---

Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan and Pakistan

I will not give way any more as I have had my allotted injury time, if the House understands what I mean. I want to mention two other topics. I believe that there are double standards at work. The west has intervened in Libya, where there are large amounts of oil and where, under Tony Blair, a deal was done with the Government and arms were sold. They were being sold right up to the point when NATO was preparing to go in there. Interestingly, the arms sales there and in every other country in the region are, yes, planes, missiles and radar systems, but in every case they include anti-personnel equipment for crowd control, to deal with civil disorder and control populations. That is what is now happening in Bahrain, with the support of Saudi Arabia. Other Members have drawn attention to what is going on there. I was with the Bahraini opposition groups in London last week. I first met Bahraini opposition groups at a UN human rights conference in Copenhagen in 1986, when they were complaining about British support for the regime, the suspension of the constitution and the lack of democracy in Bahrain. That has not stopped this country doing a lot of business with Bahrain. It has not stopped arms exports and oil imports from Bahrain. I would like condemnation of the violence of the Bahrain and the Saudi regimes equal to the condemnation of the Libyan regime and, rightly, of the Syrian regime for what it is doing. My last point concerns Palestine. Yesterday, on the anniversary of Nakba, the day on which the Palestinian people were driven out of what is now the state of Israel to become that vast diaspora, was the occasion for demonstrations outside the Kalandia crossing. Thirteen Palestinians were shot dead. Last year or the year before, Operation Cast Lead over Gaza brought about the deaths of nearly 1,500 people in that bombardment. Routine operations by Israeli forces over Gaza result in deaths. Rocket attacks and suicide attacks also result in deaths. However, there seems almost to be an approval of Israel and its perceptions of its own security needs to the exclusion of all understanding of just how brutal the regime has been towards Palestinians. If someone tries to travel through the west bank and sees the settlements, the settler-only roads, the check points and the abuse that Palestinians receive every day from Israeli border guards, they will understand why people feel so angry. They will see the walls being built, the wells being taken away and the opportunity for economic life being removed. The people in Gaza are living in an open prison and young people are growing up living their lives vicariously through TV and computer screens because they cannot work and they cannot travel—they cannot do anything. They get very angry. There must be a recognition of the rights and needs of Palestinian people. Likewise, the huge Palestinian diaspora, largely living in refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, but also all over the world, feels very angry. On a visit to Lebanon earlier this year my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman), who led the delegation, and I met an old man living in Shatila refugee camp—hon. Members will remember the Sabra and Shatila massacres in 1982. A man in his mid-80s could remember with absolute precision every tree, house and well of his Palestinian village, which he was driven out of when the state of Israel was established. Is he determined to go back? Yes. Does he think he has a right to go back? Absolutely. Do the people in that camp think they have a right to return? They absolutely do. This anger among Palestinian people is a cause that will go on for a very long time. The result of 1948 might have been seen as a reasonable diplomatic solution to the massive and awful experience that Jewish people experienced before and during the second world war, but the residue of the ill-treatment of the Palestinian people lives on. The state of Palestine needs to be supported and the Palestinian people need to be recognised. If we do not do so, the cause will go on for a very long time. We cannot just sell arms to Israel and pretend that what is happening to the Palestinians is nothing to do with us.