Quakers welcome landmark day for Palestine and Israel

Quakers in Britain welcome the UK government's resumption of funding to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, supporting a lifeline for nearly two million Gazans facing unimaginable suffering today.

We also welcome the International Court of Justice's ruling that the Israeli presence in all occupied Palestinian territory, including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, is unlawful, must come to an end, and must not be supported by third party states.

We call on the new British government to take its legal obligations seriously and review its own decades-long complicity in perpetuating the pain and suffering of all those – Palestinian and Israeli – harmed by the occupation.

We pray that today marks a turning point in the history of the Holy Land. We hold in the Light all those working towards an end to the occupation and towards a peace with justice, equality and freedom for all at its heart.