B

Baroness Deech (CB)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 13 November 2025

Debate

Palestinian Refugees

Contribution

My Lords, will the Minister accept that either Palestine is a real state and should deal with its own people or it is not, and recognition was a falsity? Since the UK recognises Palestine as a state, its citizens living in their state cannot, in principle, be refugees. Indeed, all the other Palestinians around the world are, or should be, citizens of that state and no longer stateless. It is UNRWA that is the problem. There is much new, reliable evidence that UNRWA is permeated with Hamas officials. UNRWA continues to inflate the number of refugees instead of settling them, and teaches them that they will remain refugees until they return to what they believe were their homes in what is now Israel, with the aim of obliterating the state. There will be no future for Gaza unless UNRWA is dismantled, wrapped up with the UNHCR, and the concept of Palestinian refugees in the West Bank and Gaza should disappear.

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