Article published by Ynetnews.com,  24 March 2024. © Richard Kemp

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron’s recent threats will not directly harm or constrain Israel but they will undoubtedly strengthen Hamas. He has been striking a distinctly belligerent stance towards Israel since he came into office in November, in contrast to his predecessor James Cleverly and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

Now he seems to be on the verge of making a grand gesture by cutting off weapons supplies in the midst of war as well as supporting an arms embargo across Europe. He justifies his threatened betrayal of one of Britain’s most important allies by the demand that Israel should allow the ICRC access to captured Hamas terrorists which he claims is required under International Humanitarian Law (IHL). That may well be his opinion, but it is far from clear cut; international legal opinions vary and Israel claims exemption to such visits on security grounds.

Cameron now seems to be bolstering his case by the claim in a recent letter to the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee that Israel is deliberately and unnecessarily holding up humanitarian aid deliveries into Gaza. This is patent nonsense. I recently visited the Kerem Shalom Crossing and witnessed a highly efficient operation in which staff were working round the clock to get aid into the Strip.

That of course is only one part of the picture. But multiple reports, first-hand accounts and video evidence show that the blockage is not on the Israeli side but lies with an inadequate UN distribution system as well as extensive hijacking by Hamas strong-men who divert much of the aid for their own use and sell the rest of it off at inflated prices.

Cameron’s insinuations that Israel is breaching IHL are also contradicted by his own government. On Wednesday the prime minister’s spokesman confirmed that No 10 continues to assess that Israel’s actions conform with international law. It’s difficult to fathom exactly what’s happening with these conflicting messages. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 24 March 2024. © Richard Kemp

The terrorist attack in Moscow is a devastating reminder that the threat from global Islamic jihadism never went away. US intelligence believes the Crocus City Hall massacre was the work of Islamic State Khorasan Province, or ISKP. Only a few days before they had warned of terrorist attacks in Moscow, intelligence perhaps from the same source as the warning to Iran before the ISKP suicide bomb attack at Kerman in January that killed nearly 100.

Don’t think IS have forgotten about Europe either. Only last summer it emerged that Iraqi security services had passed intelligence to MI6 that IS was planning a major assault in the UK, also against a large public gathering. And just a few days ago, German police arrested two ISKP terrorists plotting a gun attack on the Swedish parliament.

The West is unwilling to confront this growing threat head-on, just as it has wavered so badly in dealing with aggression from Russia in Ukraine and from Iran both in the Middle East and here in Europe where Tehran also continues to plot violent terrorist attacks and is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons. Thankfully, recent IS attack plans in Britain and Sweden, as with hundreds of other jihadist plots against us, have so far been frustrated by intelligence penetration. But Moscow shows that intelligence alone cannot stop attacks, a hard lesson we have learned many times before.

ISKP has been based in Afghanistan since 2014. It was badly degraded by Coalition forces until their withdrawal in 2021, since when the number of attacks and attack plans worldwide has predictably increased as a result of greatly reduced US capabilities to collect intelligence and take direct military action. That withdrawal endangered our citizens and emboldened jihadists as well as our other enemies such as Putin who no doubt saw Western weakness as a green light to devour Ukraine.

We have seen the results of our failure to stand up properly to that invasion, frightened by Putin’s nuclear sabre-rattling into denying Ukraine adequate means to win. Now we are doing the same in the Middle East where Israel is battling jihadists in Gaza. Hamas is not Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 6 March 2024. © Richard Kemp

In his remarkable speech in Prague, Emmanuel Macron displayed the kind of leadership every Western country has failed to deliver since Russia invaded Ukraine two years ago. From the start Nato governments fell over themselves to reassure Putin that they posed no threat to Russia while he repeatedly threatened to escalate even to the point of nuclear sabre rattling.

Terrified of provoking the bear, US and European leaders half-heartedly sanctioned Moscow and supplied only enough weaponry to allow Ukraine to stay fighting but insufficient to give it a real chance of driving Russia back. Every long range weapon that was provided was accompanied by strict caveats against their use on sovereign Russian territory while Moscow freely launched assaults wherever it wanted against Ukraine.

That policy was bare-facedly verified in the phone conversation by German Luftwaffe generals revealed this week when they made clear that Taurus long range missiles would not be provided in sufficient numbers to change the trajectory of the hostilities.

Above all, until Macron’s course correction, every leader made it clear that there would be no Nato boots on the ground in Ukraine despite Russian boots trampling wherever they could. In other words they left Putin in no doubt that he had a free run and need not factor in unexpected military intervention from the West.

Even the most junior officer cadet at Sandhurst could tell you that is no way to fight a war and certainly no way to impose deterrence. And deterrence is one of Nato’s most critical functions. Well, it failed in that from the outset, especially after handing victory in Afghanistan to the Taliban in 2021, which flashed a green light to Putin to do as he pleased.

It then ensured the green light stayed shining bright by repeatedly telling Putin what it would not do rather than hinting at what it might do or at least leaving him guessing. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 4 March 2024. © Richard Kemp

It comes to something when the German Chancellor appears to betray a Nato ally to help get out of a hole he dug himself.

That is exactly what Olaf Scholz did last week when he claimed that British troops are deployed in Ukraine to assist targeting of Storm Shadow missiles against the Russians. Britain’s exact role in the war beyond supply of weaponry has been kept deliberately shrouded for obvious reasons. That Scholz publicly revealed military secrets at a time when he needs to justify Germany’s refusal so far to send in the desperately needed and even more capable Taurus long range missile system may be purely coincidental. But it was followed up with an assertion that Germany could not follow the UK’s practice as it would make it a ‘participant in the war’, perhaps an attempt to shield his country from Putin’s wrath while happily throwing Britain under the bus.

Then, this week Moscow made public a call between Lieutenant General Ingo Gerhartz, chief of the Luftwaffe, and other senior officers that they had intercepted. Their conversation also alleged the presence of British military personnel on the ground and suggested that if Germany deployed Taurus they could ask British troops to take over the same ground role with their missiles as they supposedly fulfil with Storm Shadow to avoid implicating Germany in the conflict. On top of that Gerhartz said that Berlin would not send all of the Taurus missiles in one batch, but penny packet them to ensure they ‘won’t change the course of the hostilities’.

How terrified Berlin must be of Vladimir Putin that they will go to such lengths to avoid any suggestion that they are doing more than the bare minimum in this conflict. Even worse: to actually supply the missiles, if they ever decide to do so, in a way deliberately calculated to minimise their battlefield effect. This faint-heartedness is no doubt accompanied by an eye to financial advantage given that Germany has the greatest commercial interests in Russia of all European countries.

None of that is any great surprise. Germany has been hesitant about supplying weapons to Ukraine from the start. And it was only after Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 14 February 2024. © Richard Kemp

David Cameron has virtually called on Israel to surrender to Hamas as it prepares to destroy the terrorist group in Rafah. For that is surely the meaning of his words on Monday: ‘What we want is an immediate pause in the fighting and we want that pause to lead to a ceasefire.’ That’s also exactly what Hamas want, and has demanded from Israel — an end to the war that it is catastrophically losing.

Would Cameron have called for a ceasefire as Allied troops were poised to cross the Rhine in March 1945? By that time millions of German civilians had been killed in the fighting and it was a certainty that many more would die as the war proceeded towards unconditional German surrender.

Of course Israel cannot halt its offensive now any more than the Allies could then, and Cameron must know that – just as Blinken knows it. In reality their words of caution to Israel amount to virtue signalling aimed at the Israel-sceptical elements of their electorates. Like a schoolmaster lecturing a recalcitrant schoolboy, Cameron has told Israel to ‘stop and think very seriously before it takes any further action’.

Who does he think he’s talking down to? Does he seriously believe the Israeli war cabinet and general staff have not been working round the clock for months, ‘thinking seriously’ about every action they take in this war? Meanwhile Blinken has told Israel to come up with a plan to minimise civilian casualties before they launch the campaign against Hamas in Rafah. In other words, exactly what they are already doing and have been doing with considerable success since this war began.

So far the IDF has wreaked devastation on Hamas. It appears the terror army is no longer able to function as a coherent entity, with reports that senior leaders are unable to communicate with their combat units. The IDF says the Hamas fighters that remain in Rafah must now be dealt with, along with the terrorist leadership there.

As well as that there is a high probability that many of the surviving Israeli hostages are in the city; indeed two of them were rescued in a Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 8 February 2024. © Richard Kemp

When one side in a negotiation offers terms it knows the opposite side can’t possibly accept, it means they are not interested in a deal. This is precisely what Hamas has just done in the latest negotiations over a ceasefire in return for release of Israeli hostages. They are effectively asking Israel to end the war and leave what remains of the terrorist organisation to fight another day.

On the face of it, this demand makes little sense. According to Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, more than 50% of Hamas’s overall fighting strength has been taken out, either killed or seriously wounded and 18 out of 24 major terrorist units ‘dismantled’. According to him, the top level command structure of Hamas in Gaza is breaking down, with terrorist leader Yahya Sinwar no longer leading the campaign but instead focusing on personal survival.

Surely in these circumstances it would be logical for Hamas to grasp at almost any deal – perhaps including a ceasefire for even a few days – to give some respite and the possibility of either regrouping or making their escape.

What is unclear at present is the extent to which the leaders outside Gaza who are doing the negotiating are in agreement on the issue with their beleaguered henchmen in the tunnels. Perhaps the externals, in their luxury penthouses in Doha and Istanbul, know the game is up and would prefer to see their compatriots in the Strip go down in a show of defiance while at the same time buying themselves some breathing space to evade the long arm of Mossad.

More likely, they and their masters in Iran are counting on the US to ride to the rescue. That’s what the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, the Iranian proxy attacks on Americans in Iraq, Syria and Jordan, and the rumblings of war in Lebanon are all about. In Tehran and Doha, they’ve been watching the inadequacy of US and British attacks on the Houthis as well as the highly-telegraphed and, so far, underwhelming US response to the killing of three of its troops in Jordan.

They know that in an election year the last thing President Biden wants is to allow US forces to get dragged directly into another serious conflict in the Middle East. So rather than permit the Houthis’ Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 5 February 2024. © Richard Kemp

The deputy leader of Sinn Fein, Michelle O’Neill, is now First Minister of Northern Ireland. There is every prospect that the party leader, Mary Lou McDonald, will become Taoiseach in the Republic after the next election. These developments present a profound danger for the UK, Europe and Nato.

The strategic position of Ireland was of fundamental importance during the Cold War. Britain’s determination to hold on to Northern Ireland was partly motivated by fear of a United Ireland, remaining resolutely outside of the Nato alliance, emerging as a sort of European Cuba.

Only when the threat from Russia dissipated was Peter Brooke, then secretary of state for Northern Ireland, able to say that Britain had ‘no selfish strategic or economic interest’ in the province.

His words were intended to encourage peace, but his assertion was wrong then and it is certainly wrong now. In a new report from Policy Exchange, the threat to European and transatlantic security arising from the Republic of Ireland is fully spelt out.

The Republic is plugged in to transatlantic digital and economic systems but excludes itself from multilateral security frameworks, making Ireland a soft target for subversive Russian, Chinese and Iranian activities.

Meanwhile, freeloading on Nato members, especially the UK, has left the Republic lacking any significant capability to resist attacks by Russia against the underseas infrastructure on which much of Europe, including the Republic, depends.

Russia has been fast developing capabilities to target this vulnerability. In the absence of any prospect of Ireland enhancing its defensive capabilities, Britain will need to do even more of the heavy lifting as this threat increases. That will require re-establishing air and naval bases in Northern Ireland. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 18 January 2024. © Richard Kemp

The Iranian strikes in Iraq, Syria and even Pakistan are signs of weakness. In recent days the US has assassinated an Iranian proxy terrorist leader in Baghdad and the Israelis have killed Hamas and Hezbollah leaders in Lebanon. Iranian state media said the recent strikes in Erbil, supposedly against Israeli ‘spy bases’, were in retaliation for such killings. Hitting targets in Iraq and Syria of course elicited no military response from Iran’s client governments there, but striking inside Pakistan was an altogether different prospect which was met by a retaliatory attack into Iranian territory.

Why on earth would Tehran provoke a conflict with a nuclear state with a massive, well-equipped army that could, if it wanted to, overrun the regime? In order to send messages of deterrence to the US and of strength to its proxies in the face of what looks like a dangerous turnaround in the ayatollahs’ fortunes.

For many years Iran has been building what has been called a ‘ring of fire’ around Israel, comprising proxies in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan, with more distant flames in Iraq and Yemen. The purpose is to strangle the Jewish state, because the ayatollahs deplore its very existence and see it as an outpost of American power, opposition to which has been a cornerstone of the revolution since it began.

But following the 7 October attacks that all seems to be going wrong. Israel is steadily taking apart Iranian proxies Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza, killing their fighters in large numbers and destroying painstakingly constructed terrorist infrastructure. In Lebanon, Hezbollah seems to be faced with the prospect either of a hugely destructive war or a humiliating withdrawal north of the Litani River. In Yemen, the Houthis’ attempted missile strikes on Israel have all been blunted and the US and UK have unexpectedly switched from defensive to offensive operations to thwart their attacks on Red Sea shipping.

The provocation of Pakistan, however, with the inevitable retaliation, and perhaps further escalation, may go even deeper. The ayatollahs are pondering a much greater threat than their ring of fire Continue reading →