Horrendous images are tipping point for outrage over Gaza

The Herald Scotland

27-07-2025

But not until it was confronted with the jutting out shoulder blades and shrivelled heads of emaciated children did the government sit up and take notice of a situation it had the power and the responsibility to prevent. And even then it's mostly been empty words, with little action behind them.
Keir Starmer described the suffering as 'unspeakable and indefensible'; but it is 'unspeakable' only in the sense that he has chosen not to speak about it (and tried to prevent others doing so). And, by finding excuses for [[Israel]] – by declaring it had the right to switch off water and electricity, for example – he has himself defended it. Wilful ignorance is a form of complicity, but the Prime Minister has done worse than this: he has been an apologist for war crimes.
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For all his apparent disgust at the plight of malnourished babies, Starmer was last week focused on another bug bear: takeaway delivery drivers. In a dog-whistle tweet, he pledged to hand over the addresses of asylum seeker hotels – already lightning rods for racist attacks – so the likes of Deliveroo and Just Eat can make sure they don't pay their low wages to anyone who has fled here from other countries.
Asylum seekers are not here illegally (whatever the subtext of the policy might be). It is just that, under our laws, they are not allowed to earn a living. Still, unlike a crackdown on Israel, it's likely to raise a smile on the Reform crowd's faces. No wonder some of Starmer's own party are embarrassed to be associated with him.
Others have raised their voices, of course: charities, human rights organisations, the tens of thousands who have taken to the streets with their placards, powerless in the face of establishment apathy, but desperate to do their bit.
The UK government has demonised those protesters, portraying them as violent anti-Semites in an attempt to shut them down. Even as the Express newspaper — the right-wing Express, for God's sake — was publishing a splash headline that read: The Suffering of Little Muhammad Clinging to Life Shames Us All, police officers were arresting pensioners under the Terrorism Act for carrying placards and, in one case, a copy of Private Eye magazine.
This they justified by alleging those protesters were supporting Palestine Action, an organisation which has been proscribed for trying to draw attention to the very humanitarian catastrophe Starmer has deemed 'unspeakable'.
No Western leader has done enough. They have tutted at outrageous statements from the likes of former Knesset member Moshe Feiglin, who said 'every child in Gaza is the enemy', they have called for a ceasefire and issued joint condemnatory statements. But they have failed to follow through on threats of concrete action, or at least they have failed to do so to any degree likely to have an impact.
Earlier this month, EU ministers declined to suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement and visa-free travel, or to block imports from Israeli settlements. After the Labour Party came to power last year, it suspended 30 out of 350 arms export licences, but exempted parts for the F-35 fighter jet, used extensively in Israeli air strikes on Gaza. It suspended talks to upgrade its free trade agreement with Israel, but it has yet to impose any direct sanctions.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy does appear to want more; but he is running up against the intractability of his leader, who is refusing to commit to the most basic act of solidarity: the recognition of a Palestinian state. Across the Channel, Emmanuel Macron has been pushing the G7 leaders to make a joint declaration. In the absence of support, he has decided to go it alone, and has promised to formalise his decision at the United Nations General Assembly in September.
Keir Starmer has shown more interest in going after protesters. (Image: James Manning) Starmer, on the other hand, says that, while Palestinians have an unalienable right to statehood, a formal recognition must be made 'at the right time'. Half a million people in Gaza are considered to be facing catastrophe while a further one million fall into the 'emergency risk' category. The US has just withdrawn from ceasefire talks in Qatar. So when will the right time be, Keir? When the last Palestinian is dead?
The Labour government has been out of touch with public opinion on Gaza for a long time. Now, it appears to be out of touch with its own backbenchers and Westminster at large. Early last week, 60 cross party MPs and peers called for a full embargo on arms exports to Israel and for the government to be more transparent about the licences it grants for military exports. And on Thursday 100, led by the chair of the International Development Committee Sarah Champion, demanded Starmer formally recognise Palestine. Perhaps the Prime Minister will buckle under the pressure. Perhaps something substantial will come out of his emergency phone call with France and Germany.
It does feel as if the world has woken up to what is happening. In the short-term, we need to build on that momentum; to ensure something is actually done.
But in the long-term there must be a reckoning in a way there was not in the wake of Iraq. It has been clear for so long what Israel's endgame is, and that they would stop at nothing to achieve it. Yet western governments allowed it to act with impunity, and, sure enough, here is Gaza, tipping into an abyss.
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In 2016, I travelled to Srebrenica courtesy of a charity that exists to ensure we do not forget what happens when the world turns a blind eye to genocide.
At Potočari cemetery there are 7,000 white pillars like upended chalk pieces: one for each Muslim whose body has been recovered from mass graves in Bosnia Herzegovina (although another 7,000 are still missing, and the remains of 2,000 others lie unidentified in mortuaries). Under a simple pavilion, survivors tell how they fled the safe haven when the UN failed to protect them; how – captured on the roadside – they were loaded into lorries, then taken in batches into barns to be shot.
More than 60,000 have died in Gaza since October 7, 2023. The UN, Amnesty and Médecins Sans Frontières have all declared it a genocide. And yet some people are still quibbling over the word.
Perhaps, in 25 years' time, a charity will take journalists and politicians to a graveyard on the strip. Perhaps people like me will force themselves to confront the ranks of the dead, in the stupid, misguided belief that simply bearing witness will help prevent such an atrocity from ever happening again.