Miliband apologises to Palestinians and admits Britain was 'too slow to act' on ICJ ruling

Ed Miliband has apologised to Palestinians on behalf of the British government for failing to act sooner over Gaza and the West Bank, saying ministers were "too slow to act" on the International Court of Justice finding that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful.

Asked in an interview with UK Fact Check on Wednesday whether Britain owed Palestinians an apology, the Foreign Secretary said: "Yes, absolutely. We should have done more about the suffering in Gaza. We should have done more about what was happening in the West Bank. And I'm sorry we didn't."

The apology goes beyond Mr Miliband's Commons statement on Tuesday, in which he spoke of "a deep sense of shame", declared the occupation unlawful as the official position of the British government and announced an import ban on goods from Israeli settlements alongside sanctions on the companies that build, finance and sell homes in them. It also amounts to an admission, from a minister who has sat in Cabinet throughout, that Britain took two years to act on the court's finding.

"We were too slow to act on the ICJ judgment," Mr Miliband said. "We should have acted earlier, and I regret that we didn't act earlier."

Pressed on why the delay occurred, he said: "I don't know the answer to that. I can't give you an answer to that question." The question, he said, should be put to those in charge of the policy at the time. The Foreign Office was led by David Lammy until September 2025 and then by Yvette Cooper.

The ICJ found in July 2024 that Israel's presence in the occupied Palestinian territory was unlawful and that other states must not help maintain it, including through trade. When the UN General Assembly voted that September to demand Israel comply, Britain abstained. Mr Miliband was Energy Secretary at the time, and became Foreign Secretary on 20 July when Andy Burnham formed his government.

He said the Prime Minister had made the same point, that the government had been "too passive in our approach". "We did take action on arms licences, but we were too passive in relation to the situation," he said, adding that the government should have been stronger and was now putting that right.

"What I can best do now in my role as Foreign Secretary is respond. And within seven weeks of coming into the job, we have responded, we have declared the occupation unlawful, and we have taken incredibly strong action alongside our allies."

Mr Miliband rejected calls to widen the sanctions to the Israeli state. Husam Zomlot, the Palestinian envoy in London, has asked the government to sanction "agencies and institutions of the Israeli State that sponsor illegal settlements".

Put to him that the E1 settlement east of Jerusalem is a government project whose builders, banks and estate agents can now be sanctioned but not the ministry that ordered it, he said: "We're going to continue to have a relationship with the government of Israel. And I think it is important as part of this to say we believe the occupation is unlawful. We will take action against the occupation. We're not about delegitimising the state of Israel itself." Britain would maintain relations with the Israeli government "whatever that government is", he said.

Israel's Housing Ministry published a tender last month for 1,234 homes in E1, with bids closing on 19 October. "E1 would cut through the heart of a future Palestinian state," Mr Miliband said. "Our aim is to stop E1 happening." He described the measures as "an unprecedented action", adding: "No government has done this before."

The import ban requires legislation that Mr Miliband told MPs would take six to nine months. Asked why Britain had sanctioned Russia within days of the invasion of Ukraine but was taking far longer over settlements, he said the measures were taking "broadly speaking, the same amount of time as most of the sanctions" the government had introduced. He pointed to a faster route in the extension of the global human rights sanctions regime to breaches of international humanitarian law, which "will be in place in the next couple of months" and would allow "swifter action in relation to some of these settlement issues".

"We aren't going to wait," he said. "We are going to go as quickly as we can, along with our international allies."

Israel responded to Tuesday's statement by announcing the closure of the British consulate in Jerusalem, the expulsion of British representatives from the Gaza ceasefire coordination centre, an end to British training of Palestinian Authority security forces and an entry ban on 12 British nationals.

Mr Miliband said a Palestinian state remained possible but declined to say where its borders would lie. "I don't think it's for me to define the borders. They've got to be part of a peace process. The problem at the moment is there is no peace and there is no process."

It was "just not good enough", he said, to repeat a two-state formula that had become a platitude without acting on it. Tuesday's statement "was about saying we are not powerless. We will not be silent. We will act."

Britain would use "our diplomatic muscle, backed up by actions like the sanctions" to demand an end to the suffering in Gaza and a process towards two states, he said. "And whatever the government of Israel is after the coming elections, that is what we will be demanding."

The interview will be shown in full at 7pm on Thursday on ukfactcheck.com and UK Fact Check's YouTube channel.