Steve Baker
Main Page: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)Department Debates - View all Steve Baker's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(9 years, 10 months ago)
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Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Large numbers of my constituents have expressed the view that the people of Gaza are suffering collective punishment. But is it the deliberate policy of Hamas to put those same people in harm’s way?
Mr Hague
There is a good argument for that, and one of our hon. Friends who has now left the Chamber gave an alleged instance of this earlier. The Israeli Government argue that Hamas in effect uses civilians as shields—that one of the reasons for civilian casualties is that rockets are launched deliberately from within heavily populated areas, Gaza itself being a very densely populated area. It is in the nature of the conflict that that happens and that civilians are therefore in the front line, and Hamas bears responsibility for that.