Gaza: UK Assessment

Stella Creasy Excerpts
Wednesday 14th May 2025

(1 day, 19 hours ago)

Commons Chamber
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Hamish Falconer Portrait Mr Falconer
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It is obviously inappropriate to try to rehearse submissions that are currently being heard by the court.

Stella Creasy Portrait Ms Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)
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The Minister knows this, but we should put on record that when President Netanyahu says there is “no way” he will stop his onslaught in Gaza, he does not do so with the consent of the hostage families, or indeed of the majority of people in Israel. Even President Trump is now avoiding him. My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi) is right: we have obligations too. I hear the Minister’s frustration, and I think that across this House we want to give him strength so that he can go further. He will have heard the calls for sanctions and reports to international criminal courts. Will he give us a vote in this place about immediately recognising Palestine, as we had in 2014, so that we can strengthen his negotiations with Israel and send a clear message that what is happening in Gaza is wrong and must stop?

Hamish Falconer Portrait Mr Falconer
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I know that my hon. Friend has an incredibly brave and courageous constituent who is herself a member of a hostage family. Whenever I have seen her, her words ring in my ears, as do those of other hostage families, and I know they do so across the world. They are important views expressed by those who are most directly affected by the horrors of 7 October and all that followed.

I have already rehearsed some of the arguments in relation to recognition.