LONDON (Palestine Foundation Information Center)More than 800 British lawyers, academics and retired senior judges, including former supreme court justices, have called on their government to necessarily impose sanctions on the Israeli government and its ministers and also consider suspending it from the UN to pressure it to honor its “fundamental international legal obligations.”
In a letter to the British prime minister, the jurists welcome Keir Starmer’s joint statement last week with the leaders of France and Canada warning that they were prepared to take “concrete actions” against Israel. However, they urge him to act without delay in this regard as “urgent and decisive action is required to avert the destruction of the Palestinian people of Gaza.”
The signatories, including former supreme court justices Lord Sumption and Lord Wilson, court of appeal judges and more than 70 King’s Counsels, say that war crimes, crimes against humanity and serious violations of international humanitarian law are being committed in Palestine.
“There is mounting evidence of genocide, which is either being perpetrated or at a minimum at serious risk of occurring,” their letter states, highlighting recent comments by the Israeli finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who said Israel’s army would “wipe out what remains of Palestinian Gaza.”
“All states, including the UK, are legally obliged to take all reasonable steps within their power to prevent and punish genocide; to ensure respect for international humanitarian law; and to bring to an end violations of [the right to self-determination]. The UK’s actions to date have failed to meet those standards … The international community’s failure to uphold international law in relation to the occupied Palestinian territory contributes to a deteriorating international climate of lawlessness and impunity and imperils the international legal system itself. Your government must act now before it is too late,” the signatories tell Starmer.
British foreign secretary David Lammy announced, last week, the suspension of negotiations over a new free trade deal with Israel, but the jurists’ two-page letter, backed by a 35-page legal memorandum, says he must go further, faster by reviewing existing trade ties, suspending the 2030 roadmap for closer UK-Israel partnership and imposing trade sanctions.
The legal experts call on him to immediately sanction Israeli ministers or senior officials in the Israeli military establishment whom they accuse of having incited genocide or supporting and sponsoring illegal settlements. They note that so far financial sanctions and travel bans have been limited to individual settlers, settler outposts and settler organizations.
The letter highlights that Israel has been responsible for “an unparalleled assault on the United Nations.”
It points to Israel’s banning of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, which it calls the “backbone of aid” for the Palestinian people, from operating in the occupied territory and its “attacks on UN premises, property and personnel.” These acts are said to “go beyond isolated breaches. They amount to a broader challenge to the UN charter system itself.”
The letter says that the limited aid allowed a few days ago into Gaza “remains gravely insufficient to address the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe.”
In order to meet its legal obligations, Britain is also urged in the letter to secure an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, the resumption of aid and the lifting of Israel’s ban on UNRWA. Finally, it says Britain should confirm that it would execute the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants agai
