The U.K. Sanctions Israeli Settlements

Brian Lehrer (0:10)

It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Now we'll turn to the dramatic turnaround by Britain, which last week announced sweeping sanctions related to Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband laid out the measures in Parliament, a ban on settlement goods, sanctions on the companies involved, and even on banks that lend financing to them, and an end to British arms exports that support the occupation. This line on the historic nature of the turnaround has probably gotten the most attention.

SPEAKER_2 (0:43)

Now for a long time, the British government has rightly said, settlements are illegal, but we have remained silent on the question of the legality of the occupation as a whole, which in 2024, the International Court of Justice concluded was unlawful. Today, I announced that the official view of the British government is that the occupation is unlawful, because of Israel's entrenchment of its control, its intention to extend permanent sovereignty, and its expansionist agenda via illegal settlements.

Brian Lehrer (1:14)

At Miliband, the UK Foreign Secretary, 11 other countries, including France and Canada, announced similar measures the same day. It was Tuesday.

Israel's response came within hours. It's closing the British Consulate in Jerusalem, pulling the UK out of the Gaza Ceasefire Monitoring Center, ending British training of Palestinian security forces and barring 12 members of the British Parliament from entering the country. As the New York Times describes the situation, the sanctions come at a tense time for Britain, Israel, and the West Bank. In recent weeks, settlers have repeatedly attacked Palestinians as the Israeli military has stood by. Our guest, Daniel Levy, has a foot in both these worlds. He is British by birth. He grew up to become a negotiator for Israel under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Ehud Barak during the Oslo Peace Process of the 1990s. He later helped to form the liberal Zionist group J Street, and is currently president of the group called the US Middle East Peace Project. He has become a leading critic of the Israeli government that he used to work for. Daniel, thank you for joining us. Welcome to WNYC.

Daniel Levy (2:25)

It's a pleasure to be with you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer (2:27)

Speaking as a Brit and Israeli, could you start by explaining why now settlement activity, including violent settlement activity, and the government mostly looking the other way, has been going on in the West Bank for a long, long time. So why did the UK act now?

Daniel Levy (2:44)

Well, I think it's a question many of us ask ourselves, perhaps sometimes rhetorically.

It should not have taken this long. It should still not take so long to actually go from announcements to implementation of the measures. But if we're looking at why did this announcement take place when it did, I think there's a couple of things we have to factor in. First of all, we saw a change in governmental leadership here in the UK. We didn't have an election a couple of months ago, but the increasingly unpopular leader of the Labour Party, leader of the government, was basically forced out by his own party. Labour had come to power just over two years ago, after a long, long time in the opposition, and Keir Starmer never connected with the public, never connected with his own public, couldn't seal the deal with Labour voters who were deserting in droves. Andy Burnham is the new Prime Minister. He came in, he changed his cabinet, he put the gentleman who you played a segment of earlier, Ed Miliband, a seasoned political hand, a conviction politician also, including on this issue. He put Miliband in at the Foreign Office.

What we were seeing and what we have seen on this issue and on others, is I think the new Labour government listening to the public, listening to the broader public, which does not like what they are seeing going on in occupied Palestinian territories. They don't like how weak the Labour government has been in responding. It was responding to its own voters. If I can, just to say, I think that's really important if you're listening in the United States, because this was a party that's supposed to represent the side that more respects international law, has more compassion, more into human rights, doing what its voters wanted it to do rather than pretending that it could get away with doing nothing. This has landed as a popular move with those voters. That's not the only reason. You also have to look at what's going on over there. The increasingly provocative egregious moves of the Israeli government, and them telling us all very openly why they're doing it, to end any prospect of two states, to pursue a project of greater Israel, of expelling Palestinians. So put those things together and you understand why the timing.