Defence secretary rejects Boris Johnson’s claim suspension of some arms sales means UK ‘abandoning Israel’ – UK politics live

Defence secretary rejects Boris Johnson’s claim suspension of some arms sales means UK ‘abandoning Israel’ – UK politics live

Foreign secretary David Lammy announced on Monday some arms sales to Israel were being suspended

Good morning. The Hamas massacre of Israelis on 7 October last year, and Israel’s brutal war in Gaza that has been going on ever since, has had very little impact on the internal politics of the Conservative party, but it has caused endless problems for Labour. Keir Starmer’s initial response, including an interview in which he seemed to say Israel had the right to cut off water supplies to Gaza as part of its retaliation (it took him a while to clarify that that was not what he meant) horrified pro-Palestinian voters, and Labour lost one byelection, and at least four seats at the general election, as a direct result of the backlash in Muslim communities that had previously been solidly Labour.

Now Labour is in office it is in a position to make policy on the Israel/Gaza conflict, and yesterday David Lammy, the foreign secretary, announced that some arms sales to Israel are being suspended.

Boris Johnson, the former Tory prime minister, has accused Labour of “abandoning Israel” and suggested they want Hamas to win the war. He posted this on X.

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