The UK’s trade envoy to Israel visited Haifa this week, the British embassy said, despite London cutting off trade talks with Jerusalem in protest of Israeli policies in its war against Hamas in Gaza.
The envoy, Ian Austin, was in Haifa visiting a customs scanning center, the local port, the Haifa-Nazareth light rail project, and the Technion — Israel Institute of Technology, the UK Embassy in Israel posted on X.
Austin’s visit came only days after British Foreign Secretary David Lammy announced that the UK would be suspending free trade agreement negotiations with Israel and taking other punitive measures, including the imposition of sanctions on West Bank settlers, in response to Israel’s wartime policies.
The announcement followed comments by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Tuesday that he was “horrified” by Israel’s expanded ground campaign in Gaza.
The UK government defended Austin’s visit, saying that while the free trade agreement talks had been suspended, the UK still seeks to maintain existing business relationships, the Financial Times reported.
“We suspended talks with Israel on a new FTA because it is not possible to advance discussions with a Netanyahu government pursuing such egregious policies in Gaza and the West Bank,” a statement said. “Lord Austin is in Israel this week in his capacity as trade envoy to maintain our relationship with Israeli businesses.”
According to the Financial Times, Austin was in Israel until Friday and did not hold any meetings with government officials during his stay.
Austin did not provide a comment to the Financial Times.
Austin, a former member of the Labour Party, quit the faction in 2019 during the leadership of anti-Israel politician Jeremy Corbyn, because of what he said was an internal “culture of extremism, antisemitism and intolerance.”
The UK’s latest moves come amid mounting international outrage leveled at Israel over its conduct in the Gaza Strip, and particularly the growing hunger in the enclave after nearly two months of an Israeli aid blockade. In recent days, a new body backed by the US and Israel has begun efforts to distribute food to the population, but international aid groups say it is a drop in the ocean compared to what is needed.
Israel began blocking aid from entering Gaza on March 1, arguing that sufficient humanitarian assistance had entered the Strip during a six-week ceasefire, and that Hamas had been stealing much of that aid to maintain its control over the population. Israel also said the blockade was necessary to pressure the terror group to release the dozens of remaining Israeli hostages it has been holding for over 600 days. Negotiations for a new truce are ongoing.
The UK and Israel began negotiations for a comprehensive free trade agreement to bolster bilateral trade in July 2022, working off a 2019 UK-Israel trade continuity agreement. In July 2024, the UK’s new Labour government announced its intention to resume FTA talks with Israel, making it one of the six FTAs the government committed to restarting.
Israel sees the UK as its fourth-largest provider of foreign direct investment, with $1.13 billion invested in 2023, according to data shared by the British Embassy in Israel in March.
Nava Freiberg contributed to this report.