Israelis and Palestinians have already paid a high price for the mounting tensions between Iran and the United States. According to The Times this week, “a key meeting” was recently held in Beirut between Qassem Soleimani, head of Iran’s Al-Quds Brigade, and Ziyad al-Nakhalah, leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The Read more…
A weekend of violence – in which nearly 700 rockets, missiles and mortars were fired from Gaza towards Israel, purposefully targeting Israeli civilians – has given way this week to a tense ceasefire. Four Israeli civilians were killed and 142 were injured, including four in critical condition. Palestinian medical officials reported Read more…
Hamas’ twin-track strategy – to bring calm to Gaza while stoking terror in the West Bank – has been on graphic display over the past week. Leaders of the terror group, which rules the coastal enclave, were in talks with senior Egyptian intelligence officials on Thursday evening when two rockets Read more…
Labour Friends of Israel Annual Lunch, 27 November 2018 Remarks by the Ambassador of Israel, HE Mark Regev. Check against delivery. Chief Rabbi, Chair of the Jewish Agency, Isaac Herzog, Deputy Leader, Tom Watson, Chair of LFI, Joan Ryan, Parliamentarians and friends, And a very special thanks to Sir Read more…
*** CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY *** Rt Hon Joan Ryan MP Labour Friends of Israel Annual Lunch 2018 Chief Rabbi, Ambassador Regev, friends Thank you to all of you for being here today. In particular, I want to thank Sir David Garrard and Isaac Kaye, our long-standing lunch sponsors. I also want to thank all Read more…
Ordinary Gazans oppose the bloody, Hamas-led weekly border protests and want a ceasefire with Israel, newly released polling shows. The research – carried out among representative samples of approximately 500 randomly selected Gazans during early October by the Bethlehem-based Palestine Centre for Public Opinion and by a Ramallah-based organisation – shows the conflict-weary Read more…
The “machineries of repression” utilised by the Palestinian Authority and Hamas to crush their opponents and silence dissenters has been detailed in a shocking new report by Human Rights Watch. A two-year investigation by HRW, Two Authorities, One Way, Zero Dissent, accuses both the PA, which runs the West Bank, and Read more…
Jeremy Corbyn’s past links with Hamas have come under intense scrutiny this week, as the fallout from Labour’s failure to adopt the full International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-semitism continues. On Monday, it was revealed that the Labour leader had chaired a panel at a conference in Doha in Read more…
Israeli communities close to the border with Gaza have endured nearly three months of “kite terror” attacks launched from the coastal enclave. Kites, balloons and condoms laden with a metal pouch containing flammable substances such as burning coal or rags soaked with oil are able to drift across the border Read more…
This blog by Joan Ryan MP, parliamentary chair of Labour Friends of Israel, was originally posted on Times of Israel The terrible and shocking events in Gaza yesterday require urgent and immediate action to end the cycle of violence and address the plight of its people. Like any other country, Read more…
Sixteen Palestinians – eleven of whom were known members of terror organisations – died during clashes on the border between Gaza and Israel on Friday. The clashes took place in the context of a series of protests at the Gaza border, calling for the fulfilment of the Palestinian ‘right of Read more…
This op-ed by Joan Ryan first appeared in the JewishNews, click here to read it. The humanitarian situation in Gaza is desperate and deeply concerning. Electricity supplies are highly restricted; water and sewage facilities are under strain; rising unemployment has hit 40 percent, with an estimated six in 10 young Read more…