The UK is drafting sanctions to ban trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank, indicating Prime Minister Burnham seeks a tougher stance on an issue important to left-leaning Labour voters. Foreign Secretary Miliband is weighing options over the next few weeks to increase pressure on Israel’s settlement expansion, including creating a new sanctions mechanism to block goods and services linked to West Bank settlements and expanding human-rights sanctions to cover obstruction of humanitarian

The UK is drafting sanctions to ban trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank, indicating Prime Minister Burnham seeks a tougher stance on an issue important to left-leaning Labour voters. Foreign Secretary Miliband is weighing options over the next few weeks to increase pressure on Israel’s settlement expansion, including creating a new sanctions mechanism to block goods and services linked to West Bank settlements and expanding human-rights sanctions to cover obstruction of humanitarian aid. Miliband may also explicitly back the International Court of Justice’s 2024 non-binding opinion that Israel’s occupation of territories the UK recognizes as Palestinian is illegal.