Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.
Ellie Chowns, MP for North Herefordshire and Green Party Foreign Affairs spokesperson, said: “I welcome the news of a ceasefire agreement between the Israeli government and Hamas. This is a vital step to halt the devastating violence that has claimed tens of thousands of lives and caused unimaginable suffering, particularly for the people of Gaza. I also welcome reports that hostages are being released, bringing relief to many families.
“The Green Party has been calling for a ceasefire since October 2023, and while this agreement offers hope, it must mark the beginning of addressing the root causes of the conflict. The ongoing occupation, the siege of Gaza, and systemic violations of Palestinian rights cannot continue.
“The UK government must formally recognise the State of Palestine. Recognising Palestine is a vital step toward justice, equality, and a sustainable peace. It demonstrates a commitment to international law and a balanced approach to the region.
“Suspending some arms sales to Israel is not enough. The Green Party has consistently called for a full suspension of all arms exports to the Israeli military. This includes UK-supplied weapons parts, such as components of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which evidence suggests have been used in ways that violate international law and exacerbate the humanitarian crisis.
“The UK must support efforts to hold all those responsible for violations of international law accountable. We must ensure that humanitarian aid flows freely into Gaza to address the urgent needs of those who have endured this catastrophic violence.
“True peace requires justice, dignity, and equality for all people in the region. This is a moment for global leaders to act with courage and commitment, working towards a future where Palestinians and Israelis can live in peace, free from fear, violence, and oppression. Let us ensure that this ceasefire marks not just the end of the bombs, but the beginning of a pathway to lasting peace and justice.”
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
A pro-Palestine protest outside the BBC. (Photo: Monica Wells / Alamy)
Britain’s ‘public service broadcaster’ is keeping the public in the dark about UK support for Israel’s assault on Gaza, new research finds.
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Our research into the BBC’s written outputs since October 2023 finds the corporation has mainly not reported at all the major ways the UK government has been working with Israel.
It found that the BBC has reported just four times in 15 months that the Royal Air Force (RAF) has been conducting surveillance flights over Gaza.
Only one BBC report on the subject has been written since December 2023, despite the fact that hundreds of such spy missions have been conducted, almost daily, in aid of Israeli intelligence.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) says these flights are solely to aid the rescue of hostages held by Hamas. Only one BBC online report mentions the UK may be providing targeting information to Israel or flying weapons to the country.
None of the articles otherwise raise concerns about the UK being willing to collaborate militarily with Israel at a time it is devastating Gaza.
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Des Freedman, professor of media and communications at Goldsmiths, University of London, said: “The BBC is clearly utterly failing to inform the public about how the UK military and government is complicit in the horrors of Gaza. This is a national scandal, showing how far away the corporation is from being a public service broadcaster.”
He added: “The BBC’s failure to accurately report on Israel’s genocide in Gaza is as much to do with what it refuses to report as with what it does report. It is high time for the corporation to be truly held to account and be reformed in the public interest”.
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A BBC spokesperson said: “The BBC News teams are editorially independent and make their own decisions about what to cover and how to cover it.
“We have reported the Gaza-Israel conflict in great depth and consistently across our programmes and services since 7 October 2023, ensuring audiences are kept updated with the latest developments as well as providing comprehensive analysis.
“We hold ourselves to the highest journalistic standards and have reported the conflict impartially – without fear or favour.”
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
JEREMY CORBYN has demanded ministers come clean about the RAF’s use of Cyprus bases to aid Israel.
The former Labour leader, now an independent MP, has written to the Foreign Office urging it to tell the truth about RAF Akrotiri’s role in the continuing genocide in Gaza.
He asked it to confirm if the base in Cyprus was being used to ship weapons to Israel and how many US air force flights had been made from it to assist the onslaught against the Palestinians.
“We deserve to know the full scale of our government’s complicity and participation in genocide,” Mr Corbyn said in the letter.
His intervention follows a Christmas visit by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to the base, where he boasted that it was not possible to talk publicly about the vital work being carried out there.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
dizzy: I am only able to quote a few small parts of this copyrighted article. What it shows is that Keir Starmer’s UK Labour Party government is actively participating in Israel’s genocides far more than people are aware of or that is generally accepted. I recommend reading this article and DECLASSIFIED UK as a source on UK’s active military involvement in Israel’s genocides.
Israel’s military chief Herzi Halevi meets Admiral Radakin in Tel Aviv on 2 August 2024. (Photo: IDF)
The most senior figures in the UK military made at least five unpublicised visits to Israel in the months after it began striking Gaza in October 2023, Declassified has found.
British government data shows that Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the chief of the defence staff and the UK’s top soldier, visited Israel on 21 January 2024.
On the trip he met the Israeli military’s chief of staff, Herzi Halevi, “to discuss future operations in the region”.
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Radakin is also known to have visited Halevi again in Israel in August last year, while in November the Israeli soldier was invited by Britain’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) to attend a meeting in London.
Halevi was given special immunity by the UK authorities to avoid the possibility of being arrested for war crimes while in Britain.
Another senior UK figure who has visited Israel is the head of the Royal Air Force (RAF), Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, who undertook a trip on 9 January 2024, for purposes which are undeclared in the government data.
The RAF has since flown hundreds of spy missions over Gaza, in aid of Israeli intelligence. The UK says that only information related to Hamas hostage-taking is passed to Israel from these flights, which take off from the UK’s sprawling military and intelligence base on Cyprus.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
Susan Moffat, a British musician and theatre artist [Susan Moffat/linkedin]
British musician and theatre artist Susan Moffat has declined an OBE in this year’s Honours List, citing Britain’s colonial legacy and its response to what she describes as the “horrific war” being waged against Palestinians in Gaza.
Moffat, who was nominated for her services to the British community, penned a powerful letter explaining her decision, drawing parallels between her work with Bosnian genocide survivors and the current situation in Gaza.
“I remember screaming at the television during the Bosnian genocide, asking why nobody was stopping it. Now I find myself asking the same question about Gaza,” Moffat told MEMO.
Our leaders have placed value on one set of lives over another, while nations play games with which people get to live and which don’t.
Moffat, who has worked extensively with survivors of the Srebrenica genocide, drew powerful parallels between past and present atrocities. The artist cited the message from the Mothers of Srebrenica: “We must not remain silent, nor stand on the side. We must raise our voice, we must act for all those whose voice cannot be heard but who suffer injustice, especially if those are children, women, civilians.”
In her letter declining the OBE, Moffat addressed the ongoing impact of colonialism and its modern manifestations, particularly in Palestine. “Without acknowledging this legacy, would for me, feel discordant with the work I strive to do,” she wrote, questioning the appropriateness of accepting an honour tied to Britain’s imperial past while similar injustices continue.
Moffat also reflected on the broader implications of colonialism and its enduring impact: “The devastation wrought by empire is not a distant historical footnote but a profound reality that continues to shape our world. The structures of colonialism, its extraction of wealth, and the human suffering it inflicted have left enduring scars. Communities in the Global South are still recovering from the looting of resources and the imposition of arbitrary borders that fuel conflicts today.”
The artist went on to stress that “to accept an honour tied to the ‘Order of the British Empire’ without acknowledging this legacy, would for me, feel discordant with the work I strive to do.” Moffat explained that her decision is a response to the broader cultural context. “Conversations about history, accountability, and justice are often reduced to soundbites about so-called ‘cancel culture’,” Moffat said. “In truth, what is often dismissed as cancel culture is a growing demand for a more honest reckoning with our past,” Moffat went on to warn that the far-right seeks to “sanitise history” and “do a disservice to the potential for growth and reconciliation.”
Speaking to MEMO, Moffat emphasised the role of artists and musicians in combating injustice. “For our kids to understand their true legacy, both good and bad, we must be honest about our past and present actions,” Moffat explained.
When discussing what might have influenced her decision differently, Moffat outlined specific actions the UK government could have taken regarding Gaza, where more than 46,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed. “We should have upheld international law and stopped the bombing of schools and hospitals. We should have ended the blockade and used our diplomatic leverage to ensure Israeli forces didn’t target civilians. We should have issued a stronger condemnation of illegal settlements and taken a more decisive stance against the targeting of civilian infrastructure and demonstrated that we as a nation truly stand against injustice.”
Moffat went on to add that “the British government has failed to play its moral role,” stressing: “If our nation had shown the courage to prioritise humanitarian concerns over political expediency, to stand firmly against civilian casualties, and to be a genuine voice for peace and justice – that would have given me reason to reconsider accepting this honour.”
Reflecting on the ongoing devastation, Moffat emphasised the urgency of immediate action: “We keep saying ceasefire now and all wars end, so let’s put the end at the beginning. Why wait for more suffering when we know peace negotiations are inevitable?”
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
