Sarwar defies UK Labour with call to end arms exports to Israel

Scottish leader at odds with Shanks and Starmer

SCOTTISH Labour’s Anas Sarwar has defied the central UK leadership and restated his calls for arms exports to Israel to end – just a day after one of his own MPs refused to back him.

On Sunday, shadow Scotland Office minister Michael Shanks repeatedly declined to support his nominal leader in calls for weapons sales to Israel to end.

Shanks insisted it was “right” not to take a position without having seen the UK Government legal advice on the issue – the position taken by the UK Labour leadership.

However, speaking to delegates at the Scottish Trades Union annual congress in Dundee yesterday, Sarwar said it was “clear” Israel was breaching international law, and took aim at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying the continued retaliation on Gaza “undermined the cause of peace”.

Sarwar has previously called for a ceasefire but in his speech went further, claiming Israel had committed breaches of international law by “attacking difference between Scottish and UK Labour policy.

Sarwar condemned the attack by Hamas on October 7, adding that it was “the largest loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust”.

He continued: “The scenes of death and destruction we witnessed on that day and the attacks on Gaza every day since have left us heartbroken. The people of Israel and Palestine desperately deserve peace, security and freedom.

“But right now, we have a terror organisation, Hamas, who have no interest in peace and Netanyahu’s far-right Israeli government that isn’t interested in peace either.”

Sarwar added that “the rhetoric and actions of Netanyahu’s government undermine the cause of peace”.

The Scottish Labour leader pointed to humanitarian supplies not being allowed to enter Gaza, as well as the destruction of hospitals and schools and loss of innocent life.

The Israeli military’s bombardments and ground offensives in Gaza have killed more than 33,700 Palestinians and wounded over 76,200, the Gaza Health Ministry has said.