AA / Birmingham / Mehmet Solmaz
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Parliament on Wednesday that Israel was not committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
During Prime Minister’s Questions in the House of Commons, independent MP Ayoub Khan referred to comments by Foreign Minister David Lammy, who recently said that the term “genocide” referred to “millions of people who lost their lives in crises like those of Rwanda, the Second World War or the Holocaust” and that using it to describe what is happening in the Gaza Strip “is detrimental today to [sa] credibility”.
Khan then said Lammy’s remarks were not acceptable, explaining: “Article 2 of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide makes clear that genocide is not a matter of number, but of intention. The intent of the Israeli government and the Israeli military has been made explicitly clear in word and deed over the past 400 days, with more than 45,000 innocent men, women and children killed.”
The parliamentarian said the foreign minister had explicitly denied that a genocide was taking place and had “suggested that the Israeli army had not yet killed enough Palestinians” to constitute genocide.
“Can the Prime Minister share his definition of genocide with this Assembly? “, he asked.
In response, Starmer said: “It would be wise to begin such a question by referring to what happened in October last year. I know the definition of genocide perfectly, and that’s why I never described this as genocide.”
Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, currently visiting the UK, has repeatedly said she believes what is happening could be described as genocide.
*Translated from English by Mourad Belhaj
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