KEIR STARMER SPEECH FOR LFI ANNUAL LUNCH 2021 *** CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY *** Chief Rabbi, Ambassador, friends. It is a pleasure to be with you today at LFI’s annual lunch – our first opportunity to gather together since 2018. I want to join Steve in thanking today’s co-sponsors, Sir Read more…
The economy of the Palestinian territories is exhibiting “signs of recovery” despite serious challenges of unemployment and “deteriorating social conditions” in Gaza, a report by the World Bank said this week. The first half of 2021 saw a growth rate of 5.4 percent, with growth expected to reach 6 percent Read more…
Hamas, the Islamist terror group which governs Gaza, condemned six people to death last week for cooperating with Israel. The military judiciary in the Gaza Strip also announced additional sentences ranging from hard labour to life imprisonment. Two of those sentenced, a 58-year-old Gazan and a 57-year-old from Khan Younis, Read more…
Israel has advanced plans for 1,303 new homes for Palestinians in Area C of the West Bank on Monday. This was the first authorisation of its kind under the new coalition government came to power in June, and the first since the Biden administration was inaugurated in January. The Higher Read more…
Israel’s National Security Council ended a travel warning for Morocco that has been in effect for over a decade. In a statement, the council said the decision was made following an assessment that the threat level to Israelis in Morocco had decreased following diplomatic normalisation between the two countries, signed Read more…
Israel announced on Monday that it was opening its border with Lebanon – with which it is technically at war – in order to allow agricultural workers to pick olives. “In light of the economic situation in Lebanon, and as a gesture of goodwill to the Lebanese people, the IDF Read more…
Labour Friends of Israel director Michael Rubin has written the below article for the Labour Foreign Policy Group. Click here to read the original. In the months since President Biden’s inauguration, we’ve already begun to see the difference in his administration’s approach to international affairs. “America First” is out, multilateral engagement is Read more…
Israel announced this week that it had officially legalised the status of 4,000 Palestinians in the West Bank, ending a decade-long freeze in which almost no requests were authorised under Benjamin Netanyahu. The move was part of the government’s ongoing effort, led by defence minister Benny Gantz, to strengthen the Read more…
Israeli defence officials have expressed concern over a dramatic rise in hate crimes and violence by Jewish nationalists in the past two years. Most of the perpetrators appear to be West Bank settlers. Ynet news found that hate crimes increased significantly in 2020 compared with 2019, with a spike that began Read more…
Two Israeli ministers from the left-wing Meretz party, Nitzan Horowitz and Isawi Frej, met with Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday night. Health minister Horowitz said his party was working to “keep the two-state solution alive” within Israel’s new coalition government, which is led by right-wing Naftali Bennett. “There Read more…
More than 300 prominent Iraqis made an unprecedented plea for regional reconciliation on 25 September, as they called for their country to normalise ties with Israel. “We demand full diplomatic relations with the State of Israel […] and a new policy of normalisation based on people-to-people relations with the citizens Read more…
Some 56 percent of Palestinians approve of recent “confidence-building measures” by the Israeli government, intended to improve everyday life for Palestinians. Polling by Khalil Shikaki, director of the Palestinian Center for Survey and Policy Research, found that 56 percent of Palestinians viewed the moves positively, compared with 35 percent who Read more…