UK Lawyers Urge Stronger Sanctions on Israeli Settlements

More than 130 lawyers, former judges, and legal academics have urged British Prime Minister Andy Burnham to expand sanctions against Israeli settlements, stating current measures fall far short of international law obligations.

Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband last week announced a ban on trade with illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, a move Canada and France also undertook. The signatories, including former Lord Justice of Appeal Sir Alan Moses and barrister Michael Mansfield KC, argue the UK must extend sanctions to more sectors of Israel's economy, prevent public bodies from investing in settlements, and enforce a full arms embargo.

They noted the sanctions do not match the scope of those imposed on Russia, which encompassed all aspects of its economy, including banks and energy companies, for enabling the invasion of Ukraine. Ralph Wilde, a professor of international law at UCL, stated that it is impossible to disentangle the economic activity in settlements from the rest of Israel.

Meanwhile, Palestinian citizens of Israel have begun daily protests against a settler outpost established in Majd al-Krum, a Palestinian-majority town in the Galilee, after Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced plans to "Judaise" the region. In a separate incident, Israeli army forces killed a Palestinian, identified as Ziad Mohammed Jaber, 54, during a raid in Al-Bireh in the West Bank, which the Palestinian Prisoner Society accused Israel of turning into field executions.