Speeches by Mohamed.

“But no other recent assessments into why the international law—”

“If I may, I want to read the last paragraph of the staff’s letter to you. “We note with concern seeming efforts to screen out questions on the Gaza conflict during various all-staff sessions, even where such questions have secured the most prominent engagement in Q&A functions.” Is that not stifling debate when it come…”

“As a civil servant, as you referenced in your response to them, the bargain is ultimately being responsible to Government, but surely there is a requirement to uphold international law as well. Staff may feel that international law is not being upheld.”

“On international humanitarian law, what is the current function of the IHL committee within the Foreign Office, and how often does it refer advice to the Foreign Secretary?”

“For example, if there were an incident in Gaza, such as the killing of the Red Crescent workers, would the IHL committee put forward its assessment to the Foreign Secretary?”

“Is it a yes or a no? Would it not present a legal assessment to the Foreign Secretary? Why would it depend on the circumstances?”

“So it depends on the gravity of the incident whether an assessment would be given to the Foreign Secretary.”

“Okay. So how many assessments have been given to the Foreign Secretary recently?”

“Okay. Thank you.”

“Martin, you used an interesting phrase there: the UK is not in the inner circle. How might the UK bring itself into the inner circle, to be more involved in these debates?”

“Let me move on to the conflict that has been raging in Libya since 2011. Martin, do you think the UK can do any more? Is the UK’s involvement as the penholder on Libya somehow conflicted because of our involvement in the original conflict back in 2011?”

“Last week we heard evidence that potentially the UK is the penholder for Yemen because no other country would want to do it. Is it a similar case with Libya?”

“I will ask a few questions on our penholder responsibilities with a number of countries, in particular Sudan and Libya. I will start with you, Richard. What is your assessment of the UK’s leadership in the management of the Sudan file? How might we do better on accountability and holding the regional proxies to account…”

“Martin, you said previously that global powers have failed to find ways to end wars and humanitarian crises. There is an absence of consequence for powers involved in conflict, and a lack of accountability when it comes to dealing with that. How might we deal with it, based on what Richard has just said about Sudan? Va…”

“In relation to the current conflict in Gaza, what do you think should happen to bring the war to an end?”

“Under what conditions would Palestinians themselves be, in your view, able to run Gaza or the West Bank?”

“Thank you, Mr Lapid. I would like to refer you back to an interview that you gave last year where you said that Netanyahu is “not working for the country. The only thing he cares about is staying in power…He is for himself…He lost his soul”. Is the endless fight for wars and constant wanting to keep the extended war in…”

“Let me rephrase the question. Under what conditions would you see the recognition of a Palestinian state where the Palestinian Authority would be the ruling body? Under what conditions would you see this?”

“I would like to ask a question in relation to Yemen, and the UK being the penholder for Yemen. I should declare that I am one of the officers on the APPG for Yemen, as well as the first Yemeni person to be elected to British politics. My question is about the humanitarian situation. The fact is that it has stayed the s…”

“Do you think our position was compromised at any point because of the interests we had with Saudi Arabia? With one hand we were funding arms for Saudi Arabia, and with the other we were trying to formulate a peace process in a region in which Saudi had an interest. Do you think there was a conflict in terms of us holdi…”