West must use leverage to end Israeli settlements, says Anwar

 The prime minister says the statement by 12 foreign ministers on measures against illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank was overdue.

Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim arriving in New Delhi today for the summit meeting of the BRICS economic grouping. (PMO pic)

KUALA LUMPUR:

The joint statement by 12 western foreign ministers on measures against illegal Israeli settlements was overdue, and must be matched by firm implementation, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said today.

“These governments should use their considerable diplomatic and economic leverage over Israel to press for an end to settlement expansion and forced displacement, accountability for the devastation inflicted on Gaza and unimpeded humanitarian access,” he said in a Facebook post today.

Anwar said he noted that Britain, Canada and France would bring forward measures to ban trade in goods with settlements, joining several European countries that have already taken this step.

“I also recognise the significance of the statement by British foreign secretary Ed Miliband to the House of Commons. The United Kingdom has now formally recognised the unlawfulness of the Israeli occupation as a whole,” Anwar said.

“It has also acknowledged that ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is taking place in areas of the West Bank at the hands of what Mr Miliband rightly calls ‘settler terrorists’. These are significant acknowledgements, grounded in international law and in the realities confronting the Palestinian people,” he said.

Anwar called for concrete and binding measures to uphold international law, protect the rights of the Palestinian people and secure a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.

On Tuesday, the foreign ministers of Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, ⁠Poland, Portugal, Spain, ⁠Sweden and the UK moved towards restrictions on trade in goods ⁠with settlements which ⁠are illegal under international law. - FMT