Israeli President Isaac Herzog said that he and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had a "tough" meeting on Wednesday in Downin...
Israeli President Isaac Herzog said that he and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had a "tough" meeting on Wednesday in Downing Street. During the meeting, they talked about how they felt about each other's countries' recent actions.
The meeting takes place the day after Israel launched a bombing against Hamas to kill the political leaders of the Islamist group in Qatar, a British friend in the Middle East. Starmer spoke out against this action.
Britain is going to join France, Canada, and other Western countries in recognizing a Palestinian state later this month. This has made Israel angry because Israel has to meet certain conditions, such as ending the fighting in Gaza.
We can argue because friends can argue when they get together. Things that were said were tough and strong. She said this at a later Chatham House event: "We are both democracies."
He said that the difference came from Starmer's plan for a Palestinian state and his views on humanitarian aid in Gaza. He also said that he had asked the British government to go to Israel to find out more.
The office of Sir Michael Starmer said that the British leader begged Herzog to change his mind about Gaza, saying that he was very worried about the humanitarian situation and told Israel to stop military operations and let in aid.
He said again that the UK and Israel had been friends for a long time and that he was still committed to working for a lasting peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis.
Before going into the building, the two men shook hands quickly on the steps of Downing Street but didn't smile.
Starmer and Herzog also talked about the Israeli airstrike on Qatar, which they both said was "completely unacceptable."
"He said the strikes were a flagrant violation of a key partner’s sovereignty and do nothing to secure the peace we all desperately want to see," a Downing Street rep said.
The war in Gaza has made it harder for Israel to get along with Britain and other European countries. Britain has made it impossible for Israeli officials to go to this week's biggest defense trade show. Some leaders in Starmer's own party want him to be harder on Israel, but on Wednesday he told parliament that peace talks were needed to stop the fighting in Gaza and free the Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
Herzog is only officially Israel's president, but he made a lot of people angry when he said that all Gazans were to blame for the Hamas-led attack on Israel after the October 7 bombings in 2023.
Early on Wednesday, someone asked Starmer why he was meeting with Herzog. He replied, "I will not give up on diplomacy; that is the politics of students." This week, Starmer's health minister, Wes Streeting, said that the way Israel was treating the war in Gaza was making it a "pariah state."
Starmer also met with Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, on Monday. During their meeting, they agreed that Hamas would have "absolutely no role" in running a future Palestinian state.
Before the U.N. General Assembly later this month, Britain said it would recognize a Palestinian state. But Israel has to meet four conditions first, such as stopping the war in Gaza and letting more aid into the Palestinian region.
(Andrew MacAskill, William James, and Sam Tabahriti wrote the story; Gareth Jones and Daniel Wallis edited it.)