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EU: Gaza and the West Bank

I understand the noble Lord’s impatience, but every example that I have recently given are events that occurred in June this year. I confess that progress is slow, but it is not the case that nothing has happened since January. I was asked by a number of noble Lords what Tony Blair has been up to. Again, there is progress to report. His last visit was just a week ago, on 7 October. He continues to push forward with his confidence-building measures. The noble Lord is correct to express frustration that it is more of the same, if you like, but in a situation where there is no broad breakthrough on a peace agreement, perhaps incremental progress is the best we can hope for. Since January—I take the noble Lord’s point—the UK has been a key partner in the Palestine investment conference, an initiative supported strongly by Mr Blair which was held in Bethlehem in May. We have worked since then with the World Bank to try to get access to investment for Palestinian companies. In the light of that, and looking forward, on 15 December we will be holding an investment conference here in London to encourage investment and build UK-Palestinian business relations. I was asked why the Government did not more specifically mention Gaza in several recent overseas speeches. Last week in the other place, the Foreign Secretary said: "““There remains an urgent imperative to improve the access for humanitarian supplies, commercial goods and people””.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/10/08; col. 122.]" Of course it needs to be about more than just humanitarian supplies. A hand-to-mouth existence will not lift Gazans out of poverty. Without crossings open for people and commercial goods, Gaza cannot lift itself out of economic decline. Israel must allow more in and more out, and we and our EU colleagues will continue to press Israel to do so. The ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas—another new development in recent months—is welcome. We commend Egypt for its work on the ceasefire. It is good news that it has held so far. But this cessation of violence is only one step. In that regard, the retention of Gilad Shalit in captivity does not allow that to be built on, but neither does the retention of Palestinian parliamentarians in jail without trial. This has been a year of incremental progress; I plead guilty to the charge of the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, on that score. There is certainly no reason for great optimism at this stage. However, we remain absolutely committed to this peace process, which remains a core objective of Britain’s foreign policy. We view ourselves and the EU as having particular responsibilities in the coming months as the United States goes through a change of Administration, with the inevitable loss of attention and focus that that can often mean on foreign policy issues. We will try to make sure that the momentum of peace-making continues through the arrival of a new Government in Israel and that all sides are left in no doubt that only a just peace can end the terrible tragedy of the Middle East.