Britain is set to ban goods from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank in response to an expansion programme that is imperiling efforts to establish a Palestinian state, the UK government said Tuesday.
Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband is due to give details in the House of Commons later, after saying last week that he would “reset” UK relations with Israel.
Before the announcement, Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden said that it “isn’t intended to be a boycott of all Israeli goods.”
He said that the measures were “specifically targeted at the expansion of these settlements, which are illegal under international law, in the West Bank.”
“At the heart of the statement is the idea that the UK, along with many other countries, do not want to see the possibility of a two-state solution in Israel and Palestine being erased by changes to the facts on the ground,” McFadden told Times Radio.
The government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the most ultranationalist and religious in Israel’s history. It has presided over a surge of settlement construction in the West Bank, which Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war and which would make up the main part of a future Palestinian state.
Netanyahu’s government views the West Bank as the biblical and historical homeland of the Jewish people and is opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state.
The United Kingdom, a longtime ally of Israel, recognised Palestinian statehood last year in an attempt to revive dwindling efforts to achieve a two-state solution.
The centre-left Labour Party government has previously sanctioned some Israeli settlers and illegal outposts over violence against Palestinians and illegal development in the West Bank. Tuesday’s announcement is set to expand sanctions to cover trade in goods, and possibly some services, with all West Bank settlements.
UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham has voiced concerns about the E1 settlement project approved by Israel, which would effectively cut the territory in two. Palestinians and rights groups say it could destroy hopes for a future Palestinian state.
