‘I would prefer for the genocide to stop than for Starmer to recognise Palestine’
Soundings - Print ISSN 1362-6620 - Online ISSN 1741-0797
Volume 2025 Number 90 & 91
‘I would prefer for the genocide to stop than for Starmer to recognise Palestine’
Sarah Bufkin interviews Kamel Hawwash, pages 106‑122
DOI: 10.3898/SOUN:90-91.07.2025
Abstract
Kamel Hawwash is a British Palestinian human-rights campaigner and a retired academic. He was previously a Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Birmingham and the Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Hawwash left the Labour Party because of Starmer’s uncritical support for Israel and stood as an independent in Birmingham Selly Oak in the 2024 general election. He discusses the difficulties of standing as an independent in face of a local Labour Party electoral machine, and the Labour government’s unrelenting support for Israel in spite of its campaign of genocide; he sees the government’s recognition of Palestine as making no difference to its policies. As part of his continuing efforts to find ways of organising outside the Labour Party, he is running as a Green Party candidate in the May council elections.
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To cite this article
Sarah Bufkin (2025) ‘I would prefer for the genocide to stop than for Starmer to recognise Palestine’, Soundings, 2025(90 & 91 ), 106-122 . https://doi.org/10.3898/SOUN:90-91.07.2025