Israel to shut British consulate in East Jerusalem after UK, France and Canada announce settlement import bans

Israel announced Tuesday that it would close Britain’s consulate in East Jerusalem in response to plans by the United Kingdom, France and Canada to block imports of goods produced in Israeli settlements in the West Bank, marking a sharp escalation in tensions between Israel and several of its longtime Western allies.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Britain would also be excluded from a US led coordination mission in Gaza and that a number of British officials, including former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, along with certain other nationals, would be barred from entering Israel. Saar described the British decision as morally distorted and said it amounted to blatant interference in the affairs of a sovereign state, including its upcoming electoral process. He also rejected recent comments from British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband accusing Israel of ethnic cleansing in parts of the West Bank, calling the characterization deeply inaccurate.

The British consulate in East Jerusalem is formally accredited to the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. Saar said Israel’s response had been coordinated directly with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while Israeli President Isaac Herzog separately accused Britain of interfering in Israel’s national elections, which are scheduled for late October.

The trade restrictions announced Tuesday by Britain, France and Canada represent the latest in a growing series of international measures targeting Israel’s settlement policy and reflect deepening diplomatic isolation from countries that have traditionally maintained close ties with Israel. The three nations were joined by foreign ministers from ten additional countries, including Denmark, Norway, Poland, Spain and Sweden, in a joint statement reaffirming support for a negotiated two state settlement that would allow a Palestinian state to exist alongside Israel. The statement pointed to mounting concern over continued settlement expansion and rising violence in the occupied West Bank, with the ministers pledging to remain resolute in protecting the two state framework and pursuing what they described as a just and lasting peace.

Miliband said Tuesday that Britain could no longer simply criticize the situation from the sidelines and needed to take concrete action to oppose settlement expansion, which he said increasingly threatens the long term viability of an independent Palestinian state. Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand echoed similar concerns, writing that successive Canadian governments have consistently supported a two state solution as the most viable path toward lasting peace that also addresses Israel’s legitimate security needs, adding that illegal settlements in the West Bank significantly undermine that goal.

The United Nations, Palestinian officials and the majority of the international community consider Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law, a position Israel disputes. A separate investigative report published Tuesday found that Israel’s government has been providing financial support to some of the most radical settlers in the West Bank, who have used illegal outpost farms as a means of displacing Palestinian residents from surrounding land.

France, which is also introducing its own ban on settlement produced goods, cited what it called the frenzied pace of settlement expansion in the West Bank along with a recent surge in violence as justification for the move. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, however, said Tuesday that the new sanctions risked further destabilizing the West Bank and confirmed that Washington would not join Britain, France or Canada in restricting imports from Israeli settlements. Settlement exports consist primarily of agricultural products such as dates, citrus fruit, herbs and wine, and represent only a small fraction of Israel’s overall export economy, meaning the trade measures are likely to remain largely symbolic rather than economically significant for Israel as a whole.

Even so, officials described the bans as part of a broader coordinated push to reinforce international support for the two state solution, a message underscored by Israel’s announcement on the same day of plans to build 1,000 new homes in West Bank settlements. Miliband, who took over as Britain’s foreign secretary in July, went further than his counterparts, stating that the UK believes ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is occurring in parts of the West Bank and that Britain refuses to remain a passive observer to continued suffering and the erosion of the two state framework, a position Israel has long opposed.

Much of the recent international concern has centered on Israel’s proposed E1 settlement project near Jerusalem, which would cut through land that Palestinians have long sought to include in a future independent state, effectively severing the northern and southern portions of the West Bank from one another.

Relations between Israel and the United Kingdom have grown increasingly strained in recent years, with London repeatedly criticizing Israel’s conduct during the war in Gaza, the continued expansion of West Bank settlements and a rise in settler attacks against Palestinian residents. Britain joined a number of other countries in 2025 in formally recognizing a Palestinian state as part of a broader push to advance the two state solution and had already imposed earlier sanctions related to West Bank settlements back in June.

France’s new restrictions come amid growing frustration among several European Union member states that have pushed for a unified bloc wide response to settlement expansion, an effort that has so far failed to secure the qualified majority needed for formal EU action, largely due to opposition from countries including Germany. Miliband said the new British legislation would take approximately six to nine months to come into full effect, though he confirmed that sanctions against a number of extremist settlers accused of supporting violence would take effect immediately. Citing the broader threat Israel faces from Iran, Miliband added that Britain would also sanction Al Qard Al Hassan, a financial institution linked to Hezbollah, and would reimpose economic sanctions on Iran in coordination with the European Union and the United States.