Labour MP Melanie Ward has revealed that at least 32 charities in England and Wales sent £28 million to Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank over the past five years. Working with human rights researchers, she found that these donations may also have benefited from around £5.6 million in UK Gift Aid, effectively subsidised by taxpayers.
Ward argued that funding settlements should not be considered charitable activity and raised the issue directly with Prime Minister Keir Starmer. In response, Starmer said that Israeli settlements are a ‘flagrant breach of international law’ and that no UK charity should be supporting them. The UK government has since tasked the Charity Commission with investigating charities linked to settlements.
The findings come amid growing scrutiny of UK ties to settlements and recent sanctions targeting groups connected to settler violence. Ward says authorities have been aware of concerns for nearly a year, citing cases where British charities donated millions of pounds to institutions based in West Bank settlements. Such funding helps sustain and expand settlements built on stolen Palestinian land, while settler violence and settlement expansion continue to intensify.
