President Trump’s decision last week to abandon the Kurds and give the green light to Turkey’s invasion of north-eastern Syria has sent shockwaves through the Middle East, including in Israel. Even as the US now apparently scrambles to rein Turkey in, the impact of the president’s actions may be far-reaching. Read more…
The first part of Donald Trump’s much-delayed plan to secure “the ultimate deal” – peace between Israel and the Palestinians – was published on Saturday. The document, entitled Peace To Prosperity, outlines a $50bn investment plan ahead of an “economic workshop” in Bahrain this week. The Palestinian Authority, which is Read more…
LFI vice-chair Dame Louise Ellman MP has spoken about the forgotten plight of the Jewish refugees from the Middle East and north Africa, in a Parliamentary debate. In a debate in Westminster Hall, Dame Louise Ellman highlighted the tragic plight of the 850,000 Jews displaced from the Middle East in Read more…
Shortly before he was inaugurated as president in January 2017, Donald Trump said of Jared Kushner: “If you can’t produce peace in the Middle East, nobody can.” Pulling off the “deal of the century” – peace between Israel, the Palestinians and the Arab world – would have been a large task for Read more…
Israel has begun to lift the veil on its eight-year effort to counter Iran’s attempt to further its ambitions in Syria during the country’s bloody civil war. In an interview with the Sunday Times last weekend, Lieutenant-General Gadi Eisenkot, Israel’s top military commander, spoke openly for the first time about its strategy in Read more…
This week, LFI, in partnership with CFI and the Israeli Embassy, hosted a special briefing in parliament to commemorate the plight of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and Iran. Ambassador Mark Regev and Board of Deputies vice-president Edwin Shuker spoke about the 850,000 Jewish refugees who were forced to flee Read more…
Labour Friends of Israel Annual Lunch, 27 November 2018 Remarks by the Ambassador of Israel, HE Mark Regev. Check against delivery. Chief Rabbi, Chair of the Jewish Agency, Isaac Herzog, Deputy Leader, Tom Watson, Chair of LFI, Joan Ryan, Parliamentarians and friends, And a very special thanks to Sir Read more…
*** CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY *** Rt Hon Joan Ryan MP Labour Friends of Israel Annual Lunch 2018 Chief Rabbi, Ambassador Regev, friends Thank you to all of you for being here today. In particular, I want to thank Sir David Garrard and Isaac Kaye, our long-standing lunch sponsors. I also want to thank all Read more…
Rarely has an American administration invested such hope in – or kow-towed so nakedly to – a Middle Eastern state in the manner which Donald Trump’s has done since taking office last January. The president’s entire strategy for the region appears to have been shaped by a belief that Saudi Read more…
The fragile working relationship between Israel and Russia in Syria – which gave Israel freedom of manoeuvre in Syrian skies – has come under severe strain after the downing of a Russian Ilyushin military intelligence plane, killing the 15 servicemen on board. The incident, which occurred in mid-September, saw Syrian Read more…
LFI chair Joan Ryan wrote this week to Jeremy Corbyn asking him to explain his apparent decision to honour the terrorists behind the Munich massacre during a 2014 visit to Tunisia. Ms Ryan also called upon the Labour leader to apologise to the bereaved families of the 11 Israeli athletes who were Read more…
Last weekend, in an extraordinary humanitarian operation, Israel helped evacuate 800 members of the White Helmets and their families. Israel, working with North American and European countries, including the UK, transported the humanitarian workers from South West Syria into Jordan. Jordan, which has consistently refused to accept Syrian refugees in recent years, Read more…