The announcement on Tuesday by the foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, of an import ban on goods from illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, as well as a comprehensive sanctions regime, is a hard-won victory for the Palestine solidarity movement.
This is not simply a change of heart by the government: it is a direct result of sustained pressure from activists and organisers across the Palestine movement, who have consistently held the government’s feet to the fire over its complicity in the atrocities being committed in Gaza and the West Bank. Miliband’s announcement shows us what organised and persistent campaigning can achieve, and inspires confidence that movements can force political change.
Over the past three years, Palestine has become a political and electoral challenge for the Labour party, as well as a fundamental issue of public conscience. This move signals a political reset in the UK government’s foreign policy approach to Israel. But as the UN special rapporteur Francesca Albanese has said, a ban on goods from settlements must be part of a “true paradigm shift”; the government can, and must, go further.
There has already been sustained backlash at the move, with the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, accusing Miliband of “Jew hate” on the Today programme. As a Jewish campaigner, let me be clear: holding Israel to account for its human rights violations in the West Bank is not antisemitic. To conflate the actions of violent settlers and the Israeli government with Jewish people everywhere makes us accountable for the actions of those who do not represent us.
There is also warranted scepticism about the Labour government’s commitment to holding Israel accountable. But an “all or nothing” approach would be a mistake, when there is so much that can be built on here. We can certainly retain our anger at the government’s complicity. No sanction can offset the foreign policy decisions made by the former prime minister Keir Starmer and former foreign secretary David Lammy, the repression of domestic pro-Palestine advocacy, or the sheer loss of life. But we must balance this with cautious optimism that the political tide is turning.
Political victories are mobilising – they fuel the belief that collective action can work. So now is the time to push at the open door. But what comes next? How do we ensure that accountability for Israel’s oppression of Palestinians is not limited to the settlements, but builds momentum for further meaningful action in support of Palestinian human rights?
First, we should demand that these trade sanctions are enforced and expanded. Eleven nations, including Canada and France, have joined the UK in these measures; we must call for further coordination and alignment with other western governments.
The necessary next step is a full arms embargo and an end to cooperation with Israeli security forces – to truly have teeth, these sanctions must not take with one hand and then give with another. Miliband has said that “we’ve already suspended over 30 arms licences used by the IDF in Gaza. That suspension remains fully in place”, and that the government will “now also refuse all licence applications for arms and other exports that materially contribute to the occupation”. But components of F-35 jets continue to be exported to Israel and used for operations in Gaza, as are surveillance technologies such as drones and radar made in the UK by Elbit Systems. This is a total dereliction of duty by the British government.
Miliband’s announcements were a necessary reminder that a just political future is possible and, within it, a reckoning with past crimes. As a campaigner, I have borne witness to Israel’s most egregious human rights violations: I have documented Israeli settlers committing pogroms against the community of Al-Mufaqara, sat in Palestinian villages threatened with home demolitions and army raids, and witnessed the ongoing daily misery of Israel’s apartheid policies. This has all strengthened my motivation to see the end of the Israeli occupation.
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This announcement is the beginning, not the end, of the road. It is a hopeful indication of what happens when collective power is translated into political change. We must sit with the idea that Palestinians will see some justice and reprieve from relentless destruction and displacement. I hope I’m not wrong.
