Dear All,

It’s amazing how shamelessly some politicians change their tune when they need votes.

Thus both Britain’s main political parties have modified their stance on Palestine after they realised how they were alienating large chunks of voters.

Last week, the Tory foreign secretary (and ex-PM responsible for the Brexit referendum), David Cameron, announced that Britain was prepared to recognise the state of Palestine. Even as people were puzzling at this sudden turnaround from a government that had responded to every Israeli demand for solidarity and loyalty with lightning speed, Labour leaders also began to sing a completely different tune on this subject.

Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is distinguished (if you can use that word) by its immensely pro-Israel stance and its alignment with the forces that used the ‘anti-Semitism’ smear as a weapon to destroy former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. They have staunchly supported Israel in its unrepentant campaign of killing Palestinians and destroying Gaza but now Labour leaders like Starmer, Lisa Nandy and Wes Streeting have started making remarks about recognising Palestine and getting aid into Gaza.

The problem is that their change of stance is so blatantly opportunistic that it’s apparent to all. For three months, all of these people have gone on and on about ‘Israel’s right to self-defence,’ October 7th and the evils of Hamas. Not much concern has been expressed about violations of international law, the Geneva Convention, ethnic cleansing or the International Court of Justice decision. No Labour leader has expressed any concern over the killing of over 25,000 Palestinians or about the thousands of babies and children killed, maimed and orphaned.

These parties are changing their tune because they’ve suddenly realised they are actually losing a lot of votes. Suddenly, the Labour Party realised that people were not going to vote for them just to get rid of the Tories. For example, I’ve always voted Labour, but I refuse to vote for this lot: they have abandoned all Labour or socialist values and have behaved despicably.

And it’s not just Muslim voters who are rejecting these leaders. When published reports of Labour losing Muslim community votes were being circulated on social media somebody commented that it wasn’t just Muslims who were angry at this facilitation of, and support for, genocide -it was anybody with a conscience and an iota of humanity.

Perhaps finally, all of these politicians will wake up to the fact that there is genuine anger at the ethnic cleansing that is being live-streamed and accepted by Western powers. Perhaps the repeated protest marches will be heeded; perhaps the protesters holding up red-stained palms will be noticed.

One can only hope. In the meantime, voters need to remember one thing: reject leaders with no principles, no compassion and a penchant for changing their tune according to which way the wind is blowing.

Best wishes,

Umber Khairi