is to allow the US to use its ability to take out the ability of Iran to launch the attacks in the first place."
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday used similar reasoning to justify launching the war, explaining that Iran was likely to retaliate against a planned Israeli attack and that it therefore posed an "imminent threat" to US personnel even though that threat was contingent on Israel attacking first.
Corbyn described the idea of a "preemptive strike" as a contradiction in terms. "Under this convoluted reasoning," he said, "almost any attack on anybody can be classified as a defensive measure. Starmer’s words are Newspeak—and cannot shield his government from complicity in the devastation ahead."
Like in the United States, the British public has expressed low support for American and Israeli actions against Iran. According to a YouGov poll published on Monday, 49% disapprove of US military action, compared to 28% who support it. Fewer than 1 in 5 Labour voters said they supported it.
Voters also said they oppose their government's involvement. Compared with just 32% of Brits who said they supported letting the US use British bases, 50% said they opposed it.
"For too long, Britain has blindly followed the US as it indulges in disastrous imperial fantasies," Corbyn said, noting the UK's continued support for Israel over two years of US-sponsored genocide in Gaza.
Corbyn is now an independent MP who co-founded a new political party after being thrown out of Labour in 2020 over dubious accusations of antisemitism, which he has alleged stem from his strong criticism of Israel.
"It’s time to forge a different path. Now is not the time to try to rescue a ‘special relationship’ characterised by impunity, genocide, and war," he said. "Now is the time to forge an independent foreign policy based on international law and peace."
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