ROSH HASHANAH 5787 SECTION A, PAGE 11
Foreign Sec. Miliband: Also Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem
By Tovah Lazaroff
The United Kingdom, France and Canada will ban goods produced in the West Bank settlements and Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband told Parliament on Sept. 8, stating that all such communities were deemed by his country to be illegal.
The declaration exacerbated the rising tensions in the traditionally strong Israel-UK alliance.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar warned that these steps stoked anti-Semitism against British Jews in an on-camera statement to reporters in Jerusalem.
Sa’ar charged that the measures were a politicized hostile action deliberately taken ahead of Rosh Hashanah, with an eye toward influencing the country’s Oct. 27 elections.
Israel, he said, is responding by:
• closing the British Consulate in Jerusalem that services Palestinians.
• remove British representatives from the International Gaza Support Center in Kiryat Gat and
• halt the British training of Palestinian Authority security forces.
• bar the entry of 12 British politicians and other nationals involved in anti-Israel activity.
France and Canada have also announced a ban on the import of settlement goods, Miliband told parliament. He noted that the Netherlands, Ireland, Belgium, Spain and Norway have either banned goods or in the process of doing so.
In the same address, Miliband affirmed Israel’s right to exist, rejecting the notion that there was a connection between the policy steps against West Bank settlement activity and the safety of British Jews.
What is motivating the UK, Miliband said, is “a deep sense of shame about what has unfolded in Palestine under the eyes of the international community” as well as Israel’s “clear intent to bury the Palestinian state.”
In response, he said, the UK “will introduce an import ban on goods from illegal settlements in the occupied territory” as part of a “new comprehensive sanctions regime” that will be put in place within nine months.
This will include, he said, “action against specific companies and individuals who provide services, such as construction, infrastructure, financing or real estate for settlement expansion.”
To those who “finance or facilitate illegal settlements, let me say this, you will face the full force of UK sanctions,” Miliband warned.
Miliband, who is Jewish, said that the ban would not affect the export of religious items or life-saving Israeli medications.
He said that trade with the settlements was minimal and that the greater impact would be the sanctions on services.
Miliband said that the British government is also adopting the International Court of Justice’s 2024 advisory opinion that all Israeli settlement activity over the pre-1967 border was illegal.
Others in Parliament pushed back against Miliband’s declaration.
MP Richard Tice of Britain’s right-wing Reform party said that the sanctions were a grave mistake that would “embolden the scourge of anti-Semitism against British Jews on British streets,” endanger ties with the US and lead to “tit for tat” sanctions from Israel.
Tensions between Israel and the UK have been escalating in light of Israeli military actions in Gaza and the West Bank following the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
The UK’s decision under the last government to recognize Palestinian statehood in 2025 inflamed the situation, which is expected to get worse should Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu win the Oct. 27 election in Israel.
Any government that Netanyahu forms is expected to be right-wing and to continue the policies of the existing government, just as the UK under Miliband and the new Labour prime minister, Andy Burnham, are more willing than their predecessors to go head-to-head with Israel on the issue.
The foreign secretary explained that his words reflected the policies that Burnham had considered before he entered Downing Street in July, such as a ban on trade for goods produced in the settlements.
“We are obviously working across government and with our allies on these measures,” Miliband said.
Israel has said that it has a right to build homes in Area C of the West Bank, which is under Israeli military and civilian control and where all the settlements are located. Under the Oslo Accords peace process, the West Bank was divided into three areas, with sections A and B under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority.
The International Court of Justice in 2024 issued an advisory opinion that such construction in Area C is illegal, affirming a long-held stance of the UN and many nations, including the UK.
The E1 project would add 3,400 homes to the municipal boundaries of the city of Ma’aleh Adumim by building on an under-developed hilltop.
The Palestinian Authority and past US administrations say that the project would block contiguous Palestinian development in that area and preclude a Palestinian state.
Miliband referenced that viewpoint when speaking to the House of Commons Sept. 8, explaining that E1 development had long been considered a “red line,” because the project “cuts through the heart of the West Bank and risks making a Palestinian state unviable.”
He affirmed the UK’s commitment to a two-state resolution, explaining that his government would not stand idly by while that vision was being destroyed by Israeli actions on the ground in the West Bank.
In a harshly worded attack on the UK and Miliband in August, Israel Foreign Minister Sa’ar on X warned that the British government’s statements on Israel were fueling anti-Semitism in the UK and emphasized that the Jewish people had a right to build anywhere in their ancestral homeland.
