UK guilt grows as it hesitates on the brink of Gaza genocide

Alameen Templeton

The failure of Britain’s Labour Party to make any serious changes to the country’s policies on Palestine after a year of Gaza genocide, despite voter expectations and election promises, has drawn question marks over its intended direction.
Legal experts say the prime minister Kier Starmer’s decision to restrict some arms sales to Israel’s genocidal ambitions has created an inescapable dilemma for Britain.
Despite its claims to the contrary, the arms limitation is an admission that Britain knows genocide and practices unacceptable under humanitarian law are taking place in Gaza. However, continuing to supply arms to feed an acknowledged genocide, as Britain is now doing, deepens London’s complicity in the human rights violations committed by the genocidal state.
“Indeed, it is now proper to refer to London as an open participant in genocide – a fact acknowledged by its decision to restrict arms supplies and then also to continue supporting that genocide,” on public international law expert, who did not wish to be identified because he is party to legal actions, said this week.
Legal tsunami warning
The warnings come amid increasing support for South Africa’s charge at the International Court of Justice of genocide against Israel and amid International Criminal Court arrest warrants being requested for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his defence minister Yoav Gallant.
Countless national leaders have warned at the UN and in the media that genocide is happening. The latest was Nicolas Maduro who this week accused Nato of seeking to protect old, colonial ambitions by driving a new Holocaust against Muslims.
There was an ongoing “war of extermination” against the Arab people of Palestine, Syria, and Iran, which is being concealed by Western media, Maduro said Monday. He described the Palestinian struggle as “the most important battle that humanity has”.
In his television program Con Maduro +, Maduro said the struggle was rooted in the colonialist ambitions of the USA, UK, and Europe, aimed at controlling a militarised state and extending their dominance over the whole of Arabia.
He stated, “Palestine is the human homeland. Just as we defend our land, Venezuela, our Bolivarian Fatherland, the most important battle that humanity has is for the human Fatherland, for the liberation of Palestine, of Jerusalem, the epicenter of the prophets, of the envoys of God. David, Solomon, the Palestinian man, Jesus Christ, must be the earth of peace, harmony, and dialogue of religions and civilizations, as it always was.”
Welcome move
Similar concerns appeared to motivate Starmer’s Labour government as it imposed its partial arms embargo on Israel in September and withdrew its objection to an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after its July 4 election win.
The moves were initially welcomed by high profile opponents to the arms sales. They had warned Rishi Sunak’s Conservative administration repeatedly since October 7 last year that arming a known genocide was making Britian complicit in crimes against humanity.
It was hoped Starmer’s arrival in Downing Street would make a difference. Months later, however, no substantial actions have been taken to halt the genocide.
While Starmer has called for a cease-fire and improvements to the humanitarian situation in Gaza, he has refrained from directly condemning Israel’s actions.
In remarks before the election, Starmer said that Israel had the right to cut off electricity, water and fuel to Gaza, a comment that sparked furious debate as he was accused to making a genocidal statement.
Backlash growing
The UK approved more than 100 export licenses for the sale of weapons, military equipment and other controlled items to Israel after October 7, Department for Business and Trade data shows.
Now, the UK’s failure to terminate all export licenses to Israel is attracting a backlash in Britain and abroad.
Foreign minister David Lammy announced on Sept. 2 that around 30 of the 350 licenses would be suspended. Crucially, that does not include UK-made components for Israel’s F-35 fighter jets, that has been described as “the workhorse of genocide”.
Defence minister John Healey said the decision to suspend some licenses would not significantly impact Israel’s security – or, as human rights lawyers pointed out, prevent it from continuing the genocide.
Human rights organizations have criticized the partial arms embargo as insufficient and belated.
Total embargo needed now
Labour Party MP Zarah Sultana said the arms sales to Israel “deepen the UK’s complicity” in the regional war and “horrific violations of international law.”
The “Independent Alliance”, a parliamentary grouping of five independent lawmakers supporting Gaza, has called for an immediate halt to all arms shipments to Israel.
Dina Matar, chair of the Center for Palestine Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, told Anadolu more steps that went further than a partial arms suspension were needed.
“Definitely the UK should have and should announce an embargo on (all) arms sales, because that is so important to try and gain back confidence, to try and show that there is actual will, and action is not only about the rhetoric or about discourse,” Matar said.
Matar noted that the UK under the Labour Party is “a little bit wary” of fundamentally changing its relationship with genocidal Israel.
“There is not much that has happened in terms of restraining Israel from pursuing its genocide. And also, we have the issue that always comes up, which is: Can the UK take a position on its own without the support of the US?