THE SNP have hit out at the Labour Government’s move to suspend less than 10% of the UK’s arms export licenses to Israel.
On Monday afternoon, Foreign Secretary David Lammy told MPs that after a review, the UK Government will be suspending around 30 arms export licences out of approximately 350 amid a “clear risk” they could have been used to breach international humanitarian law in Gaza.
Lammy said the Government does “not take this decision lightly” and stressed it is “not an arms embargo”.
But the SNP’s Brendan O’Hara challenged the decision (below).
The MP for Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber told the House of Commons: “Of course, we welcome anything which reduces the appalling death toll in Gaza and increasingly, sadly, in the West Bank.”
He added: “Could I press (Mr Lammy) on the issue of the UK recognising that the Netanyahu government’s use of UK weapons poses a clear list of the violation of international humanitarian law.
“You will be aware that there is no legal definition between what is an offensive weapon and what is a defensive weapon. So why and on what basis, if there is, in his words, a clear risk of the violation of international humanitarian law, why has he not imposed a blanket ban on Israel until that risk has gone away completely?”
Lammy defended not imposing a blanket ban, saying that O’Hara should “recognise the real threats that Israel faces” – including from Lebanese Hezbollah, as well as what the “Houthis are doing now in the Red Sea”.
He added: “It’s for that basis that my remarks are measured and I defend that.”
Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesperson Layla Moran, meanwhile, urged the Government to “go further” by ending trade with illegal settlements in the West Bank.
She told MPs: “I urge the Government to go further. Will they not ban goods produced in the legal Israeli settlements? If the settlements are illegal, why are we allowing trade with them?
“And will they sanction Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, as the EU’s Josep Borrell is considering, or can (Foreign Secretary David Lammy) at least say that when it comes to violent extremists, nothing and no one is off the table?”
Lammy replied: “We condemn the settler expansion, the record levels that we’ve seen this year, particularly, and of course, the increase in settler violence.
“And I condemn the language that’s been used by ministers in the Israeli government, Smotrich, Ben-Gvir, particularly in relation to this. It’s entirely unacceptable language and should be condemned by the Israeli government as a whole.
“(Ms Moran) raises important issues, and she recognises that, of course, in terms of labelling, we do label in relation to goods from settlements alongside the 1967 borders particularly, but the issues are very, very complex.”
Independent MP Apsana Begum also urged the Government to go further and suspend all arms sales to Israel.
The Poplar and Limehouse MP said: “Given that over 40,000 Palestinians have now been killed, given that Israel is expanding its military operations in the occupied West Bank, and given that the former foreign office official resigned stating ‘that it is actually quite clear that Israel is perpetuating war crimes in plain site’, will the UK Government ensure that the UK is not complicit in Israel’s war crimes, and suspend all arms sales to Israel?”
