Palestinian rights group warns legal action if UK’s Israel embassy moved to Jerusalem

London (QNN)- A London-based Palestinian legal group has warned British Prime Minister Liz Truss that any attempt to move the British embassy in ‘Israel’ from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem would be “unlawful” and could result in the group issuing judicial review proceedings.

Last month, Truss said that she is weighing the relocation of Britain’s Israel embassy in Tel Aviv to the occupied city of Jerusalem – a decision that would follow former US President Donald Trump’s provocative move.

Truss told Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid about the move during a meeting at the United Nations summit in New York City on September 21. She later announced that she had launched a review into the issue.

During her campaign for the leadership of the British Conservative Party, Truss told the London-based Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI) lobby group that she would review the UK’s decision to remain in Tel Aviv if she became the British leader.

“I understand the importance and sensitivity of the location of the British Embassy in Israel. I’ve had many conversations with my good friend Prime Minister Yair Lapid on this topic,” she said.

A detailed independent legal opinion sent to Truss on Tuesday and obtained by the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) states that there are strong grounds to conclude that moving the embassy would constitute a violation of the UK’s obligations under international law, as it would imply recognition of unilateral legislative, administrative and other measures adopted by ‘Israel’ in relation to Jerusalem.

In a statement on Wednesday, the ICJP stated, “These measures, which include Israel’s enactment of Basic Law 1980 declaring Jerusalem ‘complete and united’ as Israel’s capital, have been repeatedly declared invalid by the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council. The UN Security Council has affirmed that the enactment of the Basic Law 1980 constitutes a violation of international law.”

The legal opinion also found that there were strong grounds to conclude that the potential move would violate the UK’s obligations under the Geneva Conventions.

Tayab Ali, an ICJP director and partner at the law firm Bindmans, which helped prepare the legal opinion, said, “The Prime Minister [Liz Truss] has demonstrated over the last few weeks the dangers of carelessly announcing and implementing policies that are not thought through and without proper consultation. The prime minister should not approach international situations in the same way.”

“We cannot as a country champion the Ukrainian fight for freedom from forced annexation and forced territorial acquisition and then create policy for Israel which so badly undermines the British assertion of the primacy of international law and the UN charter. The consequences of carelessness at this level would be unthinkable.”

Opposition to Truss’s decision has grown in recent days.

A spokesperson for the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the senior bishop of the Anglican Church, said he was “concerned about the potential impact of moving the British embassy” to Jerusalem.

Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the country’s most senior Catholic cleric, said that relocating the embassy would “be seriously damaging to any possibility of lasting peace in the region.”

Christian church leaders in Jerusalem also warned that the British government’s plans would be a “further impediment to advancing the already moribund peace process”.

Muslim leaders in Jerusalem have written to King Charles III condemning the move, noting “we oppose moving the British embassy to Jerusalem since we understand it, as a message to the universe that the UK, in contrary to the international law and the Status Quo, accepts the continuing Israeli illegal military occupation of the Palestinian territories, the Israeli unilateral annexation of East Jerusalem and the Israeli illegal Judaisation measures in the Holy City.”

During the Conservative party conference, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the secretary-general of the Arab League, urged British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly to “refrain from taking any illegal action”.

“I take this opportunity to express our concern over the recent statements by Prime Minister Truss on reviewing the location of the UK embassy in Israel,” said Gheit.

Former British Foreign Secretary William Hague warned, in a stark message, Truss from the potential move, telling her “this would be a breach of UN security council resolutions by one of its permanent members, break a longstanding commitment to work for two states for Israelis and Palestinians, and align Britain in foreign affairs with Donald Trump and three small states rather than the whole of the rest of the world.”

On Thursday, after 45 days in office, Truss resigned as the UK prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party, saying she could not deliver the mandate on which she was elected, making her the shortest-serving PM in UK history.