Israel announced on Tuesday that it will close its consulate in Jerusalem, in retaliation for a new United Kingdom ban on trade with Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Israel's retaliatory measures
Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Israel would take three measures in response to the UK's announcement:
- Closing the UK consulate in Jerusalem
- Barring the UK from participating in the US-led Gaza coordination mission in Israel
- Banning 12 Britons from entering Israel, including 11 members of parliament
The list of banned individuals includes Jeremy Corbyn MP, Zarah Sultana MP, Naz Shah MP, Diane Abbott MP, John McDonnell MP, Richard Burgon MP, Hannah Spencer MP, Carla Denyer MP, Sian Berry MP, Ellie Chowns MP and Adrian Ramsay MP, along with Fahad Ansari, director of an anti-Zionist legal organisation.
Saar accused Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband of "outrageous lies" and said the UK government was "systematically working against the state of Israel."
The UK measures that prompted the response
Earlier on Tuesday, Miliband told the House of Commons that the UK now considers Israel's occupation of the West Bank unlawful, and announced a ban on imports of goods from Israeli settlements in the occupied territories, alongside similar bans announced by France and Canada. He said the measures target settlement goods specifically and are not directed at Israel as a whole, while reaffirming continued UK trade with what he called "green line Israel."
Miliband also announced sanctions on companies and individuals providing services linked to settlement expansion, a ban on advertising illegal settlement land in the UK, and an extension of a UK ban on arms exports that materially contribute to the occupation, building on an existing suspension of more than 30 arms licences related to the Israel Defense Forces.
Reaction in the UK
The announcement drew strong reactions from British Jewish organisations. Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis called the sanctions "truly a dark day for British Jews," warning they could embolden extremism rather than counter it. The Board of Deputies of British Jews expressed "a deep sense of anguish" over the deterioration in relations, while the Jewish Leadership Council accused the government of an "increasingly punitive and unbalanced approach" that risked amounting to a de facto boycott.
Pro-Palestinian organisations welcomed the UK's move. Shaher Saed, general secretary of the Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions, called it "an important step in the right direction," while the British Palestinian Committee described it as "a necessary and overdue step." Omar Barghouti, co-founder of the BDS movement, called the measures "largely performative and ineffective."
