The Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis is a moderate man and chooses his words carefully. So his statement about David Lammy’s suspension of 30 export licences to Israel was striking in its tone, if not surprising in its content.
The Foreign Secretary’s timing did feel a bit rum
‘It beggars belief that the British government, a close strategic ally of Israel, has announced a partial suspension of arms licences, at a time when Israel is fighting a war for its very survival on seven fronts forced upon it on the 7th October, and at the very moment when six hostages murdered in cold blood by cruel terrorists were being buried by their families,’ he said.
The Foreign Secretary’s timing did feel a bit rum. In Israel, yesterday was an intense moment of national mourning. The cruelty of the execution of the six hostages underground was found not just in the depravity of the act itself, but the way it came at a moment when Israelis had allowed themselves to hope. A few days ago, a deal felt within touching-distance and six families sensed that their loved ones might soon be back in their arms. Yesterday, another chapter of pain opened for the children of Israel. How much sorrow can one people take?
It was into this context that the Labour government dropped its decision to ban the export of certain armaments to the Jewish state. Israelis barely noticed; indeed, British weapons account for just one per cent of their arms purchases anyway, so there was little substance to this political gesture. But as an indication of betrayal, it hit the Chief Rabbi hard and he spoke for many British Jews.
Aside from anything else, it seems unwise for the government to invite scrutiny of its arms licences in this way. Autocracies like Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt all receive British weapons. Many of them have abysmal human rights records and not even a passing interest in democracy. Yet it is the Jews who take the heat, and at their time of greatest anguish.
I’m in Tel Aviv observing it all first hand, and I can testify to the fact that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is doing more to try and protect civilian life than other armies, consistently evacuating people before attacks and aborting strikes to save them. A polio vaccination drive is now commencing in Gaza, which is far more complex and perilous than the covid jab rollout several years ago. Is this the behaviour of a genocidal regime?
Did Britain, the United States and our Iraqi and Kurdish allies evacuate civilians from Mosul before we bombed it to bits? Did we agonise about our targeting, in conjunction with legal experts embedded with military decision makers? According to estimates of men who served in Mosul, the coalition killed tens of civilians for each combatant. The facts don’t lie: even if you accept the dodgy Hamas casualty figures, a smaller number of civilians are losing their lives for every combatant in Gaza. It goes without saying that every death is to be mourned. But that is a more impressive record than other armed forces, including our own. And October 7 left Israel with no choice but to go after Hamas.
Israel’s main fault is not the war fighting but the way it has failed to get this message out, in the face of a largely hostile media. Don’t take my word for it. Listen to figures like John Spencer, America’s foremost expert in urban warfare, who teaches at West Point; or my friend Andrew Fox, a former major in the Parachute Regiment who completed three tours in Afghanistan, one with the Green Berets, as well as in Bosnia, the Middle East, and Northern Ireland; or Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British troops in Afghanistan. They have all observed operations on the ground, including in Gaza itself, and given extensive testimony.
Listen, for goodness’ sake, to ordinary voices within Gaza itself, who roundly blame Hamas for the war and are rooting for the IDF to win. I have kept in regular contact with one or two by phone – people I knew from my time as a foreign reporter – and they have consistently expressed such sentiments. For the first couple of months of the war, they referred to Hamas only as ‘the dogs’ for fear of being overheard, but now they speak more openly. It came as no surprise last week when the IDF revealed documents proving that Hamas had fabricated the polls showing high levels of local support, when in fact they sit only at around 30 per cent. My friends in Gaza remain too afraid to go on the record, but one day they may have that liberty.
Surely David Lammy will begin to discount the waves of misinformation and heed the facts. Surely he will not allow foreign policy to be built on the basis of social media, biased broadcasters and propaganda produced by Hamas. I trust that the Chief Rabbi remains hopeful that the suspension of 30 export licences will prove only temporary, until wiser heads prevail and Britain once again stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the sole democracy in the Middle East, which is battling the same foe that is coming for us all.
“Britain’s arms crackdown on Israel has come at a dreadful time” Jake Wallis Simons
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One thing I don’t see mentioned here, or too much in the US or Australia, is that politicians like Lammy are reacting to pressure from local Muslim communities in the UK, America and Australia. These are now changing local policies. Changing campaigning. Changing the way politicians see the world. They should not, but they do. And they do to an Islamist bent.
