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Comment and Opinion

Fathom Journal: Britain’s reaction to Operation Protective Edge, by Toby Greene

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With the next general election in sniffing distance, the political stakes are high for the political parties. Meanwhile the interaction of coalition politics and foreign policy – a novel experience for British politics – added a new layer of complexity to the policy making process.

When the conflict erupted, Prime Minister David Cameron followed the tone he set in his March speech to the Knesset, with a fulsome message of support for Israel. He reassured Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Britain’s ‘staunch support for Israel in the face of such attacks, and underlined Israel’s right to defend itself from them.’

Cameron defended Israel’s right to self-defence throughout the conflict, resisting calls to condemn Israel’s actions as ‘disproportionate’ or to suspend arms exports. Meanwhile Philip Hammond, who assumed the role of Foreign Secretary during the first week of the conflict, welcomed Israel’s acceptance of the 15 July ceasefire, and dismissed the UN Human Rights Council 23 July resolution condemning Israel and commissioning an inquiry as ‘fundamentally unbalanced’. During his visit to Israel in the last week of July, Hammond stressed that Hamas was to blame for the violence.

The Media Fuels Bottom Up Politics

But with mounting public concern amidst intensive media coverage of civilian suffering in the Gaza Strip, the position of the Conservatives became increasingly strained.

The media’s coverage in the first week or two of the conflict, from the perspective of Israel’s supporters, was better than expected. Hamas’s increased capabilities, deploying rockets that brought all Israel’s major population centres in range, was noticed even by media outlets usually seen as hostile to Israel. Israeli voices and perspectives were widely heard.

Read the article in full at Fathom Journal.