Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey will tomorrow table a motion in Parliament in an attempt to force the Government to publish legal advice it has received on potential breaches of international law in the Israel-Gaza conflict.
If successful, the motion, referred to as a Humble Address, was last successfully used in 2018.
On that occasion, the Conservative Government was forced to publish legal advice it had received from Attorney General Geoffrey Cox on Theresa May’s Brexit deal. It was Keir Starmer himself who tabled the successful motion.
The motion, which refers to the situation in the Middle East as an “ongoing humanitarian catastrophe” is part of a wider move by Ed Davey to attempt to increase pressure on the Government to take a harder line against Israel on the Gaza conflict. Last week Ed Davey announced he’d be boycotting Donald Trump’s state banquet later this month.
Earlier this month the UN declared that the situation in Gaza constitutes a famine. Following the news, the UK’s permanent representative to the UN, Barbara Woodward, referred to the situation as “entirely man-made” and “a moral outrage”.
Lib Dem leader Ed Davey said: “The humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is unconscionable. Hamas has clearly committed war crimes and still holds hostages in brutal captivity, and Palestinians’ lives have been devastated by the ever-expanding Israeli military campaign.
“Ministers cannot turn a blind eye to the destruction being levelled on Gaza. They must wake up to the scale of the devastation, do everything in their power to return the hostages from Hamas’s grasp, and apply the strongest possible pressure on Netanyahu to end his military operations and restore comprehensive aid access to Palestinians.
“It’s high time the Government comes clean on the legal advice it has received on whether international law has been breached in the region – and finally commits to ending all arms exports to Israel.”
The Foreign Office was contacted for comment.
