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Gaza

The sustained acts of brutal aggression to which the inhabitants of Gaza are being subjected at the hands of the Israeli Government are simply unacceptable and must be condemned. Such acts of aggression are not just disproportionate; they are outrageously disproportionate. In its heavy-handed approach, the Israeli military has given a terrifying display of its military might, killing more than 1,000 people, including 300 children. Does the Israeli Government truly believe that those innocent young children were terrorists firing rockets? The Israeli Government are also responsible for injuring more than 4,000 people, destroying thousands of homes and reducing countless buildings to their foundations. In doing so, not only have they broken established rules of international law, but they have brought shame on humanity and the entire world. The brutal scenes that we have witnessed on our television screens and read about in our newspapers have horrified the vast majority of the British public, including in my constituency, who support the Palestinian cause and feel strongly that we have so far failed the Palestinians in the current crisis. I pay tribute to the tens of thousands of people who have peacefully marched and demonstrated throughout the UK to show their solidarity with the people of Gaza at this difficult time and to demand an end to the bloody violence. The call for peace has come from members of all faith communities. I would like in particular to thank the group Jews for Justice for Palestinians for its recent statement in The Times, which was signed by more than 500 Israeli academics, artists and writers, calling for an immediate end to the slaughter in Gaza. They have asked for an end to the blockade, the opening of dialogue with Hamas, without which there can be no durable peace, an investigation into war crimes that may have been committed by any party to the conflict and the suspension of the EU-Israel association agreement until Israel fulfils the basic human rights conditions on which it is predicated. I congratulate Jews for Justice for Palestinians on issuing that statement. It is important to stress that the actions of the Israeli Government should not reflect negatively on Britain's Jewish community. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) pointed out, such acts go completely against the ethos and morals of the Jewish faith. The atrocities being committed by the Israeli Government will do nothing to achieve peace and stability in the region. They will only cause more hatred and suffering, further damage and delay any possible peace process and make the world a more dangerous place, giving a propaganda victory to terrorist groups, which will use them to mobilise more support and radicalise young people around the world. The humanitarian situation in Gaza is now desperately dire as several aid agencies have reported that Gaza's population of 1.5 million is in urgent need of food, shelter, fuel and basic medical aid. That follows on from months of deprivation arising from Israeli restrictions and the siege. It is important to clarify a couple of myths put forward by the Israeli Government. This conflict did not begin 19 days ago with the firing of Hamas rockets into Israel. It began 60 years ago with the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories. The ceasefire in Gaza was not broken 19 days ago by the firing of Hamas rockets into Israel. It was broken 10 days into an agreement previously made by Israel to end the inhumane siege of Gaza. The Israeli Government have, throughout the current crisis, used their military might to cause the relentless destruction of infrastructure and they have inflicted misery on innocent Palestinian people. In their excessive use of military force, they have shown little, if any, restraint while wreaking utter carnage in Gaza. It is time that we began to hold them to account. After 60 years of waiting for peace and justice—60 failed years—we owe it to the people of Palestine to find a lasting solution to this conflict.