I’ve joined 126 other MPs and Peers, led by the Conservative former Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee Crispin Blunt, in writing to the Prime Minister to demand action to prevent the new Israeli Government annexing parts of the West Bank that it occupied in June 1967 (read more here).

We’ve argued that the Israeli government is using “the cover of the Covid-19 pandemic to seek to implement this egregious plan. It is vital that the UK does everything in its power to prevent this.” Our letter, organised by the Council for Arab British Understanding (Caabu), describes the plan “as a mortal blow to the chances of peace between Israelis and Palestinians based on any viable two-state solution”.

We believe that the Israeli Government threat is in clear contravention of international law which prohibits the acquisition of territory acquired through war. When Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Britain responded with sanctions and we’ve made the case that the UK must do so in this case too. This week I also took part in a online symposium to help establish a twinning link between Sheffield and the West Bank city of Nablus following the delegation I led to the West Bank in 2017 (more here).