Israel arms embargo

[CAAT logo with young woman speaking truth to arms dealers via a megaphone.
Go her!] [1]

STATEMENT: ISRAEL ARMS EMBARGO URGENTLY NEEDED TO HALT SPIRALLING
ESCALATION IN MIDDLE EAST

Following a year of impunity for genocide in Gaza, Israel’s devastating
bombardment and ground invasion of Lebanon and the Iranian missile attack
on Israel, is the escalation that was foreseen and warned of. 

The West’s failure to hold Israel to account for its crimes, and failure
to stop the vast supply of weapons, has been the fuel to a fire which has
engulfed the region. 

We call for an immediate global two-way embargo on arms transfers to
Israel. We call on all countries involved in producing F-35 fighter jets,
including the UK and US, to halt the transfer of these jets and components
to Israel. 

UK political leaders, from both Labour and Conservative governments, have
engaged in an indescribable level of recklessness and self-interest in
their approach to this conflict. Neither party could bring themselves to
call for a ceasefire for months, despite the immediate catastrophic loss of
life in Gaza. 

Western leaders actively spread the delusion that Israel’s unprecedented
bombardment and destruction of Gaza would bring ‘peace’. The reality of
the last year has been a daily streamed nightmare: genocide; crimes against
humanity; torture; starvation. 

Israel’s occupation and apartheid of Palestine are purposefully written
out of the narrative, for example when former Foreign Secretary David
Cameron [2] couldn’t bring himself to admit that even the UK
government’s own position is that Israel is occupying Gaza (Q601). 

Israeli attacks on Lebanon have already killed more than 1,000 people [3],
and displaced 1.2 million, around a fifth of the total population. The
explosion of thousands of pagers and electronic devices across Lebanon in
September killed twelve people and injured thousands. This was an
inherently indiscriminate and terrorising attack, which violated the
international humanitarian law prohibition on booby-trapping everyday
objects [4]. 

Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s statement [5] this week showed once again
that our government affords Israel irrational exceptionalism, whereby it is
deemed to be the only state in this conflict possessing the right to
self-defence. As Starmer stated “Britain stands full square against such
violence” when it is committed by Iran or Hezbollah, but the bombing to
death of 40,000 Palestinians in Gaza or the invasion of Lebanon by Israel
will apparently never be worth condemning. 

Calls for ceasefire and diplomacy in Gaza and in Lebanon by western
leaders, including the UK government, are meaningless if not backed by
consequences. The UK could play a real and significant role by going beyond
partial suspension to a full arms embargo, including halting all F-35
components, and pressuring the US and other partners into following suit. 

Our hope for a just and peaceful future rests with our communities in the
UK and across the world who have held our governments to account, refused
to accept the logic of genocide and elimination, and who continue to fight
with love and solidarity for a Free Palestine, Free Lebanon.

 

Campaign Against Arms Trade

Unit 1.9, The Green House,
244 - 254 Cambridge Heath Road,
London
E2 9DA

Tel: 020 7281 0297

Web: www.caat.org.uk [6]

Email: [email protected]

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