The United Kingdom on Tuesday announced it would pause free trade talks with Israel after Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he was horrified by the military escalation in Gaza. The UK also announced further sanctions and said it will summon the country’s ambassador. “UK freezes Israel trade deal over Gaza offensive, places sanctions on West Bank settlers,” Jerusalem Post, May 20, 2025:
The United Kingdom on Tuesday announced it would pause free trade talks with Israel after Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he was horrified by the military escalation in Gaza. The UK also announced further sanctions and said it will summon the country’s ambassador.
“While the UK government remains committed to the existing trade agreement in force, it is not possible to advance discussions on a new, upgraded Free Trade Agreement with a Netanyahu government that is pursuing egregious policies in the West Bank and Gaza,” the government said in a statement.
It would be interesting to compare the UK’s weapons sales to Israel with Israel’s weapons sales to the UK. Most of the handful of British weapons now supplied to Israel can be easily replaced with weapons from Israel’s two major suppliers of arms, the United States and Germany. I am unaware of any weapons that Israel needs and that the UK alone manufactures. But on the other hand, Israel has some defensive weapons that the UK can obtain nowhere else, such as the SPIKE NLOS missiles, a fire-and-forget anti-tank guided missile and anti-personnel missile, and the Iron Dome anti-missile defense system. And then there is another weapon developed by Israeli scientists, the Iron Beam air defense system. The IDF will be the first military to widely deploy this high-energy laser weapon later this year, which analysts have described as a watershed moment in the history of military technology. Each Iron Beam intercept will cost about two dollars, compared to tens of thousands of dollars for each Iron Dome intercept. Does the UK really want to cut off its supply of Israeli weapons, and its access to the advances in weaponry that brilliant scientists in Israel keep coming up with?
Additionally, the UK will place sanctions on a number of individuals and groups in the West Bank, who it said have “supported, incited and promoted violence against Palestinian communities in the West Bank.”
Three individuals, two illegal settler outposts, and two organisations were targeted by the new sanctions, including Daniella Weiss, the former mayor of the Kedumim settlement, and her Nachala Israel Movement, a settler group promoting new Jewish outposts in the West Bank and the resettlement of Gaza, and of which Weiss is a founder.
Weiss was the subject of a recent documentary, ‘The Settlers,’ from British documentary maker Louis Theroux.
That “documentary” by Theroux could have been produced at a Palestinian studio in Ramallah. It was devoid of context, with no mention of the fact that Jewish history was made not in Haifa and Tel Aviv, but in Judea and Samaria (renamed “the West Bank” in 1950 by the Jordanians in order to efface the Jewish connection to the land). Nor did Theroux explain that Judea and Samaria were included by the League of Nations in the territory assigned to the Mandate for Palestine. Nor did Theroux have the slightest sympathy for the Israelis he interviewed, while he exuded deep sympathy for the Palestinians. He described Daniella Weiss, one of the leaders of the settler movement who has devoted her life to making it easier for Israeli Jews to live safely in Judea and Samaria, as “a psychopath.”
Under the sanctions, those listed will be subject to financial restrictions, travel bans, and director disqualifications.
In declaring war on Jews living in Judea and Samaria, the UK is trying to undo 3500 years of Jewish history, to ignore the Mandate for Palestine, and to pretend that the well-settled principle of international law, whereby a state can hold onto territory from which aggression was launched against it in the past and is likely, if it is given back, to again be the source of aggression, does not apply in the case of Israel.
Settler violence has witnessed a dramatic surge, the UK government says, citing UN data that recorded over 1800 attacks by settlers against Palestinian communities since January 2024.
“I have seen for myself the consequences of settler violence. The fear of its victims. The impunity of its perpetrators,” UK Foreign Minister David Lammy said in a statement….
Is David Lammy aware that when those “settlers” go to confront Palestinians, these confrontations invariably happen in the wake of Palestinian terror attacks in which Israelis were killed or wounded? The Israelis, though maddened with grief, limit themselves to property damage — trees uprooted, cars damaged — as their response.
“Settlers” is the scare-word applied to Israeli Jews who on their own decided — the government did not forcibly “transfer” them — to move to Judea and Samaria (a/k/a the West Bank), where Jewish history over 3500 years was made. Those territories legally belonged to Israel; they were included in the land that the League of Nations intended to be included in the Mandate for Palestine, and then in the Jewish state that would be the intended result of the Mandate. There are more than half a million of these “settlers” now living in Judea and Samaria. Does Keir Starmer expect them all to move behind the Green Line?
As for the notion that settlers are committing wanton aggression against innocent Palestinians, a closer look would reveal that almost all of the attacks by settlers are on property — Palestinian automobiles stoned in their driveways, olive trees uprooted — and are in response to Palestinian attacks on people, terrorist attacks that severely wound or kill Jews. Can David Lammy grasp the difference?
Britain violated its solemn obligations as the holder of the Mandate for Palestine from 1922 to 1948. Article 6 of the Mandate requires the Mandatary to “facilitate Jewish immigration” and to “encourage close settlement by Jews on the land, including state and waste land.” The British did not “facilitate Jewish immigration,” but did everything they could to prevent it. They did little to protect the Jews from Arab attacks. The one British officer who out of a belief in Zionism taught the Jews how to more effectively fight the Arab marauders with night raids of their own was Captain Orde Wingate. For sympathizing too much with the Jews, he was made to leave Mandatory Palestine. In 1939, when so many of the imperiled Jews of Europe were desperate to get to safety in Palestine, the British government adopted a White Paper that limited Jewish immigration to Palestine to 15,000 a year for five years, after which any Jewish immigration was subject to an Arab veto. Churchill thundered against that White Paper, but in vain. Both during, and after the war, British ships turned back all ships carrying Jewish refugees and survivors of the Nazi camps to Mandatory Palestine. Given that long history of British betrayal of the Jews of Palestine, let us at least concede that Starmer and Lammy are now part of a long, if ignoble, tradition.
Stive says
The u.k. is as guilty for the nazi Holocaust as Germany. Germany did the killing while u.k. enabled and made sure the Jews could not get to the mandated state of Israel to come. Germany repented but Britain has not. Britain deserves all evil they get and I love justice. I also wish well for all the good people trapped inside the rising Islamic caliphate they are allowing to rise,and hope they escape out of a Britain an unarmed people cannot save.
Taffy says
If Starmer gets an infection and is prescribed a 10-day course of antibiotics, I hope he quits the treatment on day 4 because taking the rest to eliminate the infection completely would be “an egregious overkill.” Hey Starmer, guess what happens then? The infection comes back with more force and fury than the original infection. See the parallel?
On another topic, Israel’s Iron Beam is a true game changer. But the press erroneously reports that each intercept costs $2-$3. That is just part of the marginal cost of operation, namely the cost of electricity—about 2.5 kilowatt-hours per intercept. But, when all costs are figured in including R&D costs, the cost of making each Iron Beam system, and the cost of maintenance, depending on how many intercepts the system has, the cost per intercept could be very expensive indeed, especially since the major rocket assaults into Israel were from Hamas and are now over, and the only country with an appreciable arsenal left is Iran.
But, the bottom line is that the Iron Beam was and still is a good idea. Coupled with Israel’s other missile defenses it creates a truly impenetrable missile defense, even against Iran’s advanced missiles. Iran’s investment in offensive drones and missiles is now for naught. And, as a bonus, there will be a long line of other countries that want to purchase this system.
Billy says
Sadly, the British women, children, and men are getting attacked, murdered and raped for their alliance with Islam’s Muslims against Non-Muslims. Allah’s Islam, a Terrorist-Criminal Enterprise, and its predatory believers continually fund, promote, and practice ideological subversion, propaganda, bigotry, discrimination, deceit, supremacy, segregation, hatred, violence, and terrorism as taught in Islamic Law and in Islam’s Quran. Muslim actions should be legally challenged with a multi-faceted force of Western Laws like Muslims wield against Americans and Westerners because Islam violates USA Laws(Quran 9:5,29, 111; 49:15; 60:4 and more).
Like a Foreign Terrorist Organization(FTO) designated by the USA Secretary of State, Islam functions as a MUSLIM TERRORIST ORGANIZATION(MTO) fighting against Non-Muslims and NOT A PEACEFUL religion under Western Law because Islam funds, teaches, and promotes Terrorist Criminal Organizations with Muslims as Terrorists for Allah(Quran 9:5,29, 111; 49:15 and more).
Under Islam and Islamic Law, Islam’s Mafia, Muslims have the Legal Right and the Quranic Duty to terrorize Non-Muslims because neglecting this QURANIC DUTY is a Crime against tyrannical Allah. Jihad means warfare against Non-Muslims to ESTABLISH ISLAM’S RELIGION(Quran 3:151; 9:5, 29, 111; Muslim Law Manual: “Reliance of the Traveller”, o9.0 and more).
More specifically, Islam, a terroristic-totalitarian way of life, is a Muslim Terrorist Ideology and Murderous, Criminal Enterprise of intolerance, continuous war, discrimination, segregation, supremacy, genocide, polygamy, propaganda, deceit, hatred, incitement, sedition, rape, terrorism, and violence against all Non-Muslims as taught in the Quran(Quran 2:208,216; 4:65, 89,95, 115; 5:14,64; 8:12,39,60, 74; 9:5,21,29,36, 41,49, 73,88, 111,123; 21:92; 49:15; 60:4; 61:9-11; 89:14 and more).
Gunter Deleyn says
Hi, I think I have two or three interesting ideas to comment about. The press do call the actions by the IDF in Gaza a genocide. According Palestinian sources something between 50.000 and 55.000. If the IDF is doing a genocide, they do it poorly. Hamas killed 1200 on one day (not counting the dead refugees). If the IDF followed the example by Hamas, after one and a half years the count would be about 700.000. That would be a real genocide. Moreover the IDF could do this without losing one IDF soldier. Only artillery and bombing. Not by invading. Secondly death by natural causes. In Europe it is about 10 per year per 1.000. £For 2.200.000 Gazans this would mean 22.000 per year, or about 33.000 (theoretically) since 7 oktober. This should bring some perspective to the number of 55.000. Also are those (theoretically) 33.000 counted separately or are they just part of the number 55.000? I wonder if the Hamas Ministry of Health cared. Thirdly now the Hamas ministry of health (propaganda would be a better name) claims two thirds of the victims are women and children. A guy of 15, 16 or 17 with a Kalashnikov, a grenade or a knife, is that also an innocent victim? And why do they never count the fallen Hams warriors ? Are those too innocent victims?
dumbledoresarmy says
The direct genetic and cultural forebears of today’s Israeli Jews were living in Judaea and Samaria long, long, LONG before ever any Angles and Saxons, Danes and Normans came to what is now called ‘England’! So it makes my brain cramp when an English prime minister brands Jews living in Judaea and Samaria, as ‘settlers’….
This man wants the Mountains of Israel to be cleansed of Jooooz, does he? He wants to tie the hated Jooooz hand and foot and hand them over to the Muslim Arabs to be slaughtered???? Somebody look and see whether Mein Kampf is on his bedside table…
dumbledoresarmy says
Theroux’s nasty propaganda piece, together with an equally vicious propaganda piece ‘No Other Land’, which is all the worse for being made by a Useful-Idiot self-hating Jew and appropriating a beloved Israeli folk song, was being shown in an Australian Anglican church, just this month…. and all the virtue-signalling ‘progressive’ Christians will gobble it up….
gravenimage says
+1
skeptiker says
Darf man Starmer einen Faschisten nennen?
jerry glenn says
UK surges in the European Islamopandering derby.
Everard says
This is, and has been so for along time. I would like to say that the “sheeple” are wakening up but l feel maybe to late. They have been embedding themselves into the British infrastructure for many a year. That and the British politians pandering to them in order get their votes has, l fear, made it an impossible task to stop the onslaught. I, however, remain optimistic as l always believe that without hope you have nothing.
Regards to yourself.
gravenimage says
UK’s Starmer Puts Sanctions On Israel
…………………………………
He’s a moral idiot–does he have any problem with Hamas?