Over 800 British judges, lawyers call for UK to sanction Israel over Gaza
A group of more than 800 senior lawyers, former judges, and academics have demanded that the UK government impose sanctions on the Israeli regime and push for its suspension from the United Nations.
The appeal came in a letter to UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Tuesday.
Israeli ministers and senior military officials must be immediately placed under sanctions, the signatories said, accusing them of inciting genocide and sponsoring illegal settlement-building.
They accuse Israel of carrying out war crimes, crimes against humanity and serious violations of international humanitarian law against Palestinians.
They added that this would encourage the Tel Aviv regime to meet its “fundamental international legal obligations.”
The letter warned that there is mounting evidence in Gaza of genocide. It cited recent comments by Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s far-right minister, who said the regime military would “wipe out” the presence of Palestinian life in Gaza.
Starmer must act without delay and take “urgent and decisive action … to avert the destruction of the Palestinian people of Gaza,” they said.
“All states, including the UK, are legally obliged to take all reasonable steps within their power to prevent and punish genocide; to ensure respect for international humanitarian law; and to bring to an end violations of (the right to self-determination),” the letter said.
“The UK’s actions to date have failed to meet those standards … The international community’s failure to uphold international law in relation to the Occupied Palestinian Territory contributes to a deteriorating international climate of lawlessness and impunity and imperils the international legal.
A significant number of MPs from both the ruling Labour Party and the opposition Conservative Party have said the UK’s recent actions do not go far enough.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy recently suspended negotiations over a new free trade agreement with Israel.
But he must place further pressure by reviewing existing trade links, imposing sanctions, and suspending the 2030 strategy for building closer UK-Israel ties, the letter said.
Israel has also carried out “an unparalleled assault on the UN,” the letter said, highlighting its banning of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees and repeated “attacks on UN premises, property and personnel.”
The Israeli strategy points to a “broader challenge to the UN charter system itself,” it added.
The letter was signed by figures including former Supreme Court justices Lord Sumption and Lord Wilson, Court of Appeal judges, and more than 70 king’s counsels.
“Everyone must be free from persecution, from displacement and ethnic cleansing, from the devastation and death deliberately inflicted on them in their homes, schools and hospitals, in their farms and villages. No one should ever be a refugee in their own land,” said signatory Guy Goodwin-Gill, emeritus fellow of All Souls College at the University of Oxford.
The letter to Starmer adds further pressure on him to take action against Israel amid mounting international anger over Gaza.
In recent months, nationwide protests and student encampments have been regularly held at UK universities in protest against the genocide in Gaza.
In the most recent demonstrations on May 24, several anti-war and anti-Zionist organizations called on peace activists to gather in front of the Prime Minister’s Office to protest the continued shipment of bombs and weapons to Israel.
Just last week, the British government was defending its supply of F-35 parts to Israel by claiming it had to maintain its relationship with the United States.
