Starmer hails 'great leader' Blair but avoids endorsing him for possible Gaza role

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said Tony Blair was a "great leader" and would "make a huge contribution" to the peace board Donald Trump is setting up to govern Gaza.

Blair, who was a Labour prime minister between 1997 and 2007, oversaw Britain's 2003 invasion of Iraq, which Starmer marched in protest against and called illegal as recently as 2020.

Since leaving office, Blair has repeatedly made appearances on the international stage, most recently to propose a plan for a transitional authority to govern post-war Gaza - and to put himself forward to lead that process. 

The former British leader, who has rarely been accused of lacking ambition, was spotted at the Gaza summit in Egypt's Sharm el-Sheikh on Monday.

Starmer, the current Labour prime minister, was also there. He kept his distance from his predecessor, whom many British MPs have started calling "Viceroy Blair". 

President Trump has previously signalled support for Blair helming the transitional authority to oversee Gaza's governance.

But Trump told reporters on Monday that he wants to "find out that he is an acceptable choice to everybody".

'A great leader'

Even Starmer has repeatedly refused to endorse Blair for the proposed role, and the prime minister dodged the question again in Sharm el-Sheikh during an interview with Sky News.

"Well, I think the make-up of the peace board is still being discussed," he said awkwardly. 

Pressed on Blair's involvement, the prime minister praised him: "Tony Blair was a great leader of our country and would make a huge contribution," he said.

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Not quite a ringing endorsement, but close to one.

Starmer quickly tempered his words by adding: "I'm not focused on which particular people should sit on which particular board. I'm focused on what we need to do tomorrow, and I mean tomorrow, to make sure this is implemented."

One source of potential awkwardness for Starmer is that Blair has been far more involved in Trump's "peace process" than Starmer himself, and that looks to continue.

Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, did pay tribute to Britain's "vital role" in the ceasefire talks in an X post on Monday.

But this was only after the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, derided British minister Bridget Phillipson as "deluded" for making that claim.

Starmer also appeared embarrassed when the US president invited him to the podium during his address and shook his hand, before abruptly turning his back on Starmer and continuing his speech.

Other leaders had been given the chance to speak. The prime minister looked awkward and sombrely returned to his place. 

Blair criticism

Meanwhile, Hamas has roundly condemned the idea of Blair governing Gaza, with senior official Basem Naim saying he should have no role in the process.

"When it comes to Tony Blair, unfortunately, we Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims, and maybe others around the world have bad memories of him," Naim said.

"We can still remember his role in killing, causing thousands or millions of deaths to innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq."

As official envoy for the Middle East Quartet (US, Russia, the European Union and UN) between 2007 and 2015, Blair was also previously tasked with resolving the Palestine-Israel question.

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Few would deny that he failed badly.

Blair's eccentric new proposal would establish a transitional authority in Gaza for up to five years, excluding both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA).

Leaked versions of the plan indicate a hierarchy in which an international board of billionaires and businesspeople sit at the top, while highly vetted "neutral" Palestinian administrators are at the bottom. 

The authority would hold "supreme political and legal authority" over Gaza during that period.

Last week, the PA's justice minister, Sharhabeel al-Zaeem, slammed Blair's involvement, excoriating his record not just in the Middle East but also in Britain.

"All these struggles for all these years in order to have Mr Blair, who failed in London, who failed in Britain, who failed in Iraq, come and - with all due respect at a personal level to Mr Blair - be our guardian as if we were minors?" Zaeem said.

But last Sunday saw a significant change in tone, with Hussein al-Sheikh, the PA deputy president, meeting Blair in the Jordanian capital Amman and expressing a readiness to work with him. 

Thousands of Palestinians have begun returning to northern Gaza with a ceasefire in place, following Israel and Hamas's approval of a deal to "end the war" and exchange prisoners.

But the future of the occupied enclave, which has suffered a genocide, remains in question.