A powerful coalition of British and French former diplomats is demanding a ban on arms transfers and a freeze on EU-Israel and UK-Israel trade agreements.

A coalition of 102 former French and British diplomats is calling on their countries to jointly sanction Israel, warning in an open letter that Israeli policy in occupied Palestinian territory threatens to permanently erase the possibility of a Palestinian state.

An open letter demands a ban on arms transfers and a freeze on EU-Israel and UK-Israel trade agreements.

France and the United Kingdom “must act together to uphold international law in Palestine”, said the letter published last week by French outlet Le Monde. It urged the two governments to push for “equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians”.

The signatories include former British ambassadors to the United Nations, Jeremy Greenstock and Emyr Jones Parry, and former French Middle East directors, Yves Aubin de la Messuziere and Denis Bauchard, drawing on decades of diplomatic postings across the region.

“Palestinian house demolitions and rampant settler violence – with the connivance of the Israeli army and police – amount to ethnic cleansing,” said the letter. “The world no longer sees Israel as a genuine democracy,” it added.

Such language, said Nicholas Hopton, a former UK ambassador to Iran, Qatar and Yemen and one of the signatories, was not invented by the diplomats themselves.

“The words are not our own,” he told Al Jazeera. “They are taken from the international legal bodies, the UN, those who have been observing from a neutral position and with expertise.”

The letter arrives against the backdrop of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, which has killed more than 72,000 Palestinians since October 2023. Despite a ceasefire that took effect in October 2025, Israeli attacks have continued, killing at least 1,285 Palestinians since, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health.

‘Action, not words’

For Hopton, the more immediate trigger was Israel’s renewed push to expand settlements in the occupied West Bank.

“There is a move by the Israeli government to allow settlements to be created in the West Bank in a way that would almost realistically prevent a future Palestinian state being able to be created there,” he said.

Peter Millett, a former British ambassador to Libya and another signatory, told Al Jazeera the letter marks a shift from words to demands. “What we’re asking for is action, not words,” he said.

“Our ministers over the last few months and years have issued statements of criticism, of condemnation and so forth, but as the letter makes clear, this is the time now where we need to see action on trade, action on settlements, more support for aid to go into Gaza, and the ending of the arms trade.”

France and the UK recognised a Palestinian state in 2025, a step the letter argues now needs to be “made real by urgent action”. The signatories trace their countries’ responsibility back to the mandates the UK and France held over Palestine, Syria and Lebanon after World War I, which shaped the region’s modern borders.

“Our two nations believe that those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity must be held to account,” the letter states. “Only then can our governments rebut the accusation of double standards.”

The letter lays out specific measures for France and the UK to adopt jointly: suspending EU-Israel and UK-Israel trade agreements and halting arms transfers and military co-operation with Israel.

It also calls for a ban on trade with Israeli settlements, a ban on citizens purchasing property on occupied Palestinian land, and guaranteed humanitarian access to Gaza through UNRWA and other UN agencies, with protected access for journalists, diplomats and parliamentarians.

“These actions, imposing penalties for law-breaking, safeguard the rule of law and show that there is an alternative to violence,” the letter states.

Millett said he wants his government to go further still, including openly backing the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and confronting Israeli settler violence directly.

“What they’re trying to do is force these Palestinians to cross the River Jordan into Jordan itself,” he said, describing Jordan as a long-standing Western ally.

“We cannot stand by and see this continually happen in Israel, which is explicitly saying it will never accept a two-state solution,” he said.

Asked whether he thinks Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is listening, Millett was doubtful, but said pressure still matters: “Action on trade, if it affects the prosperity of Israel, then maybe that’s a step that would actually have some repercussions in Israel itself.”

The letter is not directed solely at Israel; it also calls on Palestinian leadership, which it describes as “unrepresentative and dysfunctional”, to ensure the internationally recognised state remains “democratic and law-abiding”, pointing to elections scheduled for November as an opportunity for renewal.

For Hopton, though, the real test lies with governments willing to act rather than simply condemn, and he singled out the United States as the most consequential actor.

“The United States … has the most influence over the actions of the Israeli government,” he told Al Jazeera, warning that continued inaction “will create a longer-term, irreconcilable problem and store up future violence and future tragedies”.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/8/22/over-100-ex-diplomats-urge-france-uk-to-sanction-israel-over-palestine

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