Labour Party to impose sanctions on settlements in West Bank

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LIVERPOOL, England — One of the most stinging criticisms thrown at Andy Burnham is that he is a people-pleaser who hates to pick a side. But on one of the most contentious issues facing Labour, he has done just that.

Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband made the shift clear in his speech to Labour’s annual conference in Liverpool this week — directly telling internal critics who had accused the governing party of failing to take strong enough action to defend Palestinians: “You were right.”

Many of those internal critics now hope a shift in Labour policy — imposing trade sanctions on illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank — will go some way to repair electoral damage done to the center-left party in recent years.

But in addressing one of the most difficult fault lines in the party membership, Miliband has also sparked deep anger among some of his colleagues, particularly some Jewish Labour members, and charges of diplomatic recklessness. Miliband’s team has yet to respond to a request for comment on this piece.

Burnham’s predecessor, Keir Starmer, was seen as flat-footed in his support for Gaza as Israel responded with force to the Oct. 7 2023 attacks, and slow in his decision to recognize Palestine. Under his leadership, constituencies with high Muslim populations turned away from the Labour Party in large numbers, either electing independents or preferring the Greens.

But one of Miliband’s first acts as Burnham’s foreign secretary was to announce the sanctions — and accuse Israel’s government of turning a blind eye to the “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians by settlers. It was a dramatic escalation of the British government’s rhetoric.

Jess Phillips, a Labour former minister who is the MP for Birmingham Yardley, said: “I think it’s a beginning of building back trust with the vast majority.

“I wouldn’t say there is a ticker tape parade or anything but an opportunity for a fair hearing.”

Emily Thornberry, the Labour chair of the cross-party Foreign Affairs Committee, said: “As far as I’m concerned, the only important consideration is that the government has finally done the right thing.” She told at the POLITICO Pub at party conference in Liverpool Tuesday: “If you’re a grown-up politician, you can say sometimes: ‘Well, we were wrong about that. We wished we’d listened to you.'”

Even those on the left of the party who had been the most scathing about Labour’s approach to Gaza appear at least partly satisfied by Miliband’s actions — and think they have a message they can take back to angry voters. Labour MP Rachael Maskell said voters are “really engaging” with a policy shift which “is not about sides but values, and that is what people are latching onto.”

With that in mind, Labour activists are now beginning to feel quietly optimistic about an upcoming by-election in Holborn and St Pancras, Keir Starmer’s former seat, where Labour had expected to face particular pressure from the Green Party over Gaza.

“Because we have moved pretty much as far as we can now on Gaza — short of calling it a genocide — and that issue isn’t as dominating and fraught, we can talk about all sorts of issues and people feel up for listening,” said a Labour staffer.

Green officials dispute that — believing their consistency on the issue will help get candidate (and Green Party Leader) Zack Polanski over the line. “I get the sense that people don’t trust Labour on the issue,” a Green Party councillor involved in by-election campaigning — granted anonymity to speak frankly — said.

“Burnham and Miliband’s words are nice and all, but it’s a little bit too late. Greens have had a position stronger and longer.”

The Miliband factor

Despite earning party plaudits, Miliband has, for some, pushed beyond what is diplomatically wise.

Three people described a meeting with the foreign secretary before the sanctions announcement, in which he was urged to wait until after the Israeli elections because of concern Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would weaponize the move. They said Miliband was intransigent and kept repeating that it was a “moral emergency.”

The same people, who were granted anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussions, said his refusal to wait forced them to conclude that his decision was partly influenced by the desire to announce the change in policy in time for the Labour conference and the by-election.

Burnham has stood firmly behind the West Bank sanctions since they were announced, but it’s clear that they have been driven to a large extent by Miliband. The prime minister heaped praise on his foreign secretary in his own address to the conference Tuesday, insisting Britain would be “principled in our leadership in securing a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine, as Ed Miliband has shown.”

A one-time Labour leader who carries more political clout than most on the government front-benches, Miliband has indeed chosen to make this fight intensely personal, describing himself as a “proud British Jew,” with the “deepest gratitude” to the state of Israel for giving refuge to his grandmother who lost her husband, Miliband’s grandfather, and 60 other family members at the hands of the Nazis.

Miliband’s sanctions move was followed by allies in fellow middle powers, Canada and France, making similar moves, and one U.K. minister argued Britain had opened international conversations at the United Nations General Assembly that had been impossible before.

For now, the British government is relieved that the feared blowback from Israel has been reasonably restrained. While Israel announced that the British consulate in Jerusalem will be closed as part of a retaliation, ministers were assured that intelligence cooperation will continue. Donald Trump, whose relationship with Netanyahu has wavered during their war in Iran, has appeared uncharacteristically calm about the sanctions.

In Liverpool, some Labour MPs were still to be placated. Left-wing lawmaker Nadia Whittome told a Liverpool fringe event Tuesday night that Israel “needs to face a reckoning” — demanding that Britain impose a complete arms embargo and wider economic sanctions on the state.

But for now, Miliband has at least made parts of the Labour faithful feel better about itself.

MPs and party members making their way to the secure zone of the Labour conference in Liverpool have for years been confronted by demonstrations from pro-Palestinian protestors.

“Ed said we were right,” one placard read on the Tuesday morning after his speech.