SCOTTISH Labour’s Anas Sarwar has finally broken his silence on the UK’s sale of weapons to Israel.
Earlier in the week, Sarwar’s Scottish group would only defer to the UK party’s position when asked whether they believed that exports of arms to Israel should end.
Pat McFadden, a key ally of party leader Keir Starmer, had suggested that Labour backed the sale of weapons, before shadow foreign secretary David Lammy said the exports should end if the UK Government has legal advice which says Israel is likely to be breaching international law.
On Thursday, more than 600 legal experts, including former Supreme Court president Brenda Hale, said the worsening situation in Gaza and the International Court of Justice’s conclusion that there is a “plausible risk of genocide” obliges the UK to suspend arms sales to the country.
READ MORE: Lesley Riddoch: SNP must keep up pressure on UK over Israeli arms sales
On Friday, Sarwar was asked by LBC if he supported the view of those 600 experts.
In his response, he went further than his UK bosses, saying he believes Israel has clearly breached international law and that weapons exports should cease.
Sarwar said: “It is absolutely clear that if there are breaches of international humanitarian law, there should not be sales of arms to Israel.
“These legal experts have made it clear that they believe there are clear breaches of international humanitarian law.
NEW: Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar tells me the UK sale of arms to Israel should stop.
— Rebecca Brady (@Rebecca_Brady_) April 5, 2024
He says, in his opinion, Israel has breached international law.
UK Labour has not said the same.@LBC | @LBCNews | @LBCNewsScot pic.twitter.com/OiQMp4vf4q
“I've been saying for months now that I believe there are clear breaches of international humanitarian law, a failure to properly access humanitarian aid into Gaza, the targeting of infrastructure like hospitals and schools, innocent civilians losing their lives on such a huge scale in Gaza, and the death of aid workers killed because of IDF [Israeli Defence Force] attacks.
“These are clear breaches, in my view, of international law and therefore we should not be selling arms to Israel.”
Asked if he would recommend Starmer and UK Labour also take the same position, Sarwar did not say he would be pressuring them to do so.
He said: “Keir Starmer and David Lammy have both said that if there are breaches in international humanitarian law, and the legal advice suggests that of the UK Government, they should cease the sales of arms to Israel.
“There was, of course, the Foreign Affairs Committee at Westminster who recently said that they had seen legal advice that has shown that the legal view was that Israel was in breach of international humanitarian law.
“If that is the case, then sales of arms to Israel should stop.”
Alicia Kearns, a senior Tory MP and the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, had said she believed that UK Government lawyers had concluded Israel was breaching international law but the advice was not being published.
On Friday, Kearns told the BBC that the UK has “no choice” but to stop sending arms to Israel and doing so is neither political nor antisemitic.
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