Starmer Gets Cornered By Corbyn and There's NO WAY OUT!

Right, so Keir Starmer and the 5D chess he apparently plays in the opinion of what passes for his fan club, its not a big club, has now left him between a rock and a hard place over Israel because the reality is, he’s not laying a long game of strategy, he’s a political pygmy who without Morgan McSweeney to tie his parliamentary shoelaces, would have fallen flat on his face and likely been shown the exit long ago, though even McSweeney can’t save him from this bind, perhaps on this occasion we might say both his shoes got tied together?
Whatever analogy you might choose to describe the situation Starmer is now in though, there’s no denying its all his own fault. If he wasn’t so in hock to the Israel Lobby, if he wasn’t blinded by his Zionism without equivocation thinking, he might not have been so compromised, but he now faces a reckoning and the delicious irony is its Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader that Starmer suspended, expelled, abused on numerous occasions, that is writing what could well be Starmer’s political epitaph.
Corbyn, like several other MPs putting questions to the government over the UK’s military role in Gaza for Israel and the use of the nearby RAF base on Cyprus, RAF Akrotiri, has got nowhere, the answers being blocked or fudged and so now he’s introducing a bill on the 4th June to get the answers he wants, an independent inquiry into UK actions where it comes to Israel as they’ve genocided Gaza and Starmer can either back it and have everything revealed, or he can block it like every question has been and look guiltier than ever before. He only has himself to blame for this.
Right, so that was Jeremy Corbyn there from just the other day, once again trying to get a straight answer from Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who once again refused to answer the questions put to him, once again hid behind the 30 arms export licences the government stopped last September and once again defended the ongoing export of F-35 parts as part of the global supply chain for those parts, knowing parts manufactured here will almost certainly end up in Israel as they possess these high maintenance bombers themselves. It ignores completely the fact that it has just come out that in the three months immediately following said arms licence suspensions, that the UK granted £128m more in military aid to Israel, exceeding the amount the Tories sold to Israel in the 4 years of 2020-2023. It’s for reasons like that, scandalous truths emerging that the UK will not admit to, not acknowledge and the questions being blocked, parliament being prevented from scrutinising what Starmer and Co are doing in our names with our money, to aid Israel that they don not want to talk about.
Therefore, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has now announced plants to introduce a Ten Minute Rule Bill in the House of Commons, to call for an independent public inquiry because enough is enough, we need to know what this government is doing, now more than ever as Gaza’s very existence hangs in the balance. Corbyn’s proposed legislation calls for an independent public inquiry into the United Kingdom’s role in the ongoing Israeli campaign in Gaza—a campaign that many international observers, legal scholars, humanitarian organisations, not least of all a mouthpiece like me, and others in independent and alternative media as well have long been calling a genocide. It‘s way past time the irritating and disturbing pattern of UK government silence and obstruction was put an end to, and what the profound implications for current Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his predecessor Rishi Sunak will be.
Israel is now intensifying its military operations in Gaza, to the point they are no longer hiding the fact it is all about conquest, what it has always been about, hiding behind excuses of rescuing hostages, when they have never been prioritised and their claims to eliminating Hamas must be taken in the context of the comments of too many Knesset parliamentarians who regularly opine that all Palestinians in Gaza are Hamas. After 19 months of this, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians and the displacement of nearly two million people, things are now so much worse. International human rights bodies, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have raised alarms about war crimes and systematic targeting of civilians, medical infrastructure, and vital services, all part of the final push to take Gaza for Israel. Yet the UK government has remained steadfast in its support for Israel, offering political backing, military cooperation, and intelligence assistance and although they’ve made some noises to the contrary now, it is all noise and no action.
Thanks to the brilliant investigative journalism of outlets like Declassified UK, we know that British surveillance aircraft have flown continuous reconnaissance missions over Gaza, using the RAF base at Akrotiri in Cyprus as a launchpad. These missions allegedly provide Israel with real-time battlefield intelligence, despite claims from the government they are only looking for hostages, thereby directly implicating the UK in Israel’s military operations. Despite repeated questions from MPs and journalists, the government has refused to disclose the nature, purpose, and frequency of these flights. The Ministry of Defence and Foreign Office have either blocked inquiries or provided evasive responses in parliament and it simply isn’t good enough. When the government is already doing too little to hold Israel to account amidst months of blatantly aiding them, we deserve an explanation and Jeremy Corbyn is spearheading a parliamentary attempt to get some proper answers.
The Ten Minute Rule Bill that Corbyn is using is a parliamentary device that allows backbench MPs to propose legislation in a brief speech, usually lasting ten minutes, hence the name. Though these bills rarely become law without government support, they are powerful tools for raising issues, galvanizing public attention, and testing parliamentary sentiment. That said, it can happen and for an issue like this one, which is making a lot of parliamentarians uncomfortable, that support may come and whether that becomes government support, well, that’s in Starmer’s hands though I bet he’d really rather it wasn’t.
Jeremy Corbyn’s bill, formally titled the "Gaza War Inquiry (UK Involvement) Bill," seeks to establish an independent, KC-led public inquiry, akin to the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War, to examine Britain’s political, military, and intelligence collaboration with Israel.
The inquiry would seek to find answers to critical questions, many of which have been asked in parliament, but got nowhere near getting an answer, such as
What intelligence and logistical support has the UK provided to Israel during its operations in Gaza?
What role has RAF Akrotiri played in reconnaissance or other military actions?
What legal justifications, if any, underpinned these activities?
Did British officials or military personnel express concerns about potential war crimes?
Were any safeguards in place to ensure compliance with international humanitarian law?
These are questions that have already been asked and got no answers. They touch upon the heart of the UK's global moral standing and adherence to the Geneva Conventions and the Genocide Convention.
Corbyn’s bill arises from a climate of calculated silence and bureaucratic stonewalling. Dozens of parliamentary questions submitted by MPs concerning the UK's role in Gaza have been met with non-answers or flat-out refusals and these have included inquiries about the number and purpose of British surveillance flights over Gaza, the sharing of intelligence with the Israeli military, RAF Akrotiri’s use for non-humanitarian missions and whether Israel themselves have been using it, the list goes on and never is there an answer.
Every question put to the government about UK military intervention in Gaza for Israel has been met with a pattern of obfuscation and people are genuinely sick of it. It suggests not just negligence, but a deliberate attempt to hide the UK’s complicity and the longer it goes on for, the more fuel gets added to that fire. In a democratic society, the government’s refusal to answer these questions subverts the very principles of accountability and transparency. Corbyn’s bill therefore is not merely a policy proposal; it is an indictment of a system that appears more interested in shielding itself than doing what is right and just.
It is against that self-inflicted backdrop that Keir Starmer now faces a deeply uncomfortable political test. He has long been criticised for his unwavering support of Israel, the video clip where he said Israel had a right to cut off food and electricity, supporting them committing war crimes that we will never let him forget and a position that has alienated large segments of UK society, especially amongst their own voters, particularly young voters and those from Muslim and working-class communities disgusted by him and his role in this.
If Starmer supports Corbyn’s bill, he risks exposing his own government to scrutiny, undermining the very efforts it has made to keep these activities concealed by refusing to answer all of these questions. But if he opposes it, he will be confirming parliamentary and public suspicions of a cover-up. It will put Starmer on the side of Israel against the UK effectively in my view, our resources being used for the benefit of a rogue state and a government unprepared to answer for that, but as such, Starmer is damned either way and he only has himself to blame for it. Starmer’s government has made “silence and evasion” a hallmark of its Gaza policy. Rejecting the bill would not only damage his credibility but also raise the spectre of moral and potentially legal culpability.
Of course there won’t be a quick answer to this, even if Corbyn gets his inquiry. The Chilcot Inquiry took years to uncover the extent of British complicity in the Iraq War. It revealed how intelligence was manipulated, legal advice was ignored, and public opinion was misled. Corbyn’s Gaza inquiry could perform a similar function, shedding light on whether the UK has once again become entangled in war crimes abroad, but equally the fact it is happening ought to be damaging enough to the government that continuing to obfuscate and deny answering questions will look very bad, as will basically continuing to aid Israel as they appear to be doing day after day, we can of course track every flight coming and going from Cyprus online.
Support for Corbyn’s bill is not about political allegiance; it is about truth, justice, and the integrity of our public institutions, not to mention doing right by the people of Gaza when successive governments have kept us on the side of the oppressor and the occupier and against the occupied and oppressed, we’re way past the point of backing Israel on the basis of their excuses, they mean to take Gaza now, amid a war of starvation, displacement, and elimination. Bleating about Israel’s right to defend itself doesn’t cut it any longer, not that it actually did to begin with, Israel have no self defence excuse against people who they occupy.
Jeremy Corbyn’s Ten Minute Rule Bill is far more than a symbolic gesture as ten minute rule bills are too often viewed as. It is a moral imperative and a constitutional necessity. In calling for a Chilcot-style inquiry into the UK’s collaboration into the genocide of Gaza, Corbyn has forced Starmer to face a national reckoning, one way past time he was made to face.
The UK government under both Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer has consistently prioritised political expediency and alliance with Israel over transparency and justice and the people of Gaza and they need to answer for that. The ongoing use of RAF Akrotiri, the continuing reconnaissance flights, and the blanket refusal to answer parliamentary questions all point to a disturbing pattern of complicity that they won’t answer for, so we need this inquiry and need to support the call for it.
Starmer now thinks all he has to do is the bare minimum and by bare minimum I mean next to nothing whatsoever. A few weasel words isn’t enough, hiding behind arms licences that you stopped, when you kept granting more afterwards won’t do, a pretence of condemning Israel whilst refusing to be scrutinised must stop, so Starmer’s little speech and his join letter with France and Canada won’t cut it even if he thinks it will. Get all the details of the rinsing Starmer has earned himself by not going nearly far enough already in this video recommendation here as your suggested next watch.
Please do also hit like, share and subscribe if you haven’t done so already so as to ensure you don’t miss out on all new daily content as well as spreading the word and helping to support the channel at the same time which is very much appreciated, holding power to account for ordinary working class people and I will hopefully catch you on the next vid. Cheers folks