Britain Palestine Project
Peace with justice, security and equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians
The Governments of France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK issued this statement on Israeli settlements on May 6. We urge the Government of Israel to reverse its decision to advance the construction of 540 settlement units in the Har Homa E area of the occupied West Bank, and to cease its policy of settlement…
UK charities statement on the Prime Minister’s comments on the International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation – 14 April 2021 We condemn the Prime Minister’s statement on the ICC’s investigation into alleged grave crimes committed in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt). This investigation is bringing victims, survivors and their families one step closer to justice –…
The Balfour Project read with sadness and dismay the concluding words in the Prime Minister’s letter to the Conservative Friends of Israel of 9 April 2021. These words assert that “Palestine is not a sovereign State” and that the investigation by the ICC “gives the impression of being a partial and prejudicial attack on a…
The British Government has now replied to the six recommendations in the Balfour Project statement “Israel-Palestine: equal rights for a lasting peace” which concluded our 27 October conference on Jerusalem. We are indebted to our patron, Rt Revd John Pritchard, for asking his MP to forward the statement to the Foreign Secretary and seek a…
Statement by Ambassador Barbara Woodward at the Security Council briefing on the situation in the Middle East. Published 21 December 2020 Thank you, Mr President, and thank you to Special Coordinator Mladenov for his briefing. As others have done, I’d like to pay tribute to his tireless work in this role to de-escalate tension and…
Souvenir Booklet Jerusalem Conference 2020Download If you found this video interesting, please consider a donation to support our work.
Thursday 24 September 2020 Click here to view video. 3.13 pm Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)I beg to move, That this House has considered settlement and annexation of the Occupied Palestinian territories. This country has a unique place in history and a unique responsibility, particularly if we trace this back to the Balfour declaration. It is…
Question by Baroness Northover (Lib Dem) on 24th September 2020 (HL8468) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made ofreports that the government of Israel is demolishing water, sanitation and hygiene structures used by Palestinians in the West Bank. Answer from Lord Ahmad (Conservative) on 5th October 2020 The UK is concerned by…
Question by Baroness Janke (lib Dem) on 7th February 2022 (HL6030) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to recognise Palestine as an independent state. Answer from Lord Ahmed (Conservative) on 21st February 2022 We continue to work closely with international partners to strongly advocate for a two-state solution and encourage a return…
Question by Baroness Sheehan (Lib Dem) on 21st May 2021 (HL535) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of reductions in the Overseas Development Assistance Budget on donations to organisations bringing humanitarian aid to Gaza. Answer from Lord Ahmad (Conservative) on 8th June 2021 Allocation decisions have been taken…
Question by Baroness Tonge (Independent) on 18th january 2021 (HL12261) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that all Palestinians are able to vote freely in (1) the elections for the legislature on 22 May, and (2) the presidential election on 31 July. Answer from Lord Ahmad (Conservative) on 1st…
Question by Baroness Janke (Lib Dem) on 24th January 2022 (HL5626) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to protect Palestinians in territories occupied by Israel from damage to olive groves and crops by Israeli settlers. Answer from Lord Ahmad (Conservative) on 7th February 2022 We understand the particular significance of olive trees…
Business and Trade – Oral Questions to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of Business and Trade:– Kate Osamor: I understand that the Government are set to undertake a second round of trade negotiations with Israel in the spring. Israel applies our current agreement to the Occupied Palestinian Territories, against the EU negotiator’s original intentions. Have the Government…
Question: by Baroness Tonge (Independent) on 10 June 2019 Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Hebron, (HL16231) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the consequences for Palestinian children in Hebron of the removal of the Temporary International Presence in Hebron by the government of Israel. Answer: by: Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Conservative) on 24…
Question from Seema Malhotra (Labour) on 8th February 2023 To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what assessment he has made of the situation in Jenin. Answer by David Rutley (Conservative) on 20th February 2023 The Minister for the Middle East, Lord (Tariq) Ahmad of Wimbledon, set out on 26…
Question by Baroness Janke (Lib Dem) on 1st February 2022 (HL5843) To ask Her Majesty’s Government what support they intend to offer, if any, to the COVID-19 vaccination programme for Palestinians in Gaza, given reports of shortages of medical equipment. Answer from Lord Ahmed (Conservative) on 14th February 2022 Tackling COVID-19 remains a priority for…
A talk given online on 30th June 2020. John McHugo is a trustee of the Balfour Project and a board member of CAABU, The Council for Arab British Understanding. This paper is the edited text of a Balfour Project talk he gave on 30 June 2020, and is a development of what he wrote about…
By Andrew Whitley, Trustee and member of the Executive Committee of the Balfour Project Prime Minister Boris Johnson today published a last-minute appeal to Israel not to proceed with the Netanyahu government’s plans to annex parts of the occupied West Bank after the 1st July. The medium used was an Op-Ed in Israel’s biggest circulation…
By William Bell, Head of Middle East, Christian Aid UK and Ireland Last June, an 82-year-old Palestinian refugee called Fayza in Lebanon’s Nahr el-Bared camp wept as she told me: “Palestine is in our bones – it is not something to describe. When you lose your home town, you never trade it with anything. I…
Published in the Independent 30 May 2020 Whatever Boris Johnson’s troubles, he can always comfort himself that unlike the prime minister of a British ally 3,000 miles away, he’s not running the country while simultaneously being tried on corruption charges. But a difference between Johnson and Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu is the latter’s political nous, most recently deployed in…
Diana Safieh: A question from Sara Apps, is there an opportunity to unlock the blockage on the ICC application? What best can we do to help? Vincent Fean: Palestine joined the International Criminal Court in 2015 after the UN General Assembly in 2012 voted for non-member state observer status for Palestine in the United Nations.…
Click here to read the Guardian article.
This is a letter from Claudia Beamish MSP Member of the Scottish Parliament for South Scotland, to the Rt Hon Dominic Raab, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and First Secretary of State.
In a response to a letter to the Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab from Caabu Chair Rt Hon David Jones MP, the Foreign Office and DFID Minister responsible to the Middle East, Rt Hon James Cleverly MP has affired the UK Governmen’t position that Israel’s annexation plans of occupied Palestinian territory is contrary to international law. …
24 January 2020 Throughout my life, I have tried, in whatever very small way I can, to foster greater understanding between people of different faiths, to heal divisions and to remind people of so much that we share in common as opposed to what divides us. Indeed, as it says in Psalm 133 ‘behold, how…
Text of letter published in The Times, January 20th 2020 THE TIME IS RIGHT TO RECOGNISE PALESTINESir, Today Britain attends her last EU foreign affairs council. On the agenda is the Middle East peace process, which must address recognition of the state of Palestine, alongside Israel. The UK retains historical responsibilities regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,…
We must not ignore the voice of people in the Holy Land Every year we come to encounter and hear the people of the Holy Land. We are inspired by their enduring resilience and faith in a worsening situation. In their recent powerful message, the local Catholic Bishops lamented the international community’s failure to help…
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo cannot rewrite international law. By John McHugo , Balfour Project Trustee and International Lawyer Following the comments by the US Secretary of State on Monday, we have felt it necessary to clarify the legal status of the Israeli civilian settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Existing British government policy is…
Claudia Beamish MSP (Labour) introduced a members’ business debate on motion S5M-16637, “Towards an independent Palestinian state: a Scottish proposal” calling for action leading to an independent Palestinian state and acknowledging Britain’s historical responsibilities in what was to become Israel and Palestine. Claudia argued that British engagement is needed now to help secure a better…
This article was first published on the Conservative Middle East Council website Analysis 23 September 2019 Sir Vincent Fean KCVO Sir Vincent Fean is Chair of Trustees of the Balfour Project. Between 2010-14, Sir Vincent was British Consul-General in Jerusalem. The election is over and the haggling has begun, as Israeli voter sensured for the…
115 British Parliamentarians demand British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson act robustly to any Israeli annexation of Occupied Palestinian Territory. In the letter, sent from the Britain-Palestine All-Party Parliamentary Group, the Parliamentarians insisted that the British Government and its partners in Europe should respond robustly to demonstrate that flouting international law will have serious consequences for…
Talk by Sir Vincent Fean at recent Meretz UK Event Meretz UK hosted an event on 7th July in London’s Jewish Community centre JW3, to discuss the prospects, advantages and likely outcomes of recognition of the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel by the British Government. Sir Vincent Fean, former UK Consul General…
Speakers: Sir Tom Phillips and Sir Vincent Fean Chairing the debate: Prof. Yossi Mekelberg, Professor of International Relations at Regent’s University, London and senior consulting research fellow for the MENA programme, Chatham House. OneVoice Europe hosted an event on 26th June to discuss Britain’s role in Israel-Palestine with the prospect of Brexit, Trump’s ‘Deal of…
Dr. Tony Klug has written extensively on Israeli-Palestinian issues. He is a special advisor on the Middle East to the Oxford Research Group and a consultant to the Palestine Strategy Group and the Israel Strategic Forum. His Ph.D. thesis was on Israel’s policies in the West Bank from 1967 through 1973. He writes here…
Letter to the Times 30 March 2019 Sir,A year on from the avoidable deaths of 60 people at the Gaza fence, rockets and reprisals are recurring. This dismal pattern of behaviour must be broken. Two million people are imprisoned in Gaza, an integral part of Palestine. The UN says that Gaza will not be “a…
Israel/Palestine: Equal Rights 17 March 2019 From Edinburgh, and the home university of Arthur Balfour,we acknowledge Britain’s historical responsibilities in the Holy Land, from before the Balfour Declaration through the British Mandate to today. Gaza was, is, and always will be, an integral part of Palestine. Past British responsibility for present injustice demands British engagement…