Israeli government ‘not gaining friends, losing allies all over’: Top UK diplomat

The British foreign secretary said the Israeli government is losing friends and allies because of its actions in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, which he said have mobilized people around the world, Anadolu reports.

The “Israeli government is losing friends. It’s not gaining allies; it’s lost allies. It’s losing allies all over,” Ed Miliband said Tuesday in an interview with UK-based podcast The Rest is Politics.

He noted that the recent sanctions announcement targeting illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank came after warnings that the two-state solution is being “destroyed by the facts on the ground.”

“All measures were to make a difference to that, the sanctions regime targeting the illegal occupation, not targeting or delegitimizing in any way the state of Israel,” he said.

“The status quo is not working,” noted Miliband, adding that Israel’s E1 settlement expansion project had long been seen as a “red line” for the international community “because it basically would split off East Jerusalem from West Bank (which) really makes Palestinian state unviable.”

He noted that the combination of the International Court of Justice’s 2024 ruling that Israel end its occupation, dismantle settlements and pay reparations; the length of the occupation of Palestinian territories; and the displacement of many Palestinians led the government to take that step.

“We can’t give up” in the face of “settler terrorism,” said Miliband, adding that he believes there is no stable Middle East without a two-state solution between Palestinians and Israelis.

READ: Over 55,000 urge new UK premier to hold Israel accountable over Gaza genocide

‘Nothing can justify what has unfolded in Gaza’

“We have got to put a stop to settler terrorism, genuine terrorism, I used the term, ethnic cleansing by the settler terrorists, that’s what is happening,” he said.

Miliband said before his sanctions announcement he thought what would his mother say, who died in May.

“She would say, ‘Look at what is happening to Palestinians! Look at what is happening to these poor people; it’s wrong,” said the foreign secretary.

Miliband said he recently met a group of people, including a doctor who worked in Gaza, and said it is “absolutely unspeakable” and “appalling” what they were saying.

He also said Israel’s blocking of humanitarian aid entry into Gaza “seems like an absolutely deliberate strategy.”

“The situation on the ground is terrible,” he said. “Nothing can justify what has unfolded in Gaza.”

“Since the so-called ceasefire, 1,200 Palestinians have been killed. That’s not much of a ceasefire,” he said.

Miliband underlined that the UK can not give up in the face of “settler terrorism.”

“We don’t know what’s going to happen in Israeli elections on Oct. 27, but we are trying to send a very clear message to the Israeli people to say, ‘look, the international community is not going to stand by as this occupation proceeds,'” he added.

Miliband announced a series of measures last week, including a ban on imports from illegal Israeli settlements, sanctions on companies and individuals facilitating settlement expansion, and additional sanctions on extremist Israeli occupiers accused of supporting or inciting violence against Palestinians.

READ: UK sanctions on Israeli settlements to cover East Jerusalem, Syria’s Golan Heights: Report