UK has still not responded to legal petition detailing colonial-era war crimes in Palestine
UK has still not responded to legal petition detailing colonial-era war crimes in Palestine Submitted by MEE staff on Mon, 09/07/2026 - 13:35 A year since it was submitted, the British government has not responded to Britain Owes Palestine's 400-page petition The Union Jack is lowered on 30 June 1948 in Haifa harbour a month and half after the State of Israel was proclaimed in Tel Aviv (AFP) Off…
A year since the petition was delivered, the British government has yet to provide a response to Britain Owes Palestine's 400-page legal petition detailing colonial-era war crimes in Palestine. The petition, drafted by leading human rights barristers Ben Emmerson and Danny Friedman, alongside historian Avi Shlaim and legal academic Victor Kattan, calls for an official apology from the British government for the country's unlawful conduct in Palestine from 1917 to 1948.
The petition highlights how Britain breached international law during the Mandate period and committed war crimes, including murder, torture, arbitrary detention, and mass home demolitions. Today, the campaign argues, Israeli settlement expansion and displacement in the West Bank and Gaza are not a break from the British colonial period but a continuation of it.
The petition, backed by 75 MPs, peers, cultural figures, and legal experts, requests an official apology and a conversation about appropriate reparations.
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