Hampstead and Kilburn Labour Party passed the following resolution on Tuesday. It was considered for submission to the Labour Party Conference but lost out on two other motions on the recent rise in anti Semitic incidents and the NHS. The NHS motion will go to Conference.
Israeli-Palestinian relations
Conference welcomes the Egyptian brokered ceasefire of 26th August 2014 that brought to an end to fighting in Gaza.
Conference is alarmed by Israeli TV reports on 1st
September 2014 Israeli Prime Minister, Binyamin Netanyahu told his
cabinet that Israel would not be sending a delegation to Cairo to
participate in further negotiations over the reconstruction of Gaza’s
air and sea ports and the demilitarization of the area as stipulated in
the ceasefire conditions.
Conference also notes that on Sunday 31st
August Israel announced the expropriation of almost 1000 acres of
Palestinian privately-owned land, their declaration as state land and
the intention to build the largest Israeli settlement on the land, being
contrary not only to international but also Israeli law.
Conference
suggests that this is an indication that the present government of
Israel is not genuinely interested in a two state solution, despite
surveys of the Israeli and Palestinian publics consistently showing
majorities in favour of such an outcome.
Conference
further notes that while past announcements of a similar nature have
been condemned, deplored, described as unconstructive and harmful to a
two state solution by the UN, the EU, the White House and UK government,
the expansion of illegal settlement activity has continued, leaving the
goal of a peaceful two state solution hanging by an ever thinner
thread.
Conference
therefore believes that these illegal settlements should be subject to
not merely political censure but also economic sanction and that all
commercial activity with them should be as illegal as the settlements
themselves and therefore banned by a future Labour government.
