https://www.declassifieduk.org/rafs-support-for-israel-stretches-concept-of-self-defence/
Israel’s bombing of the Iranian consulate in Syria was a grave violation of diplomatic protocol. Should the RAF have shielded Benjamin Netanyahu from Tehran’s inevitable retaliation?
Rishi Sunak’s decision to deploy RAF warplanes to shoot down Iranian drones heading for Israel raises serious questions about international law and the spectre of Britain’s involvement in a widening conflict in the Middle East.
The contents of Britain’s military cooperation agreement with Israel signed in 2020, and a defence pact signed a year later, are secret but they are not believed to require Britain to protect Israel if it comes under attack.
A more recent “2030 roadmap for UK-Israel bilateral relations” vaguely commits London to “tackle shared threats” with Tel Aviv.
Sunak justified the RAF’s deployment as “saving lives not just in Israel but in neighbouring countries like Jordan as well”.
His defence secretary, Grant Shapps, went further and described Iran’s combined drone and missile attack on Israel as posing “a threat to civilian lives in the Middle East”.
They delivered these sweeping justifications of British military activity seemingly unaware that this rationale would also oblige them to intercept Israel’s air strikes into Gaza, which have killed many thousands of civilians.
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https://www.declassifieduk.org/rafs-support-for-israel-stretches-concept-of-self-defence/