“The government’s announcement that it is suspending the sale of some weapons to Israel is welcome but it is not enough. A comprehensive end to all arms sales is a necessary step towards ending Britain’s complicity in Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians.”
By Louise Regan, National Education Union and Chair, Palestine Solidarity Campaign
Over 41,000 Palestinians have now been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza, over two thirds of them women and children. In March, the UN reported that more children had been killed in Gaza in four months than in four years of war world wide. Thousands more have been killed since. Ten children a day face an amputation with no anaesthetic and at least 3000 children have had at least one limb amputated.
Across the West Bank attacks have increased significantly with over 650 Palestinians killed since October. A report released from DCIP earlier this week, “Targeting Childhood: Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces and settlers in the occupied West Bank,” states that 20 percent of the Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces and settlers in West Bank, since 2000 have been killed after October 7, at a rate of one child every two days.
Despite this, our political leaders continue to sell Israel weapons even as it stands charged in the International Court of Justice for the crime of genocide. It is obscene to continue arms sales at a time when two senior Israeli government leaders stand personally accused of crimes against humanity, including extermination and murder; starvation of civilians as a method of warfare; intentionally directing acts against a civilian population; persecution; and wilfully causing great suffering.
The supposed ‘safe zones’ in Gaza are facing repeated attacks and evacuation orders are forcing already displaced civilians into increasingly overcrowded and uninhabitable shelters.
Palestinians are facing bombardment from the sea, air and land, with images of burned and decapitated children becoming a regular occurrence on our social media feeds.
85% of schools in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed. All 12 universities have been completely or partially destroyed.
625,000 students have had no access to education for an entire school year. They have witnessed horrific and terrifying events and the trauma they have suffered will take years if not decades to overcome.
And now, the people of Gaza are on the brink of another crisis. Polio has returned for the first time in 25 years, posing an unimaginable threat to all of Gaza’s children. Its outbreak is a direct result of Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s health and sanitation infrastructure. Agencies and medical professionals from around the world have called for an immediate ceasefire to allow for the vaccination of Gaza’s children, and yet still Israel’s bombing continues.
Right now every ounce of our energy and effort must be focused on calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire and the ending of weapon sales to Israel
The government’s announcement that it is suspending the sale of some weapons to Israel is welcome but it is not enough. A comprehensive end to all arms sales is a necessary step towards ending Britain’s complicity in Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians.
The UK arms export licensing regime allows the UK to export military goods used by Israel through ‘incorporation licenses’, weapons, components and military technology are exported to a third state, incorporated in larger weapons systems, and then exported on to Israel.
One example of this is F-35 fighter jets used to bomb Gaza. Campaign Against Arms Trade has reported that the UK provides approximately 15% of the components in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet, an aircraft revealed this week to have been used in a massacre committed in July in al Mawasi camp killing 90 Palestinians and injuring at least 300. Two days ago al Mawasi camp was hit again killing at least 40 people.
Amnesty UK has called on the government to withdraw the 2002 incorporation guidelines as part of ending all arms sales to Israel and last week 18 charities called on the UK to end all arms transfers to Israel.
Right now Palestinians are standing in the dark but we know that they will rise again as they have always done. Our task is to stand with them, to escalate our actions, to keep speaking out. Palestinians tell us that they don’t need our tears they need our voices as theirs are silenced. But they need more than our words – they need our actions too. This involves not only protesting on the streets, putting pressure on our politicians but also pushing forward with the BDS campaign.
Palestinian trade unionists have called for the global trade union movement to pressure organisations and companies complicit with Israel’s crimes. That call makes explicit the need for trade unions to build BDS campaigns and to make their unions apartheid free zones.
There is much that we must continue to do in building our movement but we cannot and must not stop until there is a permanent ceasefire, until the genocide is ended until all the walls of apartheid are dismantled, until the day when Palestinians are finally free.
- Louise Regan is the National Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and an executive member of the National Education Union (NEU). This is an edited version of the speech she gave to TUC Congress 2024, successfully moving a motion to end arms sales to Israel. You can follow her on Twitter/X; and follow the Palestine Solidarity Campaign on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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