HC Deb 01 March 1995 vol 255 c1037
12. Mrs. Jane Kennedy

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on British-Israeli relations.

Mr. Douglas Hogg

Our relations with Israel are excellent.

Mrs. Kennedy

Does the Minister agree that British-Israeli relations, good though they are, will be improved on every occasion that the British Government can do something concrete to assist the peace process? As I am sure that the right hon. and learned Gentleman would agree about that, will he give urgent and sympathetic consideration to the request from the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan for a 50 per cent. reduction in its debts to the United Kingdom?

Mr. Hogg

On the question of our bilateral relations, upon which the hon. Lady concentrated, when Prime Minister Rabin met my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister last year, he commented that Anglo-Israeli relations had never been better. As to the question of making concrete contributions, we have made many such, for example, we are spending around £75 million over three years in support of the peace process and Palestinians.

Mr. Cyril D. Townsend

When the British Prime Minister goes to Israel, will he take the opportunity to build on those cordial relations with that country and totally condemn the 10 per cent. increase in settlements on the west bank and close to Jerusalem, which endanger the peace process and which give great support to Hamas and all it is trying to do to undermine Chairman Arafat and the peace process?

Mr. Hogg

As we have often made plain to the Israeli Government, we regard the settlement policy as an obstacle to peace and we would like to see it stopped.