The letter protesting against his visit on Thursday is signed by the leaders of Unite, RMT, Aslef and TSSA unions, and numbers of the Labour MPs and many other activists and academics.
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In a letter to the Guardian, MPs, union leaders and others say that as head of government Israeli prime minister must bear responsibility for war crimes.
According to Taghrib news reporter(TNA) in London, a group of union leaders, Labour MPs and other prominent leftwingers has denounced Binyamin Netanyahu’s official visit to Britain this week, saying that as head of government the Israeli prime minister “must bear responsibility for war crimes identified by the UN human rights council in its investigation into Israel’s 2014 assault on Gaza”. the letter reads.
During the conflict in July and August of last year, Israel carried out 6,000 airstrikes and fired 50,000 tanks and artillery shells, killing 2200 Palestinian civilians, at least 500 of them were children.
The international criminal court is conducting a preliminary investigation into the conduct of the war in the face of stiff Israeli opposition, while more than 105,000 Britons have signed an online petition calling for Netanyahu to be arrested on war crimes charges when he arrives, passing the 100,000-signature threshold required for parliament to consider a debate on the issue.
Israel’s foreign ministry has previously described the petition as “a PR exercise with no real meaning”.
“Bilateral ties between Britain and Israel are closer than ever before, as evidenced by data on mutual trade, doubled in recent years, and by cooperation in academic studies, culture and science between the two countries,” it said.
The letter protesting against his visit on Thursday is signed by the leaders of Unite, RMT, Aslef and TSSA unions, and numbers of the Labour MPs and many other activists and academics.
“While Cameron continues to impose limits on the number of refugees who can take shelter in the UK, he is willing to welcome Netanyahu to our shores … We call on him to instead impose immediate sanctions and an arms embargo on Israel until it complies with international law and ends the blockade and the occupation,” the letter reads.
The visit is expected to trigger widespread protests and stiff security measures. There was no immediate response to a request for comment from the Israeli embassy in London or Downing Street.
