Streeting branded a hypocrite after accusing Starmer of ignoring Gaza war crimes
The UK’s former health secretary, Wes Streeting, has been branded a liar and a hypocrite after he accused Prime Minister Keir Starmer of ignoring detailed evidence of Israeli war crimes in Gaza.
In an interview with the News Agents podcast, Streeting said that Starmer accused him of sharing a dossier of evidence provided by British doctors who had been to Gaza for “political purposes” so that it could be leaked.
“When I sent that dossier around, the prime minister accused me of sending around a document that was designed to be leaked,” said Streeting, who resigned as health secretary last month.
“Now, that might have been the way that the briefing operation against me in Downing Street worked, but you’ll have noticed that until the messages were released this week, I didn’t publish that dossier,” he continued.
“I had met British doctors, I had been distressed by what they told me, I had seen serious and substantial allegations of war crimes being committed and I felt this country had a moral and legal responsibility to respond.”
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The dossier was first alluded to in messages from Peter Mandelson, the now-disgraced New Labour grandee and former ambassador to the US, released on Monday.
In the messages, Mandelson describes Streeting's views on Israel as “wild” and “hysterical” after the then health secretary told him Israel was committing war crimes and should be sanctioned.
Pat McFadden, a cabinet minister and, like Mandelson and Streeting, a figure associated with the right wing of the Labour Party, told Mandelson: “Wes has circulated a series of videos and a note [redacted] to the whole cabinet in advance of the meeting.”
“It is pathetic,” Mandelson replied.
“I think Wes is experiencing an early midlife crisis.”
Streeting condemned for hypocrisy
Doctors, Labour sources and Palestine solidarity campaigners told Middle East Eye they questioned Streeting’s motives.
The politician, who was close to Mandelson, is widely rumoured to be preparing a challenge to Andy Burnham to become the next Labour leader and prime minister, should Burnham win the upcoming Makerfield by-election and move against Starmer.
'Wes Streeting was and remains part of the same genocide enabling political apparatus that his boss Keir Starmer leads and his friend and mentor Peter Mandelson was part of'
- Ghassan Abu Sittah, British Palestinian doctor
Streeting is also facing pressure over his position on Gaza in his own constituency of Ilford North.
In 2024, the British Palestinian independent politician Leanne Mohamad came within 528 votes of defeating him.
Streeting has also received donations from a number of pro-Israel figures.
Streeting told the News Agents that Keir Starmer’s interview with LBC, in which the prime minister said Israel “had the right” to cut off water and electricity to Gaza, had “nearly taken me out” at the election.
“Wes Streeting was and remains part of the same genocide enabling political apparatus that his boss Keir Starmer leads and his friend and mentor Peter Mandelson was part of,” Ghassan Abu Sittah, a British Palestinian surgeon who has worked extensively in Gaza, told MEE.
“They ensured that the genocide project last for two and a half years and protected it from public outrage through a campaign of political repression and censorship.”
Abu Sittah said that neither he nor any other British doctor he knew who had served in Gaza had met with Streeting. He told MEE that he believed Streeting was lying in his interview.
MEE contacted Streeting’s office for comment, but heard nothing back by the time of publication.
'I would also reject the term genocide being used as some sort of ideological litmus test about whether you care about the lives of Palestinian people'
- Wes Streeting, Labour MP
Abu Sittah said that Streeting had pressured the General Medical Council (GMC) into a “McCarthyite witch hunt against me and other doctors who spoke out against the genocide”.
Abu Sittah was reported to the GMC by UK Lawyers for Israel, a pro-Israel legal activist group. Tribunals have twice found that there was no reason to sanction the doctor.
In March, Streeting, then still health secretary, agreed to new rules that could make it easier for Britain’s medical regulators to suspend and strike off doctors accused of antisemitism and racism for their pro-Palestine views.
'Lying toad'
One former Labour official, who is usually critical of Starmer, called Streeting “a lying toad”.
Peter Leary, deputy director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), told MEE: “It should not take the prospect of a Labour Party leadership election for politicians to start speaking publicly about Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinian people.
“If Wes Streeting really wants to atone for his role in supporting Israel’s genocide in Gaza as part of Keir Starmer’s government, he should start by joining those who have long been calling for meaningful, wide-ranging sanctions, including a full arms embargo to be imposed on Israel - something that even now he seems unwilling to do.”
Nick Dearden, director of Global Justice Now, said: “Streeting was a member of the cabinet while this horror was unfolding. It’s not enough, given the scale of the inhumanity, that he had confidential discussions with his boss; he should have demanded a different policy or resigned.”
Dearden pointed out that Andy Burnham, who may end up running against Streeting to succeed Keir Starmer, has simply said that he “doesn’t know whether a genocide has taken place or not”.
In his interview with the News Agents, Streeting said comments such as Mandelson's description of him as hysterical were representative of “the problem I’ve had all the way through on Gaza inside government”.
Streeting said he was proud that the UK had recognised the state of Palestine and that it had sanctioned some Israeli leaders and settlers. However, he said the government had not done enough on Gaza and that it had acted too slowly.
Streeting said he would not use the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s onslaught in Gaza, which has left more than 73,000 Palestinians dead and destroyed almost the entire enclave.
“I would also reject the term genocide being used as some sort of ideological litmus test about whether you care about the lives of Palestinian people and kids,” he said.
“I think the lives of Israelis and Palestinians are of equal worth and value and that has always been my view,” Streeting added.
“I have spent time with survivors of October 7, and I have spent time with survivors of the onslaught in Gaza, too.”
The former health secretary described Hamas, which is banned in the UK, as “evil and vindictive”.
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