UK complicit in Israeli war crimes, Jeremy Corbyn's tribunal hears

There were around 50 people packed into a room in Westminster's historic Church House to hear evidence on Britain's role in Israel's genocide in Gaza. But over 12,000 people were watching online.

Thursday was the first day of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn's highly publicised Gaza Tribunal, which aims to hold Britain accountable for its role in enabling Israel’s ongoing war crimes in Gaza.

The independent MP, now a key figure in the establishment of a new left-wing party, put forward a bill earlier this year for a public Chilcot-style inquiry into Britain's military cooperation with Israel.

But the Labour government blocked the bill. This unofficial two-day inquest is taking place instead.

There was nothing trivial about the tribunal. Eyewitnesses, UN rapporteurs, journalists, medics and academics all gave evidence on Thursday.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on occupied Palestine, addressed the inquiry over Zoom.

She said there is a "requirement on states like the UK to cease investment and economic relations with the state of Israel."

'States, including the United Kingdom, have been on notice for decades'

- Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur 

Albanese said: "States, including the United Kingdom, have been on notice for decades of their legal obligations."

She added that they have "miserably failed" by providing weapons, military assistance and political support to Israel.

"This failure to abide by long-standing international obligations might be sufficient to establish a criminal case for complicity in the actions of Israel," Albanese warned.

She further explained that "government officials can be held individually responsible for crimes", including approving arms sales to Israel and providing it with intelligence.

'We will uncover British complicity'

The tribunal is chaired by Neve Gordon, professor of human rights law at Queen Mary University, and Shahd Hammouri, a lecturer on international law, as well as Corbyn himself.

Corbyn said: "Just like Iraq, the government is doing everything it can to protect itself from scrutiny. Just like Iraq, it will not succeed in its attempts to suffocate the truth.

"We will uncover the full scale of British complicity in genocide – and we will bring about justice for the people of Palestine."

Richard Burgon, an MP in the governing Labour MP, gave testimony to the tribunal. 

Burgon said the government was "complicit through the political greenlight" it gives Israel.

He further said the government "has not properly carried out the assessment it needs to fulfil its legal responsibilities".

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Burgon described it as "perverse" that the government has relied on information from Israel itself to make its legal assessments, questioning whether the government would write to Vladimir Putin when examining evidence of Russian war crimes.

Corbyn asked Burgon whether he felt ministers were unaware of the consequences of their actions, or whether there was a "cover up going on".

Burgon responded that "it may be the case that ministers have convinced themselves that what they're doing is sufficient".

He added that "we don't get straight answers. Sometimes we don't get answers at all."

John McEvoy, chief reporter for Declassified UK, told the tribunal that components for trainer aircraft were excluded from the UK's partial arms embargo and have been shipped to Israel.

"Even as recently as last month" the Ministry of Defence was training Israeli soldiers, he added.

Significantly, McEvoy noted, the Foreign Office recently disclosed that it had not sought to view footage from surveillance flights run by the Ministry of Defence over Gaza - despite those flights giving the UK a bird's-eye view of Israel's actions in the besieged enclave. 

'Active suppression of opposition'

Katie Fallon of Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), also addressing the tribunal, described a "huge increase" in weapons components sent from Britain to Israel since 7 October 2023. 

Natalie Roberts, the executive director of Doctors Without Borders, described how "our medical teams are working under the harshest conditions with little food for themselves".

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"We have written letters to past and present prime ministers," she told the tribunal.

"When we have received a reply, from a more junior minister, it’s very perfunctory and doesn’t really acknowledge the gravity of the situation."

Ben Jamal, the director of Britain's Palestine Solidarity Campaign - which organises regular major marches in London - focused on domestic attacks on pro-Palestine activism.

He described the "active suppression of opposition to [Israel's genocide] from British citizens".

This has occurred, he said, through the "unprecedented usage of the Public Order Act to impose conditions on the marches we organise" and in some cases banning marches.

"We see it right now," he added, "in the grotesque decision to designate Palestine Action," a direct action group, as a terrorist organisation.

'The Israeli military bombed the intensive care unit while I was operating next door'

- Nick Maynard, surgeon and Oxford academic

The panel also heard testimony from eyewitnesses to Israel's genocide.

Tareq Abu Azzoum, an Al Jazeera reporter in Gaza, spoke to the tribunal over Zoom. He described how "journalists are targets themselves", referencing the killing by Israel of at least 247 of his colleagues.

Nick Maynard, an Oxford academic and surgeon who has travelled to Gaza three times during Israel's genocide in the enclave, described how at Al-Aqsa hospital last year, "the Israeli military bombed the intensive care unit while I was operating next door".

He described operating just months ago on a 12-year-old girl called Habiba. "I had to spend the whole night reconstructing her oesophagus which had been destroyed in an attack… she died four weeks afterwards because we couldn’t get any food to save her."

Maynard said he operated on numerous children who he believed were used as "target practice by the Israeli soldiers", since on particular days several children would all be targeted in the same body parts.