The International Community must press for an immediate ceasefire, not only “restraint”. My article in the Huffington Post today is online here. You can also help the people of Gaza in a practical way by donating to Medical Aid For Palestinians’ emergency appeal online here. See more about MAP’s work online here. Gaza: Leaders play to the Gallery, the innocent suffer but will the...
Over 60 British MPs from across seven political parties have signed a parliamentary motion supporting UN recognition of Palestine.
The MPs signed the motion after the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared his intention to ask the UN General Assembly to recognise Palestine as a non-member state when the General Assembly meets between 24 September and 1 October.
MPs welcome independent report on Palestinian children in military custody Members of the UK Parliament have welcomed the publication yesterday of a hard-hitting report by senior British lawyers on the treatment of Palestinian children under Israeli military law. The report – funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office – found that Israel is in breach of a series of articles under the UN...
On a delegation with the All-Party Parliamentary Jordan Group, I visited Ramtha in the north of Jordan with Andrew Harper from UNHCR to look at the situation facing refugees fleeing from Syria and the impact this is having in Jordan.
Damon Hill is right to call on the governing body of motor sport to rethink its decision to go ahead with this year’s Bahrain Grand Prix. I say that as someone who is a motor sport nut as well as an MP with a keen interest in the Middle East. The inquiry which the Bahrain Government set up into the events on its streets last year proved to be more independent than many expected and there is...
We finally entered Gaza through its Rafah border crossing with Egypt mid Sunday morning and spent the next 22 hours in the strip. As ever, Gaza was surreal. Things that logically could not sit side by side do so. To understand the place, you have to suspend disbelief. For the next 22 hours we did so.
I was Labour Member of Parliament for Birmingham Northfield between 1992 and 2019 and a former Shadow Transport Minister. I now chair Healthwatch in Birmingham and Solihull, and the West Midlands Board of Remembering Srebrenica. I also work as a public affairs consultant. I am an effective community advocate and stakeholder alliance builder with a passion for human rights. I am a trustee of the Balfour Project charity and of Citizens Advice Birmingham, and a former Chair of Medical Aid for Palestinians.