Foreign Office minister attacks Livingstone over Hamas interview

Ivan Lewis says New Statesman interview was a "propaganda coup" for the Hamas leader

By Staff blogger Published 18 September 2009

The Foreign Office minister, Ivan Lewis, has launched an outspoken attack on Ken Livingstone over his interview with the leader of Hamas in this week's New Statesman.

Lewis, whose responsibilities include Middle East policy, accused the former Mayor of London of handing Khaled Meshal, the head of the Islamist group, a "propaganda coup" by interviewing him.

In a statement issued by his office, Lewis said: "Ken Livingstone rightly earned praise for his strong and responsible leadership in the aftermath of the 7/7 attacks on London.

It is therefore particularly regrettable that he learned the wrong lessons from history by handing a propaganda coup to the leader of a terrorist organisation.

Hamas has not only breached international law by firing rockets at civilian populations in Israel but continues to violate the human rights of Palestinians in Gaza."

In the interview, Livingstone sought to pre-empt such criticism by arguing that "at the beginning of any peace process, what matters most is engagement."

He recalled that he had been "vilified" in the Eighties for his talks with Sinn Fein leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, a policy later adopted by Tony Blair's Labour government.

Livingstone wrote: "No major conflict can be resolved without each side talking to the other. That was the case in South Africa, Ireland and countless other situations where people said they would never talk to their opponents."

He added: "In the Middle East, peace can only be achieved through discussion between the elected representatives of both the Israelis and the Palestinians - and that means Hamas, which won a big majority in the last Palestinian parliamentary election, as well as Fatah."

Lewis is a long-standing supporter of Israel and was formerly the vice-chair of Labour Friends of Israel. He defended the country's widely-criticised military assault on Gaza in January 2009.

Hamas remains a proscribed terrorist organisation in the European Union and the UK government has refused to talk to the group until it renounces violence and formally recognises Israel.

The Commons foreign affairs committee recently urged ministers to begin talks with Hamas and warned that non-engagement appeared to be achieving little.

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3 comments

Fri, 2009-09-18 17:34 — AdamSGNJ

I think the interview might have been more useful if Mr Livingstone were a more critical and sceptical
interlocutor. Though he makes some mild statements about fostering dialogue and remaining neutral, his
belittling of Qassam rockets and his limp, superficial questioning undermines his professed goal. The result, intended or not, is indeed to give a big, English-language soapbox to the hardest-liner in a hardline movement. Appalling.

Sat, 2009-09-19 14:12 — Leigh M Ross

This shouldn't be surprising. The norm is to talk to only those that can or are providing successful resistance. That's why the South African government had to start negotiating with the African National Congress, since they represented the vast majority of the population and were launching some effective bomb attacks around the country. That's why talking to the Taliban is suddenly on the table in Afghanistan, because beating them militarily doesn't seem to be an option. Or countries deal with North-Korea through talks, since they have nuclear weapons and a very large military. Even Iran will offer significant military resistance, so countries propose talks. But those that are not providing very effective resistance, such as those in Gaza, continue to suffer under military rule. That's also why poor Tibet seems permanently stuck under Chinese rule. So clearly the message countries tend to send these days is this: the more violent you are, the larger your military, the more nuclear weapons you have, and so forth, the less likely we are to invade or occupy your country or declare war against you. And this is a pretty alarming message that can be changed only if the populations of democratic countries force their governments to change it. So of course governments would object to media coverage of the weak underdog's position: if governments do not want to talk to them, they certainly wouldn't want their countries' populations to think that these people are worth talking to or might have some plausible points to make. They're meant to be rogues or terrorists, after all, not people with reasonable grievances.

Sat, 2009-09-19 15:50 — mount1

It seems you must always remember that despite the clear divisions of opinion on rights and wrongs in the area, there are substantial corporate reasons for backing one view.

And for those of us with no corporate ties it is also always worth remembering that one side have grievances of sub-standard life - that there but for the grace of god, go us, and the other side. Are intellectual grievances to be compared? Are we not beyond the age of believing man can live by religion alone? Do we the people wish others to see us as Blair/Brown?

Too many stupid or distracted people in the world thinking that if you criminalise something, it just goes away ... and they're being used by people who know it doesn't.