Every day constituents write to me about Gaza, Lebanon, Ukraine, Sudan and now Syria.
I do my best to represent your views to the UK Government, meet Ambassadors, Foreign Politicians, UN Agencies and NGOs and civil society activists when they come to the UK. But in recent months this has felt woefully insufficient and as you know I travelled to Palestine, Israel and Ukraine in February this year to see for myself, meet senior decision makers and take aid. A few months ago I received an invitation from the Qatari Embassy to attend the Doha Forum due to my work on conflict resolution and international mediation, I agonised long and hard over whether I should go but in the end concluded that Qatar has played a vital mediation role in many of the international conflicts I care deeply about, in particular their current role as the negotiators between Hamas and the Israeli Government in Gaza.
I am now very pleased I attended as just as I arrived it was reported the Assad regime had fallen and the weekends event was overtaken by Syria with many Syria experts in attendance. I was very lucky to have three private meetings with the Prime Minister of Qatar, the Chief Negotator and the principal Foreign Policy Advisor of the Prime Minister (who studied Politics at the University of Leeds). I also had private meetings with
Philippe Lazzarini Commissioner-General of UNRWA and Mustafa Barghouthi former Minister of Information in the Palestinian unity government and member of the Palestinian Authority. I attended a range of sessions on every aspect of international policy and was to my distress in a corridor with Sergei Lavrov!
In my meetings with His Excellency Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, Prime Minister; His Excellency Dr Mohammed Al-Khulaifi, Minister of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and His Excellency Dr Majid Al-Ansari, Advisor to the Prime Minister and Spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs we discussed the situation in Gaza. Here are my reflections from those meetings.
The preliminary document to create a ceasefire, hostage release and Palestinian prisoner release is written. Doha is hosting Shuttle diplomacy between Hamas and the Israeli Government. The parties won’t meet in the same building so the Qataris must transport all the documents in writing and translated between the parties. The Qatari Government believes that all the issues have been tabled and are in the document. There is sadly a huge lack of trust between the parties. It takes hours to go line by line through the agreement.
Qatar has had to suspend the process as both sides have not been considered serious by the negotiator and the parties need to become more serious about the process. Both sides need to feel they are the winner.
The process last achieved success in November 23 with a temporary ceasefire, hostage release and prisoner release. The Qatari Government will carry pushing for agreement and are still engaging with pending points of the proposed agreement.
The Qatari Government take a purely practical approach and the Qataris are always ready for implementation and have NGOs on alert for them, so if agreement is reached it can be actioned immediately. The Qataris are also willing and talking about mediation between the Palestinian factions.
They recently assessed the seriousness of the parties to proceed with negotiation. They have had conversations with the incoming Trump Administration and its clear that they want progress by the inaugaration on 20th Januay.
Everything that happens in the region affects the negotiation and can delay the process. Syria has changed the dynamic.
Hezbollah have also agreed to decouple from Gaza, they have agreed to allow some space for Lebanese civil society. Hezbollah supply route has been disrupted by fall of Assad, They feel the Lebanese presidential election is crucial and need for all parties to accept the president and not allow a civil war to start in Lebanon by turning their weapons round from their borders inwards.
They concluded that recent history has not given much optimism in relation to Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.
I will, through these meetings, continue to engage with Qatar at the highest level.
In my meeting with Mustafa Barghouti we discussed the situation in the West Bank in great detail and the work on sanctions by the UK Government especially of Amana (the Settlement building organisation) which he was very pleased about and what further sanctions the UK Government could make. He asked me to facilitate a trip to the UK for him which I will, our meeting was cut short as he had to meet with the Turkish Foreign Minister.
In my meeting with Philippe Lazzarini we discussed the need for international support on easing restrictions on border crossing into Gaza and funding of UNRWA. I reconfirmed my support for UNRWA and pledged to do all I can to ensure continued UK funding.