Shockat Adam MP: speeches

Speeches

• 30 Jun 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T2. In response to my written parliamentary question, the Minister for the Armed Forces said that the Ministry of Defence assesses support to foreign forces on “a case-by-case basis. UK training courses promote British values, including human rights…and…international humanitarian law.”How does that response square with our continued support of Israel’s war crimes in Gaza? Will dual nationals serving in the Israel Defence Forces be held accountable?

• 24 Jun 2025 · War Memorials · Hansard source

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  It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairship for the first time, Mr Stuart. I thank the hon. Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) for securing the debate. Like everybody else, I will speak about the importance of war memorials, not just as statues but as living symbols of remembrance that link our past to our present and help us shape the future that we want to build together in this country. Each war memorial—a cenotaph, a plaque or something practical such as a hospital wing or a bus shelter—is unique. These monuments build cohesion and serve as a method of remembrance for local communities. Sometimes the names etched on memorials are the only place where those individuals are remembered, so it is vital that we preserve them. Through them, we honour the sacrifices and courage and—a vital point in this divided and polarised world—our shared history.

• 24 Jun 2025 · War Memorials · Hansard source

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  I agree: that local link with the community connects the past and the future. As we remember, we must also reflect. It is painful to acknowledge that the stories that we tell through our war memorials have been incomplete for far too long. Animals that were sacrificed in the war efforts were rightly honoured with a national memorial in Hyde park in 2004, yet black and Asian soldiers who fought, bled and died for Britain have only recently begun to receive dedicated recognition. That is a shame that we as a nation must not shy away from. More than 1.3 million soldiers from British India, including 400,000 Muslims and 100,000 Sikhs, served with dignity and honour in world war one. More than 53,000 lost their lives, and at least 2.5 million Muslim soldiers and labourers from across the globe supported the allied war effort. In fact, more than 9,000 soldiers from Palestine fought for Britain in world war two, and yet their stories remain largely erased from our national consciousness. As recently as 2021, a report from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission concluded that hundreds of thousands of predominantly black and Asian service personnel were not formally commemorated like their white comrades—a legacy underpinned by systemic racism at the time. Who we remember and how we remember them matters, especially in these times of amplified fault lines. War memorials are not just stones and bronzes, but teaching tools. They are historical touchstones that allow young people to understand the past and the diverse sacrifices that were made in building this country and defending its freedoms. Excluding the contribution of black and Asian soldiers distorts our understanding of our shared history. I am proud that in my city of Leicester, we now have a statue commemorating Sikh soldiers. It was unveiled in 2022, making it a long-overdue tribute to a community that made up more than 20% of the British Indian Army during world war one. I also welcome the plans to erect a national Muslim war memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum. That monument will finally give permanent recognition to the service and sacrifices of Muslim soldiers who fought for this country. There is still much more to do. War memorials must do more than help us remember. They must tell the truth fully and fairly, and help us understand that British history was not built by one group alone but by people from every corner of the world. Memorials are and must always be more than stone and metal; they are symbols of our history and, when reflected accurately, our unity.

• 23 Jun 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  The most in-depth study ever conducted of the casualties of the so-called war on terror was carried out by Brown University in America, which found that, directly or indirectly, more than 4.5 million people lost their lives partly because of what was voted for in this House. Does the Foreign Secretary agree that the only way in which this conflict can be resolved is through diplomacy, and can he assure the House that he will not follow the last Labour Government and the mantra of the former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair when it comes to America’s bombing a middle eastern country—“with you, whatever” —and lead this country and the world into the abyss?

• 16 Jun 2025 · Iran-Israel Conflict · Hansard source

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  Last week, this House was united in supporting the long-overdue recognition of a Palestinian state, and we urged the Minister to advocate for that at the United Nations conference in Saudi. That has now gone up in smoke. We believed that the US-Iran nuclear peace negotiations were coming close to fruition, so does the Minister share my concern that Netanyahu’s Government may be seeking to create further instability in the region, to block progression for peace and the recognition of the Palestinian state, and to distract from the genocide in Gaza?

• 10 Jun 2025 · Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories · Hansard source

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  Ben-Gvir is so extreme that the Israeli Government themselves banned him from joining the army, and that was three decades ago. So if the Minister will please excuse me, I am not going to extend a warm welcome to this announcement. The fact is that this is a matter of trust. The Government tell us they are going to cease arms sales to Israel, yet F-35 fighter jet parts get to Israel, massacring young children. The Government tell us they are appalled by the actions of the Israeli Government, yet Government Ministers find themselves partying with the Israeli ambassador and Holocaust trivialisers. The Government tell us that they are ceasing trade deals with Israel, yet the very next week a trade envoy is sent to Israel to drum up business. Who are the Government trying to fool?

• 10 Jun 2025 · USAID Funding Pause · Hansard source

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  It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Hobhouse. I thank my the hon. Member for Melksham and Devizes (Brian Mathew)—who cut his teeth in the continent and the country in which I was born, Malawi—for securing this important debate. We are seeing the dismantling of the world order that we created. I sincerely believe that we stand at a crossroads of not just policy, but principle. The United Kingdom has long prided itself on punching above its weight, not just militarily, but with moral leadership. Having said that, to address the point made by the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (David Taylor), it was Tony Blair—the “hard left”—who said that Putin should have a seat at the table and gave him a pair of silver 10 Downing Street cufflinks. With our moral leadership, through decades of smart and targeted overseas aid, we have saved lives and shaped the world in our image—an image that is just, resilient and humane. The decision that we have made to cut overseas aid by £6 billion is lowering our commitment, such that overseas aid will be at its lowest level in 25 years. That not only betrays the world’s most vulnerable people; it betrays us. It betrays who we are and what we stand for. Let us be clear: aid is not just about generosity. We all know that. It is also about foresight. I am an optometrist, and this decision is extremely myopic. Aid is about security for us in the long term. It is about stability and recognising that the surest way to keep disease, conflict and extremism from reaching our shores is to invest in preventing them, rather than reacting in panic when they emerge. In my opinion, cutting aid while increasing defence spending is putting the cart before the horse. How can we talk about protecting our nation while we tear down the very programmes that prevent wars, contain pandemics—have we already forgotten covid?—and stabilise fragile regions? These aid cuts are not just numbers on a spreadsheet; they are unprotected lives, including children who are unprotected because they are unvaccinated, whose futures will be erased. For example, over the past four years our support for Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance has helped to immunise 1 billion children. Now that we are reducing the funds for aid, we risk reversing decades of progress. Measles, polio, typhoid—these are not diseases of the past. They are clawing their way back and our retreat invites them in. We have seen what our aid can do. In just two years, the Reach Initiative helped to boost immunisation rates in conflict zones from 16% to 96%, reaching more than 9 million children. Are we now to abandon those children in the name of “sharpening focus”? The UK’s aid has helped to provide antiretroviral therapy to 23 million people, distributed 133 million malaria nets and, as mentioned by the hon. Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald), educated more than 1 million girls in the world’s hardest places. Are we about to cut this system to meet a political target or to mimic a short-sighted policy from across the Atlantic? Aid fosters growth over time. Since 1960, the International Development Association has helped 36 countries through loans and grants; 19 of them have seen economic development to such a degree that they are now giving money to the IDA rather than receiving it. Let us not kid ourselves. This aid cut is not about leadership; to me, it looks like retreat. While following the USA in gutting aid programmes might seem politically expedient, it is morally bankrupt and strategically reckless. This policy will stoke the very fires that we seek to extinguish—displacement, disease and extremism—and send their embers across the globe. And what of our standing on the world stage? Are we prepared to go from aid superpower to spectator, and to shrug while global poverty, education and health collapse under the weight of our absence? While we pull back, authoritarian regimes are—as we speak—filling the void with their influence, their ideologies and their terms. I believe that we should increase our investment in global health security, not scale it back. Our aid was not charity, in a world still reeling from covid and now facing new disease outbreaks; it was, in fact, an insurance policy against global collapse. Now is not a time for retreat; it is a time for us to lead, with compassion, clarity and courage. We must not allow short-term politics to cause long-term catastrophe. We must restore our commitment to giving 0.7% of GNI, reassert our leadership in education in particular, global health and crisis response, and protect not just lives overseas, but the future of our nation and the values that we claim to defend. We are not just donors; we are architects of a safer and more stable world. Let us not dismantle what we have built.

• 4 Jun 2025 · Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories · Hansard source

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  Ward Jalal is a six-year-old Palestinian girl who, last week, crawled out of a burning school, leaving behind her mother and two siblings, who burned to death. I mention Ward because she is Palestinian. Last month, there was Al-Haq’s case against the Government. By September 2024, 40,000 innocent Palestinian men, women and children, like Ward and her family, were killed. The Government reviewed 413 cases and found one possible breach of international law, which was the killing of volunteers at the World Central Kitchen. Do the Government have any regard for children like Ward and the Palestinian people?

• 2 Jun 2025 · Arms and Military Cargo Export Controls: Israel · Hansard source

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  In the week before last, the Foreign Secretary said that we were suspending arms negotiations with the Israeli Government, yet just last week, we had a trade envoy—Lord Austin—visiting Israel and saying how wonderful it was to be there. Can the Minister please explain how those two matters do not contradict each other?

• 20 May 2025 · Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories · Hansard source

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  I, too, cautiously welcome the Foreign Secretary’s passion and his statement, although they come a little late for 51,000 Palestinians. He has talked of the suspension of negotiations on new trade deals; would not a suspension of existing trade deals be more effective? If the Foreign Secretary does indeed believe that the behaviour of the Israeli Government is abominable, may I ask why a Minister partied with the Israelis just last week, while 370 Gazans were massacred and the world was mourning for them? Does that not undermine trust in the UK’s role in this conflict?

• 14 May 2025 · Gaza: UK Assessment · Hansard source

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  Three weeks ago, while I was in the west bank, I spoke to a young Palestinian refugee mother who asked me, with tears in her eyes, “Why has the world forgotten us?” My response then has been echoed today: the world has not forgotten them, but what we have done is fail them completely. The failure looks like this: the United Nations has now confirmed that since March, more than 100 children every single day have been killed or injured. Imagine if it was our children. If, God forbid, 100 European children or 100 Israeli children were being killed every single day, would we be supplying even a penknife to the perpetrators of the crime—yes or no?

• 13 May 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T7. The right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) raised a point of order yesterday following the Department’s failure to respond to a letter from a number of hon. Members asking the Secretary of State to come to the House to make a statement on alarming research that shows that the UK continues to send large-scale exports of lethal weaponry to Israel. May I beseech the Secretary of State to make a statement to the House on this matter? If he is not willing to do so, can he confirm that all statements that he has made in this House since September 2024 relating to arms exports to Israel have been completely accurate and fully transparent?

• 7 May 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q8. This week, the Israeli Government approved a plan to officially conquer Gaza. Just yesterday, Minister Smotrich vowed that Gaza will be “entirely destroyed” and that the Palestinians will have to “leave in great numbers to third countries.” This follows the extermination of over 50,000 Palestinian men, women and children, and the simultaneous expansion of illegal settlements in the west bank—something I witnessed with my own eyes last week. Will the Prime Minister now finally acknowledge that ethnic cleansing is under way and end all UK military co-operation with Israel, especially the illegal provision of F-35 fighter jet parts, or will he risk making Britain complicit in war crimes and be the Prime Minister to see Britain answer at The Hague for its role in this atrocity?

• 24 Apr 2025 · London Sudan Conference · Hansard source

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  I thank the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) for securing the urgent question. Despite the barbarity of Sudan, it seems to be the forgotten conflict. What steps are being taken to investigate and prevent the transfer of arms to Sudan via third countries who may have been present at the conference over the weekend and are allies of the UK?

• 2 Apr 2025 · Gaza: Israeli Military Operations · Hansard source

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  Another day, another statement, another day of predictable and depressing answers. Nothing is more predictable and depressing than the statement, “We are doing everything we can.” Are we really doing everything we can when we do not call out genocide and ethnic cleansing as we see it happening in real time? Are we doing everything we can when we have not imposed bilateral economic sanctions? Are we doing everything we can when we have not even called in the ambassador to express our concerns? If we are indeed doing everything we can, why have the Government just sold £9 million-worth of technology for Israeli submarines that are being built to house nuclear weapons?

• 20 Mar 2025 · Conflict in Gaza · Hansard source

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  Along with a billion Muslims around the world, I began my fast on Tuesday morning, having taken some food and water, with the screams of 400 innocent men, women and children ringing in my ears, as they were burned alive in their makeshift tents. I object to the resumption of the conflict and the cessation of the peace deal. The Israelis have continued to kill hundreds of people, including freezing babies, and to proceed with the Gazafication of the west bank through the removal of 40,000 people. The Minister will be aware of the peace deal that was available in May 2024. According to President Biden, the hostages are not a priority for the Israelis—a sentiment that was echoed just the other day by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which accused Mr Netanyahu of “complete deception”, and said that “the Israeli Government has chosen to abandon the hostages.” The fact is that the Foreign Secretary is aware of all this, as we continue to provide Israel with military support and the use of our air base in Cyprus, and to give it moral, economic and political support. I hope that he takes my sincere question as it is meant. He has spoken passionately about his heritage and his ancestors, who were shackled in the chains of slavery. To unshackle his own chains, will he immediately cease all arms licences? Despite the £6.1 billion-worth of economic ties between Israel and the UK, will he impose economic sanctions, and put in place a viable process for recognising the state of Palestine?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered the matter of military collaboration with Israel. It is a real honour to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. My speech for today’s important debate was written and completed yesterday. My arguments were factually and systematically constructed, and at the core of my speech was essentially the pursuit of truth, with very little emotional rhetoric. I woke up this morning just before dawn, like millions of other Muslims around the world, to begin fasting for another day with some food and water, when news broke of yet another violation of yet another peace deal, as Israelis rained down bombs on makeshift shelters, slaughtering men, women and children. Perhaps like me, those men, women and children were preparing for their day of fasting, but now they will never see another sunset. The question is this: have we provided those lethal bombs, or the parts for the aircraft that are dropping them, and has our intelligence sharing led to the slaughter of a further 400 people last night? I beg the Minister, “Please do not sit here and say we are doing everything we can,” because that will add insult to injury. I accept that no one in the Labour Government has openly called for the Israel Defence Forces to be given a Nobel peace prize, but we have not even summoned the Israeli ambassador to express our concerns or contemplated economic sanctions because, in the words of our Foreign Secretary: “Israel remains an important ally. We have an important trading relationship, worth £6.1 billion last year and involving 38,000 British jobs. I am sorry; any discussion of sanctions is just not correct.” —[ Official Report , 14 January 2025; Vol. 760, c. 152.] I say to the family of the children who were burned alive last night that I am sorry; the Government say that we cannot afford to lose the money.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  That is the question that I wish to be answered. Were we involved, directly or indirectly, in the Israeli operation in Nuseirat in June 2024, when 276 Palestinians were killed at the rescue of four Israeli hostages? Critically, has our intelligence been used to conduct air strikes? If so, under article 25 of the Rome statute, is the UK now legally complicit in war crimes?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  I completely concur with the hon. Member’s timely intervention. The Government claim that they provide intelligence only when they are satisfied that it will be used in compliance with international law, but what independent due diligence has been conducted to verify that? If hundreds of UK flights have taken place over Gaza, what have we witnessed? What crimes, if any, have we seen? In the light of what happened this morning, why has the RAF continued to deploy Shadow R1 surveillance flights towards Gaza, when a stipulation of the ceasefire explicitly forbids surveillance operations? Is that not a violation of the spirit of the ceasefire agreement? Can the Minister confirm that the Israeli armed forces will not use surveillance supplied by the RAF flights during a hostage exchange in future attacks on Gaza? The war has taken the lives of an unprecedented number of aid workers, including three British nationals who were killed while working with the World Central Kitchen humanitarian convoy. Their families have repeatedly requested video footage from our own Shadow R1 surveillance aircraft, which was operating above Gaza at the time. The Government have refused to release it. Similarly, on 27 May, when at least 45 Palestinians were killed in Rafah, another UK surveillance aircraft was in operation. Again, the footage has not been released. Why? What is being hidden, if anything? If we are confident in our innocence, why the secrecy? Finally, there is now mounting suspicion and evidence that UK facilities in Gibraltar are being used for the facilitation of armed shipments, harbour services, and jet fuel supplies for vessels transporting weapons from the US to Israel. Can the Minister please clarify the usage of Gibraltar in the war effort? We must confront the bigger picture. The UK helped to build the modern international legal order, but we risk dismantling it today. International law is not a game of pick and mix, where we enforce it in one case —namely African despots—and ignore it in another. By allowing Israeli exceptionalism, we threaten to undermine the very concept of international law itself.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  I thank all hon. Members for their sincere contributions. We all want the hostages to be released, but as the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said, “The Israeli government has chosen to abandon the hostages.” I say to the shadow Minister that I agree with the defence industry that we must have a robust arms industry, but I pray that our children’s lives are never at the behest of a nation’s economic profit. History will judge us not by our words but by our actions. Let me be completely clear: this debate is not an attack on our Government, nor is it about politics. It is simply about truth. Only truth can serve justice, and only with justice can we bring about peace. I urge hon. Members to reflect not on their political loyalties but on their moral duty. When history looks back at this moment, we must be able to say with absolute certainty that we stood on the right side. That is the least we owe to Shaban, Hind and all the dead children of the conflict. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the matter of military collaboration with Israel.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  In addition to the 400 the hon. Member mentions, we have seen close to 50,000 Palestinians killed, the majority of whom have been women and children. In addition to the manufacture and supply of F-35 parts, it appears that RAF Marham in Norfolk has been used at least seven times to send spare parts directly to Israel. Since declaring a so-called suspension of arms exports, the UK has issued 34 new licences, including those for essential aircraft components. I ask the Minister directly: which licences were suspended in September 2024, which licences remain suspended, and why have the Government refused to publish details of arms exports between July and September 2024? Our military co-operation extends beyond arms sales; it is operational, especially when it comes to using our airbase in Akrotiri, Cyprus. In one year alone, from December 2023 to November 2024, the UK conducted 645 surveillance and recon missions, which amounts to almost two flights a day. Interestingly, during the same period, the US moved heavy transport aircraft carrying military equipment to Akrotiri, and the RAF subsequently conducted daily cargo flights from Akrotiri to Tel Aviv. We have been told that those flights were for surveillance and hostage rescue, but if that is the case, we must ask why we used RAF Atlas C1 aircraft, which are large enough to transport military vehicles and helicopters.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for his intervention; that is something I will come on to. The question is very clear: are we upholding the rule of law or are we complicit in its erosion? Too often we speak in numbers. Tens of thousands are dead and millions displaced, but as the saying goes: “A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” Before we proceed, I want us all to pause not to cite figures, but to honour lives lost—two specifically. Shaban al-Dalou was a 19-year-old software engineering student who had already been displaced five times. The eldest of five siblings, he had memorised the entire Quran and was just days away from his 20th birthday when an Israeli airstrike hit the Al-Aqsa hospital compound. The world witnessed the horrific image of Shaban attached to an IV bag, his body burning alive. His mother, the woman who had nurtured his every single dream, was killed alongside him. For a crumb of solace they were buried together in an embrace. Who can forget the face of Hind Rajab, a six-year-old girl who was trapped in a car with five of her dead relatives, their bodies riddled with bullets? The whole world heard her call for help—a voice scared but full of hope. Rescuers from the Palestine Red Crescent Society responded. Unfortunately, they too were killed. These are not statistics; these are human lives. Let us take time to look at their faces. The question before us again is: did we as a nation facilitate those crimes? Following this, in September 2024, our Government acknowledged that Israel was at clear risk of not complying with international humanitarian law and admitted that there was a risk that UK arms exports might be used to commit serious violations. Yet according to Campaign Against Arms Trade, potentially £100 million-worth of military equipment has been approved for export to Israel, including spare parts for F-35 fighter jets that require continuous maintenance to remain operational, therefore constantly requiring spare parts. Furthermore, exports of F-35 parts are covered under what we call an open general licence, which allows unlimited exports to all approved partners worldwide., so we will never know the real numbers. Given that more than 15% of every F-35 is made in the UK, Israeli airstrikes would simply not be possible without British components.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Military Co-operation with Israel · Hansard source

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  I concur with the hon. Member completely. In the words of Martin Luther King: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” Against that backdrop, let us continue. As I mentioned, today’s debate has been secured on no other premise than to find the truth. At this moment, the global order that we helped to build stands on the precipice of collapse. If we, as one of its architects, fail to uphold the principles that we established, we will also be complicit in its destruction. No one voted me in to resolve the conflict in the middle east overnight singlehandedly, or expects me to do so, but what the British people in their millions are demanding—rightfully and unequivocally—is moral clarity, a strategic commitment to ending hostilities and the absolute assurance that our nation is not complicit in facilitating war crimes. Today’s debate will not delve into the historical archives of the conflict, which date from Balfour onwards—the Nakba, the occupation and the consistent humiliation, or the Hamas atrocities of 7 October. Instead, this is a legal and moral inquiry into our nation’s military co-operation with Israel in the face of credible allegations, including of genocide, now before the International Court of Justice. The ICJ has ruled that the occupation is illegal and warned that Israel’s actions in Gaza may constitute genocide. Under international law, the UK has an obligation not only to refrain from facilitating those crimes but to prevent them actively. Yet despite that duty, our country continues to engage in military co-operation with Israel. The question before us is very clear: are we upholding the rule of law?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Gaza · Hansard source

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  The blockade of aid is just the last line in a long list of activities that Israelis have committed against the Palestinian people. Now that we have cut our overseas aid to a mere 0.3% of GDP—the lowest in real terms in 20 years—does the Minister still agree with the Labour party manifesto that international aid makes the world “a safer, more prosperous place”? Does she agree that, with this move, the UK’s historic role in the middle east is dead and over?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Palestinian Rights: Government Support · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir John. I want to say a special thank you to the Father of the House, the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), for his compassionate and humane speech. It was extremely touching. I want to speak about a certain aspect of this conflict. Last Monday, 24 February, a piercing shrill broke the silence of the night. It was a mother crying because her two-month-old baby, Sham, had frozen to death. These are the real human costs of this conflict. Sham joins five other children who have frozen to death in the past month, joining the 116 other Palestinians who have been killed since the ceasefire began. Like many other Members here, I have spoken about this issue countless times here in Westminster Hall and in the main Chamber, and nothing seems to change. We sit here and discuss the rights and wrongs, but as the Father of the House said, this conflict keeps nobody safe, including the Israelis. I want to be a little more forthright than the hon. Member for Stratford and Bow (Uma Kumaran), who could not repeat what she heard in the Knesset. There are sentiments that have been openly declared and that, unlike any BBC show, require no translation. Let us take a glimpse into the minds of many Israeli Ministers. Nissim Vaturi, who is the Deputy Speaker of the House, said that Palestinians are “scoundrels” and “subhumans”, and that Israel must “separate the children and women and kill the adults in Gaza. We are being too considerate.” He has previously called for the complete erasure of the Gaza strip. The Israeli Heritage Minister, Amichai Eliyahu, openly suggested that Israel drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza and said that there were no “uninvolved civilians in Gaza”. The then Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, who announced a “complete siege” of Gaza, said Israel was fighting “human animals”. And, of course, we have Benjamin Netanyahu himself, who—reciting the Hebrew Bible—said: “Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.” We rightly ask about the impartiality of the BBC, but I do not recall the same level of hysteria about the open sentiments expressed by Israeli Ministers that demonise, dehumanise and destroy two-month-old babies. The BBC’s infamous documentary merely gives us a glimpse into the blighted lives of Palestinian children, at a time when no independent journalist is allowed into Gaza and over 160 journalists have been killed. All I ask the Minister is this: when will the Government call out the atrocities as war crimes and as genocide, and when will they do that with the same conviction as we call out other conflicts? Or are Palestinian lives simply not as important?