The UK government approved $169m worth of military equipment to Israel in the three months that followed the Labour government’s partial suspension of arms exports over concerns they could be used unlawfully in Gaza.
Export data released on Thursday shows that 20 different licences in categories such as military aircraft, radars, targeting equipment, and explosive devices, were approved between October and December 2024.
Arms campaigners say the three-month total is more than what was approved altogether under the Tory government between 2020 and 2023, and said the increase was “truly shocking”.
“This is the Labour government aiding and abetting Israel’s genocide in Gaza,” said Emily Apple, media coordinator for the UK-based Campaign Against Arms Trade.
By the sounds of it we aren’t even exporting directly to them, we just have to put parts into a pool as part of the F35 programme.
It’s shit Israel can benefit from it, but the alternative is to leave the programme and not have a robust air defence, which would also entail pullingbback a lot of Ukraine support.
The UK knows where these parts are ending up. There is an extensive tracking system on these parts.
I know we know where some of the parts are ending up.
But our options are:
Ignore everything and continue selling to Israel regardless.
Stop direct sales to Israel, but remain part of programmes like the F35 programme, which countries like the US, Germany, Italy, Israel are in. (This is what we have done, the headline and article is misleading)
Stop sales to Israel and also abruptly leave any any military partnerships they are also signed up to. This would lead not only to the UK not being able to defend itself and its neighbours properly because we wouldn’t be able to build and maintain our jets, but we’d also have to pay billions in exit fees, we’d torch our relationship with the other countries in the scheme, and it’d show the world the UK is not a country you can count on for strategic and manufacturing partnerships, meaning that we’d lose out for decades and our defence sector would be seriously harmed.
Look, I get you want to be ideologically pure, but that final option is obviously not a sensible one. We live in a world where there are shades of grey, not just black and white, and that means sometimes you have to pick the lesser of two evils.
Going forward, we shouldn’t get into partnerships that include Israel. Thankfully that appears to be the case with our upcoming GCAP 6th gen jet (UK, Japan, Italy).
I don’t think you understand. The genocide convention doesn’t excuse war-crimes if arms are sent through a third party.
If the UK starts sending weapons to Kazachstan which then gives them to Russia, and it is brought to the UK’s attention that Kazachstan is sending the weapons to Russia, do you think that “no we’re sending them to Kazachstan” is an acceptable excuse?
That’s not a like for like comparison, because we aren’t selling weapons to Israel or sending them through another country, we’re just in the F35 programme.
I get it, if you were PM (you claim) you’d drop out of the F35 programme, despite it being an absolutely tremendously expensive move that would also leave us extremely vulnerable in terms of defence and ability to defend others. You’d piss off allied countries that we have defence pacts with, as well as others in the F35 programme. You’d signal to the world that Britain is not to be trusted and should never be entered into a defence agreement with, something that would cause permanent irreparable damage to us.
In the meantime, Israel would still get to maintain their planes. But critically, you’d get to feel righteous, and that’s what’s more important.
The F35 programme is not a magic wand which absolves all complicity in war crimes. There’s a reason the UK denies that Israel is committing genocide.
Kid Starver is not doing this out of strategic importance. He got his position by kicking out Corbyn for being anti Israel.
Just a PSA but @[email protected] is a troll. In case you wanted a chat about real solutions and policy.
This guy is a self admitted troll who got mad at me for saying genocide denial is bad and is now stalking me around Lemmy
Trolling. No one denied such or was calling you out for that.
You are indeed trolling, hence the following me around and lying about me. Days later and you’re still so mad about being told genocide denial is bad.
I don’t think any sane person could look at the that final option and say that it’s worse than participating in active genocide.
We aren’t participating in genocide. Israel is participating in genocide.
By this definition of participating in genocide, we’re participating in genocide any time we trade with China, too.
“we aren’t involved in the Holocaust, we’re just selling the Nazis Zyklon B” (and you’re also flying surveillance aircraft over Gaza for Israel)
And China hasn’t killed tens of thousands of Muslims, so no.