EuroPal Forum notes the recent announcement by UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy on 20 May suspending free trade agreement negotiations with Israel, summoning the Israeli Ambassador to the UK, and imposing targeted sanctions on illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank. While these steps mark a notable shift in tone and represent a response to growing public pressure, they fall significantly short of the robust and urgent action required to halt the genocide in Gaza.
We echo the serious concerns raised by MPs during today’s parliamentary debate following Lammy’s announcement. Jeremy Corbyn’s renewed inquiry into the UK’s arms exports to Israel and Shockat Adam’s pointed call to suspend existing - not merely prospective - trade agreements highlight the increasing dissonance between the government’s rhetoric and its ongoing complicity in sustaining Israel’s military and economic power.
The recent revelation that the Labour government approved more than £127 million in military export licenses to Israel between October and December 2024 - surpassing the Conservative government’s total over the previous three years - presents a deeply troubling contradiction to Lammy’s narrative of restraint.
While today’s developments suggest a growing discomfort among policymakers with the scale of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the UK’s measures remain largely symbolic and insufficient. They fail to impose any meaningful and tangible cost on Israel or deter its ongoing violations of international law.
As Zaher Birawi, Chair of EuroPal Forum, aptly stated:
‘There have been unprecedented positive shifts in official European stances toward the occupying state and its crimes in Gaza. However, these remain largely symbolic, lacking effective and immediate impact, and are insufficient to stop the genocide’.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry’s dismissive response - rejecting British pressure - only reinforces the urgency of a stronger, more principled stance. Words and gestures alone are clearly inadequate in the face of a state openly pursuing a campaign of genocide against the people of Gaza.
The UK must go beyond gestures. It must immediately impose a comprehensive and enforceable arms embargo, suspend existing trade and security agreements with Israel, and actively support international legal mechanisms to end impunity for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The government must also release its internal risk assessments on the likelihood of genocide, as demanded by Carla Denyer MP, to demonstrate that its stated commitments to international law are more than rhetorical.
