August 27 2026 - 1:00pm
The announcement by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich of plans to build settlements in the so-called E1 area of the West Bank — cutting off Palestinian East Jerusalem from the rest of the territory — has reportedly prompted Andy Burnham to adopt a UK-wide boycott of all Israeli settler products and businesses.
Burnham has so far been surefooted in his negotiation of issues which dragged down Keir Starmer’s leadership, and this is further evidence of his smart politics, even if it ultimately has little impact on the situation in the West Bank itself. Though it will certainly make British relations with Israel more tense, as the Jewish state considers expelling officials from its Gaza headquarters.
Yet while there is a clear moral case for making this decision — these settlements are illegal under international law — you don’t have to be too cynical to assume that the policy is more designed for internal Labour Party politics, and for winning back disaffected voters from the Green Party.
In this regard, it is a no-brainer: 140 Labour MPs have already signed a letter in support of the sanctions, and it will help Burnham’s signal that he is breaking with Starmer on the issue — much like his admission that Labour “got Gaza wrong”.
After all, support for the settlers is a contentious position within Israel itself, with 40% of citizens saying settlements help national security while 35% say the opposite. Meanwhile, the combined vote of the religious-settler parties at the last Knesset election, in 2022, was just over 10%.
Even Labour Friends of Israel state that it “strongly opposes” the settlements, and supports “steps against violent settler extremists and the organizations which support them”, while Steve Yemm MP, who, despite warning of the “unintended consequences” of Burnham’s boycott, nonetheless stresses that he strongly opposes the E1 development itself.
Although some of the more uncritical supporters of Israel in the Labour Party are already grumbling that it will be difficult to enforce and risks an effective boycott of the entire country, there simply isn’t a meaningful political constituency to oppose this move.
It also makes sense to make the decision now, since the optics from the West Bank will only get worse — in the months leading up to the Israeli election in October, it is likely there will be ever-increasing settler violence against the Palestinian population. By getting ahead of this and announcing sanctions now, it will make Burnham look less like a hostage to events or as though he is being reluctantly forced into decisions he would rather not take, as with Starmer’s belated recognition of a Palestinian state.
At the same time, it avoids committing to anything too painful or controversial, such as ending all arms exports to Israel, or stopping all military cooperation and intelligence sharing. It also won’t make a noticeable difference to the UK economy or consumer prices, given that Israel accounts for just 0.3% of UK trade, and the West Bank settlements make up just a fraction of that figure.
That such a boycott would have so little impact on the UK also indicates what little difference it would make to Israeli settlement policy — although this could change if other countries follow suit.
In fact, the international situation has never been more favorable for renewed action against the West Bank settlements. A poll conducted immediately before the Iran war found that, for the first time in decades, more Americans sympathized with the Palestinian cause than with Israel.
Assuming that the Democrats take back the House of Representatives during November’s midterms, it is not hard to see the US Congress taking a firmer line with the settlers than ever before, and Donald Trump going along with it, either as leverage to win Israeli support in other areas, such as his Gaza peace plan, out of spite for the fiasco of the Iran war, or just out of sheer indifference.
Currently, only a few European nations, such as Spain and Ireland, sanction Israeli settlements and West Bank businesses — but if Burnham’s decision sets in motion a broader trend, like the UK’s and France’s decision to recognize a Palestinian state, it may shift the foreign policy Overton window, so that sanctioning settlers and settlements becomes widely adopted, making a difference way beyond UK politics.
