The motion passed. Watch above to listen to the whole debate – video above.
Three of our executive committee (our Chair, Cllr Anne-Marie Simpson, our former Chair, Cllr Clare Cape, and Dr Imad Ahmed, Parliamentary Spokesperson for Bradford West) spoke on the motion and overall supported it, but with criticism. Below, we publish those speeches, as well as the prepared speech by our executive member Miranda Pinch. Tomorrow, we will update this page with the addition of the speech of Dr Ruvi Ziegler, Associate Professor of Law at the University of Reading.
LDFP Chair, Cllr Anne-Marie Simpson
Hello conference, I am going to ask you to look past the numbers written down, the 40,000 plus Palestinians killed, the 1100 plus killed in the 7 October attacks, the 100 plus hostages and see a person YOU know.
For some of you, this is painfully real. I am sorry.
Think of your son, your daughter, your mother your father, your sister your brother. Your grandmother, grandfather, cousin, your aunt, your uncle. Your friend, your neighbour, your work colleagues, your school mates. Gone, suddenly, traumatically, brutally, tearing your heart, mind and soul apart.
The apocalyptic scenes coming out every day from Gaza, the escalating violent images and destruction from the illegally occupied West Bank, the hostage families demonstrating on the streets of Israel can leave us in no doubt that we need an immediate bilateral ceasefire – we needed it over 11 months ago.
For Gaza this cannot come soon enough, with over 2million people displaced and zero safe zones.
Nobody who heard it can forget the frightened, young voice of 6 year old Hind Rijab, trapped in car with her dead relatives, pleading to be rescued in an over 3 hour phone call to the Red Crescent, before she too was killed.
The Liberal Democrat Party should call on Israel to lift the ban on foreign journalists accessing the Gaza strip. Until the media has access, it should be assumed that Israel has acts it wishes to hide, which means the conduct of genocide is all the more plausible.
The role of Iran in destabilising the region is noted. We should also call out Netanyahu for actively working to prevent peace and for his government’s role in destabilising the region.
If Netanyahu abandoned his belief that Jerusalem is exclusively the eternal and indivisible capital of Israel and that Judea and Samaria are part of Israel, and instead recognised the Palestinian people, and their inalienable right to self-determination, the world would come together to construct the two state solution, based on the rights of each party under international law. Iran would then find itself completely isolated.
The Israeli governments words and deeds have led to a marked increase in Settler violence against palestinians which goes unchecked by the IDF, so I welcome the call on government to uphold international law and international courts, ban trade with illegal Israeli settlements, and bring sanctions against anyone in the settler movement that uses or incites violence.
The motion calls on government to end the use of arbitrary administrative detention of Palestinians by the IDF, where prisoners are held without charge or trial, however it fails to mention the systematic torture of Palestinian prisoners, particularly under this policy, including sexual violence and rape.
Israeli politicians have explicitly defended and justified this.
This goes well beyond anything we would consider to be ‘legitimate political differences’, and is not something we can or should tolerate from a state we call a friend and ally. These human rights violations have been well documented by NGOs and most recently in Israeli human rights organisation, B’tselem’s report, “Welcome to Hell”.
It is right to call for the immediate recognition of the State of Palestine and press for a two state solution. We have long understood, as the International Court of Justice has confirmed, that the occupation of the Palestinian Territories is illegal, not just immoral. Israeli and Palestinians alike deserve peace, equality and justice – including an end to the occupation. It is time for the Palestinian people to be recognised and treated as equal human beings and not just numbers.
Please support this motion. Thank you, conference.
LDFP Treasurer, Cllr Clare Cape
Thank you to Layla Moran and the team for putting together this important and timely motion; for your powerful opening remarks; and those of the other speakers we’ve already heard.
I am speaking against the motion on the basis that it is weak and it does not go far enough in recognising the injustices being experienced by Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank. These have been widely described as genocidal war crimes carried out by the ultra right wing Israeli government, the IDF and violent settlers in the illegally occupied West Bank.
The Lib Dems have an opportunity, which we must take now, to address the findings of Janice Turner’s review of the Alderdice report 6 years on. This includes: “The lack of sufficient engagement with ethnic minority communities, particularly at a time when many who felt betrayed by Labour policies on Gaza would have welcomed Lib Dem policy, resulted in the votes moving away from Labour mostly transferring to other parties.”
My view is that the motion is not strong enough on international law as it applies to Israel; and the International Court of Justice’s findings.
And specifically my criticisms are that:
Line 9 omits to mention the huge number of Palestinian prisoners.
Line 40 omits the need for immediate recognition of Palestine as a pre-requisite for a two state solution.
Line 56 should include the need for functioning healthcare in Gaza. Hospitals are virtually unable to function.
Line 94 would benefit from commenting on the need for democratic leadership in the Israeli government.
Having made these criticisms of the motion, I will on reflection support it on the basis that what is there does need to be endorsed by the party.
LDFP Executive Member, Miranda Pinch
In 2014, Israeli shelling destroyed the family home of Moataz in East Gaza. They moved to Khan Younis, where he married and had a family. With his pregnant wife and two small children, they fled to Rafah when Israel invaded, and for a while they sheltered in a UN school, but were forced to flee again. During that time, the IDF took all their possessions, for no apparent reason.
With help, they bought a tent and stayed on the beach in Khan Younis until that too was destroyed. Again with help, they bought another tent where they lived with his wife’s family. They have now left that tent and are living among the rubble because it was flimsy and it is cold at night. The young children have scabies and no medication. Moataz says, “We are alive. But I do not know if we are really alive, or if we are human or deserve to live with all that is happening to us, from hunger, thirst, cold, killing and bombs. We are not well. Our health is deteriorating every day and we feel hungry and thirsty. I do not sleep because of the terror that we always live with. My little girls scream from the sound of the bombs and have terrifying nightmares. My oldest child wets herself from the fear and terror that we live in. Winter is coming and we do not have blankets, mattresses or warm clothes. We have no power or shelter to protect us from the coming winter. This is all beyond my control. I cannot do anything. I now care for 15 people with my divorced sister and her children. Every day I cry over the suffering of my children. We need help urgently.”
Moataz’s younger brother Amro has become like a surrogate grandchild to me and we correspond daily as I try to give him some love, hope and comfort and try to be there for him. These are human beings like you and me and like the Israelis. Yet these people are not treated like human beings, but like political pawns and cannon fodder. It is domicide, ecocide, educide as well as genocide.
This is not about the self-defence of one people against another. This is not about Iran. Both Hezbollah and Hamas were created because of Israeli belligerence. Whatever Hamas has become, however vile, they are a product of the occupation, the blockade, the ethnic cleansing and the hopelessness that is the lot of the Palestinians.
I support the motion, but believe that the most dangerous state actors are Israel and the USA, both of whom have the ultimate responsibility for this terrible suffering and dreadful destruction.
LDFP Executive Member, Dr Imad Ahmed, Parliamentary Spokesperson for Bradford West
While LDFP and Bradford West broadly support this motion, we note that it has several key weaknesses.
This motion omits mention of
- Israeli torture of prisoners,
- The destabilising role the USA plays
- The need to allow the international media to return to Gaza
It also calls for engagement with Yesh Atid which, although is an observer member of Liberal International, evidently does not share our liberal values.
1. Omission of Torture Against Palestinian Prisoners
The motion omits the systematic torture of some 1200 Palestinian prisoners. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have highlighted this, particularly under the policy of administrative detention, where prisoners are held without charge or trial. The omission reflects a lack of balance and misses a significant part of the broader human rights violations Palestinians face under occupation.
2. Inclusion of Iran
If we are going to mention Iran’s support of arms to Hamas, we really have to also mention the USA’s unconditional support to Israel, and the destabilisation this causes in the region.
3. Engagement with Yesh Atid
Yesh Atid has supported military actions in Gaza.
Their leader Yair Lapid presided over the deadliest escalation in violence since 2006 in the West Bank during his 6 month prime ministership in 2022.
While we may consider engaging Yesh Atid, we should also be questioning their observer membership of Liberal International. They do not share our liberal values.
4. Israel must allow international media to come to Gaza
Any country which bans war correspondents has crimes to hide.
The party must call for the ban to end.
These are the weaknesses. But we do support another resolution that calls for the immediate and unconditional recognition of Palestine, upholds international law, and an end to arms exports to Israel.