Three new grounds added to the sanctions regime

The UK sanctions on Israeli settlements rest on a statutory instrument that adds three new grounds to the 2020 global human rights sanctions regime: serious violations of international humanitarian law, obstruction of humanitarian assistance, and serious violations of the right to liberty and security of person. It also lets the UK freeze assets and target entities enabling illegal Israeli settlements. Unlawful settlement activity is captured as a breach of international humanitarian law, including the Geneva convention on occupation.

Refusing permits or blocking convoys will be sufficient grounds to apply sanctions without a formal breach of international humanitarian law, lowering the threshold for action. It is the first time the general power has been applied as part of a worldwide regime that includes Israel; the UK previously used designations over humanitarian aid restrictions in Sudan and South Sudan.

Who can be targeted and how

The powers reach beyond direct perpetrators to those who facilitate, incite, promote, support, finance, supply goods or technology for, conceal evidence of, or benefit from qualifying conduct. Banks and commercial entities could fall within the sanctions remit, since designation requires only reasonable grounds to suspect involvement. The available measures include:

• asset freezes and prohibitions on making funds or economic resources available
• travel bans
• director disqualifications

A new urgent procedure lets ministers mirror designations already made by the EU, US, Canada or Australia for up to 112 days while a separate UK case is prepared.

Israel's response and the E1 settlement

The Israeli government closed the UK consulate last week in protest, forcing the UK to withdraw 21 diplomats and downgrade the consulate to the status of a mission. The Israeli punishment does not appear to have deterred the UK government.

Foreign secretary Ed Miliband is pushing the measures through at speed because Israel has vowed to press ahead with an E1 settlement containing 1,234 homes in the West Bank, which observers say would make a contiguous viable Palestinian state impossible. The E1 bids close on 19 October; the Israel Land Authority confirmed the tender box will not be opened, nor the bids considered, before 19 November, after the Israeli election on 27 October.

The British Palestinian Project said the deferral does not remove the need to deter commitments being made now, since bidders and their backers commit on 19 October and contracts could still be signed before a new Israeli government is formed.

Detention of Palestinian children in scope

The British Palestinian Project welcomed the addition of the right to liberty and security of person, saying it opens a route to sanctions for serious arbitrary or unlawful detention, including of Palestinian children. Save the Children put out an estimate in November 2023: over the two decades before it, 10,000 Palestinian children had gone through Israeli military detention.

Figures also come from a UN report on children and armed conflict issued in 2026. It verified that in 2025 Israeli forces detained 981 Palestinian children, and that 180 of them were still being held in administrative detention without charge or trial when the year ended.

The regime comes into force on Thursday but will need endorsement by MPs and peers within 28 days. Separately, UK officials are working with European partners on how to outlaw British trade with unlawful Israeli settlements.