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Labour Party Foreign Policy in the Middle East – an Analysis

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Labour Party Foreign Policy in the Middle East – an Analysis BICOM Briefing Labour Party foreign policy in the Middle East – an analysis November 2017 Key points: Introduction • The Labour leadership’s approach to • The results of the 2017 general election and international affairs, as with other policy subsequent polling indicate that a Labour areas, is in flux as the radical left agenda government led by Jeremy Corbyn as Prime that has defined Jeremy Corbyn and his Minister is a real possibility. Labour’s supporters meshes with the possibility of potential Middle East policy demands facing the real world challenges that come attention not least because Jeremy Corbyn’s with holding office. long record of positions on Middle East issues, in line with radical left positions • Labour’s positions taken in the 2017 which have shaped his career, give the manifesto, and in Jeremy Corbyn’s speeches potential for a radical shift. But to what and interviews since becoming leader, extent would these ideas shape Labour were more moderate than those to which government policy? he subscribed previously, though would still signal a major realignment, threatening • This paper summarises the Labour leader’s to drive a wedge between Britain and its record on international affairs and the Middle traditional allies – both Israel and Western- East, before analysing statements by him and aligned Arab states. Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry. • Labour has clearly committed to supporting • Any predictions are of course inherently a two-state solution, but a manifesto pledge uncertain. The possibility of holding office to recognise Palestine would likely be swiftly is forcing Labour’s leadership to focus on fulfilled by a Labour government, boosting the building a winning electoral coalition, and to Palestinians’ campaign for recognition outside consider the difference between opposition the context of an agreement with Israel, whilst rhetoric and the dilemmas that come with having a chilling effect on UK-Israel relations. holding office. In addition, decisions in This could be compounded if the Labour government would be shaped by the specific leader’s calls for increasing international political conditions following an election pressure on Israel were expressed by a shift (e.g. size of majority; portfolio allocations; in its voting patterns in the United Nations, potential coalition partners; balance of power UNESCO, and the UN Human Rights Council and views in cabinet etc.), as well as the to move closer to Palestinian positions. regional situation. • During a recent visit to Israel Shadow What is Jeremy Corbyn’s record on Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry stressed international affairs and the Middle East? Labour’s commitment to UK-Israel relations and her opposition to BDS, but also said • Jeremy Corbyn has moderated many of his she would personally avoid buying goods positions over the last two years. As the from settlements. Moreover, whereas the prospect of general election victory has Conservatives have worked against local become more realistic, his positions have government boycotts, Labour has said local increasing reflected an interest in broadening councils should set their own policies, his electoral appeal and avoiding a party raising concerns that pro-boycott positions – split. Nonetheless, he assumed the role after which have support on the Labour left – may a 30-year Parliamentary career in which his gain ground under a Labour government. views were consistently articulated. • The way in which a Labour government • Corbyn comes from Labour’s radical left, might react to major events in the region, and throughout his career was considered such as wars between Israel and Hamas or marginal in the Parliamentary Labour Party Hezbollah, will be just as consequential as (PLP). His approach to international affairs any preordained policy shift. has typically been articulated in relation to 1 specific issues rather than an overarching Israel – as an instance of Apartheid. In ideology. Nonetheless, those positions have the 1980s Corbyn was a supporter of the been consistent with an anti-capitalist, post- Labour Movement Campaign for Palestine colonial and anti-imperial world view which which supported replacing Israel with a tends to see the West, led by the United secular democratic state of Palestine and States, as a malign force which has exploited called “to eradicate Zionism” from “the the developing world or “global south”. Labour Movement”. Corbyn is a patron of The hostility to Western capitalism feeds a the Palestine Solidarity Campaign which “campist” mind-set, which tends to view all is ambiguous about a two-state solution radical forces challenging Western hegemony but which calls for the right of return for as essentially aligned. Palestinian refugees of 1948 and their descendants – interpreted by Israel as a • This approach underpinned positions taken threat to its existence as a Jewish nation by Corbyn in international affairs before state – and which opposes what it terms becoming leader: hostility towards NATO “the apartheid and Zionist nature of the and the European Union; sympathy for those Israeli state”. In a 2015 interview shortly challenging Western hegemony including before being elected Labour leader, Corbyn Russia and Venezuela; sympathy for radical stressed that the “right to return” of even armed movements considered emancipatory fourth generation Palestinian refugees was or post-colonial (including the IRA); a “key” to solving the conflict. Israel’s security tendency toward pacifism which includes barrier – built to prevent Palestinian terrorists unilateral nuclear disarmament; blanket reaching Israeli population centres after a opposition to Western military interventions wave of suicide bombings in 2001-2 – was including even the 1999 Kosovo intervention; described by Corbyn as “an absurd piece of and a sense of common cause with Islamist 21st century civil engineering built upon the groups and leaders. principle of apartheid”.1 • Corbyn’s political cooperation with Islamists • Corbyn and some of his leading supporters has included working alongside the Muslim have also tended towards a narrow Brotherhood-aligned Muslim Association view of antisemitism, which sees it as of Britain, and support for radical armed a malaise of the fascist and racist right, groups Hamas and Hezbollah, whom Corbyn without acknowledging the deep roots described as “friends” in a 2009 speech. of antisemitism on the left, and the links From 2011 to 2015 Corbyn chaired the between antisemitism and anti-Zionism. Stop the War Coalition, a campaign group Whilst Corbyn has repeatedly stressed mobilised in response to the US and UK led that he abhors any form of antisemitism, “War on Terror” following 9/11, which serves he has in the past associated with groups as an umbrella to mobilise radical left and and individuals with overtly antisemitic Islamist activists in a sustained anti-Western views. When the revelation of antisemitic and anti-Zionist campaign. The group has views among Labour office holders mired been an important source of organisational the party in controversy after Corbyn’s and campaign backing for Corbyn. election, he commissioned a report to address the challenge and backed rule • Corbyn has a long record of support for changes to strengthen procedures for anti-Zionist positions that frame Israel as expelling members. However, many remain a product of Western imperialism, a racist unconvinced that he has truly grasped the colonial enterprise, and an oppressor of problem, and the failure to permanently expel Palestinian rights. This same conception former mayor of London Ken Livingstone for frames the Palestinians as the archetypal, engaging in Holocaust revisionism is seen as just, anti-colonial, national liberation exemplifying a half-hearted response. movement. This approach regards Israel and its relationship with Arabs – those 1 Dave Rich, The Left’s Jewish Problem: Jeremy Corbyn, Israel in the occupied territories and citizens of and Antisemitism (London: Biteback Publishing, 2016). 2 What policies has Labour proposed and In a speech to Chatham House in May 2017, what would their effects be? Corbyn said Labour would want a “strong and friendly” relationship with the US, • The following summary of Labour policy before criticising the Trump administration’s positions draws on Corbyn’s recent speeches “reckless” and “erratic” foreign policy. He and interviews, the 2017 manifesto, and criticised Theresa May’s “hand holding with comments from other members of Labour’s Donald Trump” and declared that, “Britain front bench, principally Shadow Foreign deserves better than simply outsourcing Secretary Emily Thornberry. Overall these our country’s security and prosperity to reflect a conscious moderation by Corbyn of the whims of the Trump White House.” views he articulated previously, as well as Thornberry described Trump’s reasons for the tension of trying to bridge between the believing the Iran nuclear deal is not working left-wing agenda of Corbyn and his support as “a figment of his fevered brain”. Such base, and the more centrist views of the bulk language no doubt plays into a broad based of the Parliamentary Labour Party, and the distaste for Trump amongst the electorate but wider electorate. would surely undercut the goal of a “strong and friendly” relationship if carried into Cooling relations with US government. Most likely once in government the Labour leadership would be more diplomatic, but how exactly they would seek • Labour appears ready to back away
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