London (Parliament Politics Magazine) – Lawyers have presented evidence to the UK High Court highlighting severe Palestinian suffering and calling for a halt to arms exports to Israel, citing potential war crimes.
What Are the Key Allegations Against the UK Government Regarding Arms Exports?
Declarations of Palestinians being tormented, left untreated in hospital and incapable of escaping constant bombardment have been presented to the high court in London by lawyers pursuing an order preventing the UK government from persisting in granting arms export licenses to British companies trading arms with Israel.
How Does the Witness Testimony Illuminate the Plight of Palestinians in Gaza?
The 14 witness declarations covering more than 100 pages come from Palestinian and western medical doctors operating in Gaza’s hospitals, as well as from ambulance drivers, civil defence department employees and aid workers.
The graphic proof is designed to back a request for a court order that the UK government has acted irrationally in declining to ban the sale of arms, arguing there was not a straightforward risk the weapons would be employed to commit breaches of international humanitarian law.
The inscribed testimony has been provided by witnesses all identified to the court, but only two of them are being called by the Guardian due to the need to protect families in Gaza from potential retaliation. The judicial review is due to be held between 8 and 10 October.
How Are NGOs Involved in the Legal Challenge to UK Arms Exports?
The case has been conveyed by an alliance of NGOs including Al-Haq, Global Legal Action Network (GLAN), Amnesty International, Oxfam and Human Rights Watch. It is the first try to put such a graphic affidavit of alleged Israeli war crimes in front of a British magistrate since Hamas launched its deadly attack on Israel on 7 October in which more than 1,100 Israelis were killed and 250 taken hostage.
The earlier Conservative administration upheld its decision to continue to grant licences, stating there was insufficient risk that UK weapons were being employed in war crimes.
What Are the Main Concerns Raised by Medical and Aid Workers in the Testimonies?
One of the quoted witnesses, Dr Ben Thomson, a Canadian kidney specialist, stated he treated a patient who had been pushed to stand for 48 hours, needing a skin graft on his heel. He stated he also treated a 60-year-old man who had been undressed naked by Israeli forces, whose wrists had been tied tightly for three days, and who had been carried on the floor, pushing his wrist to be worn down to the bone.
He stated: “Every part of the healthcare system has been hit and destroyed and is now completely incompetent in providing care. So many people are passing from completely treatable issues.” He stated he had personally treated three kids whom he could have saved if he had any access to the proper medicines.
He vowed that when he visited the tent city in Rafah in March, water was assigned to three litres a day and there was one toilet for every 800 people. He stated he was forced to reset bones without pain medicine and that on one occasion, such was the overcrowding in a hospital that a man in his care died “on the floor in a pool of his own blood and brain matter”.