British consulate in East Jerusalem will stay open as UK mission, says Ed Miliband

He said Britain would ⁠not take any reciprocal action ​against Israel ​while the ​two sides engaged in ​talks, in effect suspending discussions until a new Israeli government is formed.

UK sources said Sa’ar had threatened to close the whole consulate, and that it was better for Britain to retain its reduced presence in the hope it could be restored and rebuilt, regardless of the imminent election outcome.

The sources emphasised that the right to take reciprocal action remained, and the UK did not accept that Israel had the legal right to close the consulate, which has stood for 200 years and is in East Jerusalem on territory that Britain and international courts recognise as occupied territory. It was thought not feasible to defy Israel since the UK diplomats would have no security protection.

Miliband said the UK mission would be independent, operational and still able to provide vital services to the Palestinian people. The value of that assertion will be tested by the small number of diplomats remaining and their reduced diplomatic status. The UK national security adviser, Jonathan Powell, travelled to Israel last week to negotiate a version of the deal.

Vincent Fean, the UK consul general to Palestine between 2010 and 2014, said: “The term mission is a generic diplomatic term and does not of itself have any meaning … In terms of numbers, losing 20 staff is a big drop but it’s a better outcome than nothing. It leaves a space, a place and team to build up whatever the outcome of the Israeli election.”

Diplomats from other western countries had been worried about any closure setting a precedent, and suggested Britain had to respond strongly to the Israeli move because it had implications beyond the immediate dispute.

The ‌incident has highlighted growing frustration among Israel’s longtime allies over its settlements in the occupied West Bank, viewed by much of the world as illegal under international law. In his statement last month to the UK parliament, Miliband said settler terrorists, supported by Netanyahu’s government, were committing ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. Israel disputes this.

The UK Foreign Office was advised informally by the former attorney general Dominic Grieve that Israel would be acting unlawfully if it closed the consulate on the basis it was sited in East Jerusalem, which is recognised by the UN and most of its members as being occupied Palestinian territory.

Israel has also said it will revoke the credentials of Dutch diplomats from the country’s mission to Palestine in response to the Netherlands’ ban on imports from illegal Israeli settlements. France and Canada, which joined the UK in the settlement trade ban, have not had action taken against them.

UK-Israeli relations have deteriorated steadily during the war in Gaza, prompted by Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel, as Britain has become increasingly critical of the way in which Netanyahu seems prepared to tolerate the deaths of thousands of Palestinians in an effort to render Hamas inoperative, a task successive Westminster governments have thought is unachievable through his methods.

The UK has rescinded a large number of arms export licences to Israel, and Miliband has spoken of evidence of war crimes in Gaza. He has declined to accuse Israel of genocide on the grounds he believed this a matter for international courts to determine.

Kaynak: The Guardian · Özgün metin İngilizcedir.