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UK Considers Sanctioning 2 Ultranationalist Israeli Cabinet Ministers

A handout photograph released by the UK Parliament shows Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaking during the weekly session of Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) at the House of Commons, in London, on October 16, 2024. (UK Parliament/ AFP)
A handout photograph released by the UK Parliament shows Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaking during the weekly session of Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) at the House of Commons, in London, on October 16, 2024. (UK Parliament/ AFP)
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UK Considers Sanctioning 2 Ultranationalist Israeli Cabinet Ministers

A handout photograph released by the UK Parliament shows Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaking during the weekly session of Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) at the House of Commons, in London, on October 16, 2024. (UK Parliament/ AFP)
A handout photograph released by the UK Parliament shows Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaking during the weekly session of Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) at the House of Commons, in London, on October 16, 2024. (UK Parliament/ AFP)

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday the UK government is considering sanctioning two ultranationalist Israeli Cabinet ministers.

Starmer said “we are looking at” imposing sanctions on Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. He said the pair has made “abhorrent” comments about the situation in Gaza and the West Bank.

Britain, France and Algeria have called a meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday on the humanitarian situation in northern Gaza, which Starmer called “dire.”

“Israel must take all possible steps to avoid civilian casualties, to allow aid into Gaza in much greater volumes, and provide the UN humanitarian partners the ability to operate effectively,” Starmer said in the House of Commons.

David Cameron, who was foreign secretary in the previous Conservative government until its defeat in the July election, said Tuesday that while in office he was working on a plan to sanction Smotrich and Ben-Gvir over their support for blocking aid from entering the Gaza Strip and expanding illegal Israeli settlements there and in the occupied West Bank.

The sanctions were not put in place before Britain’s snap election was called.

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US Officials Who Resigned over Biden’s Gaza Policy Form New PAC

A Palestinian boy looks at destroyed shelters at the site of an Israeli airstrike which hit tents for displaced people two days earlier in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on October 16, 2024. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy looks at destroyed shelters at the site of an Israeli airstrike which hit tents for displaced people two days earlier in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on October 16, 2024. (AFP)
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US Officials Who Resigned over Biden’s Gaza Policy Form New PAC

A Palestinian boy looks at destroyed shelters at the site of an Israeli airstrike which hit tents for displaced people two days earlier in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on October 16, 2024. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy looks at destroyed shelters at the site of an Israeli airstrike which hit tents for displaced people two days earlier in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on October 16, 2024. (AFP)

Two US officials who resigned last year in protest over President Joe Biden's policy on the Gaza war have launched a lobbying organization and a political action committee to advocate for a revamp of Washington's long-standing stance on the Israeli and Palestinian conflict.

Josh Paul, a former State Department official and Tariq Habash, who used to work as a policy advisor at the US Department of Education, said the American public is no longer in favor of unconditionally sending US weapons to Israel but that elected officials have lagged behind.

Their PAC, called "A New Policy", would support candidates whose position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict center on aligning US policies with human rights and equality and would ensure US arms transfers to all countries in the Middle East including Israel comply with both US and international law.

Washington's unwavering support for Israel's military operations in Gaza and more recently in Lebanon has emerged as a key reason for why Muslim and Arab voters, who resoundingly had backed Biden in 2020, may withhold their votes from Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris in the upcoming election.

"American voters are clear: they do not want to be complicit in this humanitarian catastrophe and a majority want an end to the transfer of lethal weapons that are used to kill Palestinian civilians," Habbash said.

Many Muslims and Arabs in the US have urged Biden to call for a permanent ceasefire. Harris faces Republican former President Donald Trump on Nov. 5 in what polls show to be a tight presidential race.

The US is Israel's largest weapons supplier and has provided it with billions of dollars in military aid since Oct. 7, when Palestinian Hamas fighters attacked southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and kidnapping 250 others, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's relentless retaliatory offensive of the densely-populated Gaza Strip, which was home to 2.3 million people, has reduced the enclave to a wasteland, with hundreds of thousands of people repeatedly displaced. More than 42,000 people have been killed, according to Palestinian health officials.