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As Israel starves children, Labour MPs overwhelmingly fail to back Corbyn’s challenge

On 4 June, former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn challenged MPs to back an “inquiry into the UK’s complicity in genocide”. His Gaza (independent public inquiry) bill was a chance for MPs to support accountability, or to “block our attempts to uncover the truth”. And while it passed its first reading in a quiet parliament, the vast majority of Labour MPs were nowhere to be seen. This was despite Israel’s ongoing genocidal attempts to starve Palestinian children into inconsolable despair.

Corbyn: Israel starves children

Outside parliament, protesters (and some MPs) insisted that “starving children is a red line”. One British surgeon, meanwhile, told journalists about witnessing Israel’s campaign of “mass murder and mutilation” in Gaza, calling it “the most appalling humanitarian catastrophe of our young century”. Another said children were entering hospital as if on a “conveyor belt“. She added that:

I was running an operating list and everyday at least half of the people on it were under the age of 11

Israel’s genocide has taken a massive toll on Gaza’s children, killing around one per hour since October 2023. And in this context, it’s hardly surprising to hear Save the Children’s humanitarian director Rachael Cummings saying:

Children are sharing with us now that they wish to be dead… [they] see no hope, they see no future.

This is, indeed, the mission for many politicians leading Israel’s settler-colonial project in Palestine. Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, for example, wants to “kill the de facto Palestinian state”. And he promised last month that people in Gaza:

will be totally despairing, understanding that there is no hope and nothing to look for in Gaza, and will be looking for relocation to begin a new life in other places.

Most Labour MPs have no red line, apparently

Despite Cummings’s comments, Save the Children emphasised that:

the UK continues to transfer arms to Israel.

In fact, the British government is currently in court trying to defend its actions. Because under both Conservative and now Labour rule, the UK has consistently offered Israel the political and material support it has needed to commit genocide.

Jeremy Corbyn’s bill to investigate Britain’s role in Israel’s genocide got cross-party support. But only a “small number of MPs” were in parliament to vote it through. Only 10 Labour MPs signed the letter co-sponsoring Corbyn’s call (they were Diane Abbott, Jon Trickett, Imran Hussain, Richard Burgon, Kim Johnson, Nadia Whittome, Ian Byrne, Neil-Duncan Jordan, Steve Witherden, and Brian Leishman). Bell Ribeiro-Addy also said she was supporting it. The second reading will take place on 4 July.

However, there are currently 403 Labour MPs in total. So the overwhelming majority stayed silent, while a handful even opted to visit Israel’s genocide-cheerleading head of state recently. And as the independent socialist left gears up for the creation of a new party, most Labour MPs have shown they prefer to go down with a sinking ship siding with genocide.

Keir Starmer’s government – which, just hours after the first reading passed, allowed a US military plane to fly from RAF Akrotiri to Israel and a UK spy plane to fly over Gaza – is unlikely to allow time for debating Corbyn’s bill or make it law. But what the challenge does is it draws a line in the sand. Which MPs are willing to stand against genocide, and which aren’t? Because that is something we should never forget.

Featured image via the House of Commons

By Ed Sykes

This post was originally published on Canary.