Miliband’s betrayal of Britain and Israel

West Bank settlements are a wearisome subject to have to write about, but it is relevant to the UK debate at the moment. I'm not one to wag the finger at Israel on this matter. I consider it 100% an internal affair. It is, however, much more nuanced than is presented in the UK press.

Israeli settlers on the West Bank have become a law unto themselves, often finding themselves in conflict with the IDF itself, and there is a lot of domestic Israeli opposition to the behaviour of settlers. Where it gets murky is that there actions are not officially sanctioned, but there are factions within the Netanyahu administration who encourage it. It will continue to be a running sore in Israeli politics as the West Bank turns to chaos.

While I do not personally approve of the conduct of the settlers (I regard them as thugs), Israeli absorption of the West Bank is an inevitability - and in the long term, its Arab inhabitants will be better off for it. The only way these ethno-religious spats ever resolve is when one side comprehensively wins. I am also of the view that it is as necessary as it is inevitable. An essential component of any nation state, Israel especially, is secure and defensible borders.

This absorption, though, runs counter to the "international community" position, endorsed by the British government, that there should be a two state solution. Muttering about the two state solution is the default throat clearing exercise before chastising Israel for whatever reason.

In reality, though, a Palestinian state in the West Bank is not something within anyone's gift. It has to be built from the ground up, and in all this time there has never been any serious attempt on the part of the Palestinians to build one because they've always been preoccupied with wiping Israel off the map. There is no good reason why Israel should assist its enemies in formalising a hostile state on its own doorstep - especially not one that could be sued as a staging point for an invasion that could cut Israel in two. There is precedent for this, and so Israel's posture is entirely understandable.

As such, when braindead British politicians yet again chastise Israel in order to curry favour with their own Islamist electoral hinterlands, and having recognised the state of Palestine in the wake of 7/10 (a hostile act if ever there were one), you can't be at all surprised if Israeli attitudes towards Britain sour somewhat.

I am even less surprised, then, to see certain elements within Israeli politics recognising Argentina's bogus claim to the Falklands. Javier Milei has been a full throated advocate of Israel while Britain and Europe has been mealy mouthed and cowardly. This is short-sighted being that Argentina could just as easily revert to its basketcase leftist norm.

It has, however, become germane to the right wing debate in Britain, in that some are reading this bickering over the Falklands as justification for pre-existing animosity towards Israel and Jews in general. Certain factions of the Netanyahu administration are not making any friends and are burning a lot of bridges.

Personally, I don't read too much into it. Most of the posturing is for domestic Israeli electoral purposes. Meanwhile, I don't have to like its current government to still recognise that Israel has a right to exist, and has a right to defensible borders, or recognise that the two state solution, if ever it was viable, is long dead now. If not before 7/10, then certainly on that day when Hamas went on a rape-murder spree. Nobody is obliged to hand those scumbags a state.

As such, the obnoxious conduct of Israeli settlers is little more than a sub-regional public order problem, and hardly of interest. Were it that British politics was functioning properly, this issue would not register in our discourse at all.

There is only one reason it is of any interest to the British government and that is to shore up its Islamic support in the Northern slums because it has lost the support of the native working class. Little wonder, then, that the White House is less than impressed, and Britain faces US trade penalties if it goes ahead with an unenforceable ban on settler goods. Labour now has to decide whether it values Palestinians more than it values trade with the US. But as we know, for Labour, the prosperity of the British people will always come last in their priorities.